While a collection of trees do not an urban forest make, they do make a wonderful home for birds and beneficial bugs and a setting for sitting out, playing in the shade, playing in, eating from. These trees were retained, and some new mature specimens added, when the social housing blocks were redeveloped by Wellington City Council.

These trees transform what would otherwise be a  fairly bleak, open space

Contrast the courtyard area above with this purpose-designed care home space and you can immediately see the difference trees make to a living environment. 

Trees take an institutional setting and make it 'home'. We have been brought in to transform this space and bring it to life, both to enhance the lives of residents, and the local environment. A real win:win. 

...after the important business of the election Hurricane Sandy is now being seen not as a political event but for what it is, a symptom of climate change.  

Perhaps if more people paid more attention to sustainable design principles, and understood the importance of sustainable urban design, green space would be seen for the buffer it provides, the carbon sink, the natural urban drainage system, the free mental health prescription that comes from time spent in healing gardens and urban forests.

Life on the planet is all linked. We can not afford to act in ignorance and arrogance. "To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it." - G.K. Chesterton.

Tomorrow I'm meeting with Christchurch's city arborist. We're going to discuss the role the urban forest can play in the health & well being of a redeveloped Christchurch. In the UK GPs are already prescribing a 'green' treatment for early stage depression, whereby people are given a prescription not for expensive medication but for a walk in a forest for 20 minutes, 3 times a week.

Landscape architecture has an important role to play in the sustainable design of the city. Sensory gardens are those gardens that are designed to stimulate the senses, to do more than just look good, but to function on a human scale, providing food, shelter, habitat and employment. Urban forests can be the ultimate sensory garden, when planted with mixed natives, fruit and nut trees, and designed for year round interest, to attract native birds and invertebrates.

Urban trees represent an irreplaceable asset for cities, and unlike most municipal infrastructure a trees’ value will increase over its life span. In technical terms, an urban forest refers to the trees located within a city’s limits, whether planted or naturally occurring.

Check out the link to the Danish Architecture Centre's article on Edmonton's trees.

As much as being stuck in depressing places and losing your way can diminish healthcare objectives, so can the wrong type of green spaces.

Over the last 50 years or so, shopping centres and office lobbies have demeaned the value of natural features with their plastic plants and feeble fountains. Such token greenery has rendered nature invisible - a virtual green wallpaper we no longer see, or benefit from.

A study by Massey University found that to be effective in reducing stress and countering depression / improving mood in hospital, retail and office based settings, greenery needs to be real and it needs to be placed sympathetically. " "Street" style navigation is logical, allowing services to be grouped together, with access and waiting areas pleasantly defined by greenery.

ITALY 2010: 9 million tons of edible food in the garbage, in the whole food value chain the amount goes to 20 million tons - an economic waste of €13 billion

How we define waste is part of the problem. What is 'waste' to one person may be a valuable food source for another. Establishing efficient connectons between the food services industry and people who would value cheap or free food (students, the urban poor, the elderly) or community gardens requiring compost, local animal feed users needing vegetable peelings etc is one way to reduce waste from landfill.

Composting food waste, collected kerbside from residences and street-side as part of the city's waste collection service is another important way to keep it out of the 'garbage'. The local authority needs to have clear goals for the food 'waste' to become plant food for the next crop of fruit and vegetables. It has to be a self sustaining system, so that the cost of collection is met by the production and delivery of product back into the community.

However, lack of knowledge of how to handle food / how to prepare leftovers as a tasty nutritious meal, is a big part of the problem, within the domestic setting, as well as within the food industry. Yes, use-by dates are there to protect us, but we need to know when they are a guide and when they must be adhered to. Cooking shows and recipe-based blogs are popular. They could do more to encourage a sustainable lifestyle if they show cased low cost foods, recipes for 'left overs', and garden to table initiatives.

All the hard work has paid off. Finally, after months of late nights, mulitple cups of coffee and pots of tea, the website is up and running. Greenstone Design's brand of ethical, low maintenance, sensory landscape architecture + sustainable design has officially arrived in New Zealand.

Greenstone Design UK has been around for a while but when my husband got head hunted home it was the perfect opportunity to open a new office down under. We have now been here 9 months, exhibited a sustainable sensory garden at the Ellerslie International Flower Show, designed a family Eco garden for the Wellington Home and Building Show, run the first Garden Design workshop and as of this month have 2 residential, 1 commercial and 1 public sector clients on the go. Our design team is growing and we can now offer full surveys and engineering reports as part of the wider Greenstone Design offering. Life is always busy, never dull.

I will be updating the pages regularly as I'm a bit of a fiddler and a perfectionist. So check back soon! (and do tell me if you find any glitches, typos or just have a question)

This blog will be my oportunity to post thoughts and ideas, as they happen. It won't be regular but will be worth reading I hope! Please comment as you feel the urge.

Our Facebook page has stories and links to research and design projects. You can find it at https://www.facebook.com/GreenstoneDesign. Please Like us and tell your friends

I came across this in an Indian art in design forum. It is true of landscape architecture everywhere.

• "Do not believe that landscape design is only about making gardens. Instead, try and fathom that it’s about making a world - and influencing it since all space outside the built is the theatre of the landscape architect. It includes the streets, the play grounds, the gardens and also the country side, the forest and the hills.
• Do not believe that landscape design is not intellectually challenging. In fact, the best works are those that are philosophical, delve in the abstract, border on the realm of the arts, and are lucid and structured so that people can occupy them and use them. In many parts of the world in history, it’s good to remember that landscape architecture was considered the mother of all arts- above architecture and the other arts." Ar. Aniket Bhagwat