I never really thought that I could become a good gardener–grow my own food and keep plants alive (especially really delicate ones like cilantro.) But I was dead wrong. I put my mind and my Pockets to it this year and not only did I grow cilantro, but I grew whole entire meals! Admittedly, I killed a couple of green friends along the way, but all in all I’d say that last years’ resolution can be considered accomplished. I am an urban gardener. Wait lemme say that a little louder I AM AN URBAN GARDENER! I mean, I grew cauliflower for goodness sake–right in my L’il Meadow.  I am very, very proud.

So, as we enter into the new year, if you never thought that you garden, or never thought that you had the space–it’s time to grow up– up a wall that is. Make a resolution that you can keep, and eat, and that can make your home look really pretty.

That’s all. See y’all next week. Have an amazing new year my friends.

As the Holidays approach, the senses are overwhelmed with the sights, smells, sounds and tastes of Christmas. It’s amazing how many of these flavors are plant-related: from the Evergreen Christmas trees in living rooms to the cinnamon and cloves in christmas cookies, the Golden Cedar  wreaths and the Mistletoe.  As the weather turns crisp and icy outdoors, we bring in the outside cheer with boughs of Holly, Poinsettias, Pinecones and Eucalyptus branches. The relationship between festive plants and Christmas go way back (if you’re curious here’s a neat article on Chrismas’ horticultural heritage).

Here at Woolly, we like to keep these green traditions ALIVE– both figuratively and literally, so we keep our Evergreens alive  and cozy all year ’round in Tinas, Lanas and Steves. Our Poinsettias come wall-ready: they’re nice and cozy in Wally and the Holiday cheer lives on and on…

From our green homes to yours…we wish you a lush, lively, woollyful Holiday!

Images via:

White Poinsettias in Pockets Poinsettias Red Poinsettias Holly Plant

There are two simple truths that many gardeners and urban dwellers understand—land is scarce and time is a luxury. We are all super busy with life and it becomes hard to manage and grow a beautiful and plentiful garden. This is especially true with community gardens in urban environments

At Woolly Pocket, our team took on the Norman Harriton Community Garden in Los Angeles to help build a vertical farm in a community garden using our high performance Pockets, Wally Fives. Now, the garden has the ability to grow over double the amount of plants on the same plot of land while saving half the amount of water. How sweet is that? You can grow the best organic veggies, herbs and other edibles, all in a Pocket!

The Woolly Pocket vertical gardening system is unique because it’s easy to install, completely modular, and very easy to maintain. We invented the vertical system because there was no other solution that fit the needs of urban gardeners. We are huge advocates of community gardens and it’s important to build a sustainable and growing community garden.

To learn more, click here to watch our video tutorial on community gardening!

As Thanksgiving approaches, aromas of rosemary, sweet basil, cloves, sage, majoram and nutmeg waft to mind. Fresh herbs and spices are a quintessential  part of any Thanksgiving feast, so instead of buying sad little herbs in plastic boxes at the grocery store this Thanksgiving, grow your own! Use the herbs to cook your fresh herb stuffing, your herb-roasted turkey (or Tofurky), your gravies, salads and pies and then, use the herbs as edible centerpieces to enjoy and celebrate the harvest during the meal as well– doesn’t that sound herbalicious?  What are you growing for Thanksgiving this year?

Wowzers! And I thought my living wall was large.

Drexel University just completed the installation of the largest known active living wall in the United States. And when we say large, we are not kidding. The wall spans 1570-plus square feet and is located in the new Papadakis Integrated Sciences Building in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

NEDLAW Living Walls designed the living wall in collaboration with Toronto-based Diamond and Schmitt Architects as part of the sustainable design features surrounding the Papadakis building.

According to Dr. Donna Murasko, Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at Drexel University, “The living wall not only improves the overall learning environment, but also creates an opportunity for further research into even higher quality living walls in the future.”

We understand that it isn’t easy building a 1570-plus square foot living wall in a home, but how awesome would it be if we all can? However, it is extremely easy to create a smaller living wall using Woolly Pocket. And if you decide to change your environment with a Wally we’d love to hear about it.

As Earth’s natural air-fresheners, it seems only natural to put lots of plants in the room that needs freshening the most: the bathroom. The good news is plants, especially tropical ones, thrive in the bathrooms because of the mist and humidity created from tubbing and showering.

Want to add some greenery to your water closet? If your bathroom is low-light, try Spider plants, Bamboo, Peace Lilies, Boston Ferns and even Aloe Vera (the aloe can serve double duty to sooth scrapes and burns–so put one near your medicine cabinet).

If your bathroom is sunny and bright, you can plant Asparagus ferns, Gardenias and Orchids.

Also try Sansevieria– (Mother-in-law’s Tongue) in the bathroom. They flourish in low-light, they are very low-maintenence, and if that’s not enough to convince you– According to the book Bedroom Feng Shui it’s good Feng Shui to keep Sansevieria near the toilet bowl. Who new?

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I lived in Europe for 10 years (the above balcony shots are pics from a recent trip to London)–and one thing that I learned over there is that Apartment living and small-space living does not mean that you can’t have a garden. When you’re working with a tiny space, vertical gardening is the best way go. Leave the floor space for a little patio table and chairs– and let your walls do the growing.

One of my favorite ways to use Pockets is the saddle-bag style (top, right photo). If you tie two Wallys together back to back with zip ties and hang them over your balcony railing, you can enjoy the beauty of your Pocket garden from indoors and out. The saddle-bag living railing is so quick and easy to do (takes literally seconds) and it’s truly a space saver.

As the winter approaches, try planting flowering kales, sages and pansies in your Pockets. Pockets are great for the winter as they keep your plants cozy and Pockets, unlike many ceramic, plastic and terracotta pots, will not crack in the cold. Now that’s cool.

Water is one of our most precious and valuable resources, and there is increasing concern over us approaching its limits. For this reason, it’s becoming increasingly important to educate our youth—and each other—about water conservation and sustainability.

At Luther Burbank Middle School in Los Angeles, one inspiring teacher—Jamie Wisehaupt—uses her Woolly School Garden to teach her students about water sustainability in California. She covers important topics, such as “how we get our water supply, how to recharge our local water table and most importantly choices we can make as a community to encourage responsible water usage.” With the help of two students from Woodbury University, Jamie created a California Natives garden in order to demonstrate why we should consider planting “California-native plants as opposed to all these plants that come from other parts of the world.”

As a result, Jamie’s students have become increasingly interested in California-native plants, especially cacti and other succulents—which, of course, don’t need much water!

Jamie and her students decided as a class that they wanted to create a vertical garden using succulents. “While our plants are still small” Jamie explains, “they are thriving in the pockets and are enjoying the California sunshine.”

I suppose this is what I truly love about the Woolly School Garden Program—how every school uses the program in their own unique way! Thank you for sharing your story with us, Jamie.

How are you using your pockets? Let us know! Email us at pr@woollypocket.com

I was reading a post over on Jeff McIntire-Strasburg’s blog Sustainablog called The 5 Best Cities for Urban Gardening. I encourage you to check it out because he does a great job at outlining the different cities and why they scream, “SUSTAINABLE!”

However, I took something else out of the blog post. In the third paragraph Jeff states:

“One way large cities are becoming green is through urban gardening. Community gardens help bring communities together. They do this by producing food specifically for those in need, hosting youth programs, and reducing crime rates.”

Urban gardening is more than fresh and organic veggies. It is more than sustainability and creating life in urban decay. It is fully about community development.

One of my favorite authors is Malcolm Gladwell. In “The Power of Context” and later “The Tipping Point”, Malcolm poses a theory to explain the phenomenon that occurred when the sudden period of intense cleaning and maintenance of New York City was able to slash crime.

It is extremely important to realize that an individual’s environment makes a huge impact to their well-being. An urban garden brings the community together and creates a beautiful landscape of life. That life helps curb turbulent tendencies in neighborhoods where hope is a luxury.

At Woolly Pocket, we encourage all people to investigate and build a sustainable future for our neighborhoods, schools, and communities.

Let’s start with the basics – What is a vertical garden?

A vertical garden—sometimes called a living wall—is an organized system of plants that grow vertically up a wall, fence, or other vertical surface. Vertical gardens are beautiful ways to show off plants, cover an unsightly wall, or create privacy in a courtyard. Because they are hung vertically, they hardly take up any space. The Woolly Pocket vertical gardening system is unique because it’s easy to install, completely modular, and very easy to maintain. We invented our vertical system because there was no other solution on the market that suited our needs.

It’s true. If you live in the city it is probably a good chance that you are going to run out of space for gardens. I am speaking strictly in places where economic development is moving faster than we realize. When buildings start invading the spaces our plants call home… it’s time to move in the vertical garden.

Of course, we are huge advocates of the vertical garden at Woolly Pocket. It is as important to be plantastic on the ground as on the wall!

Photography by Jonathan Krisel

You must start a vertical garden. It is key to happiness and success in life. In order to help in this process, we want to give you a few pointers in starting and maintaining a vertical garden.

1. You Need a Strong Frame (or Wall) – The frame is your support for the vertical garden. Any concrete wall will do, however, it is important that you create your vertical garden (using Woolly Pockets of course) on a
frame that will last. This could be a wall inside or outside. It is extremely easy to hang our Wally on the wall using screws and fasteners.

2. Block the Plants on the Wall – Our product is totally modular. Just line up the pockets and overlap their grommets to create a wall of lush plants. When you hang them vertically you can space them 13 inches up and down. We can also provide you with 3 different lengths of Wallys. Going vertical and overlapping Wallys allow for a wall of pristine beauty.

3. Decide What To Plant – Before setting up a Wally vertical garden it is very important that you decide before hand what kind of plants you want to watch grow up. This will make planning your Wally garden easy and you can easily arrange the plants in any order. We believe that any Wally garden can be plantastic since there are plenty of different plants suited for a Wally wall. Any container plant can grow in a Wally . Pick plants that are the right size for their new Pocket home.

4. The Best Soil – A suitable growing medium for your plants is the key to your vertical garden success. The important thing to remember when choosing potting soil is that it should provide water retention, drainage, and nutrition. Most premium brands of all-purpose potting soil provide all of these things. Our favorite brand of soil is called ProMix BX.

5. The Right Use of Soil – For your Wally vertical garden it is important to use at least .45 cubic feet per individual pocket.

6. Use Drip Irrigation – Our favorite way to water larger vertical gardens is by drip irrigation because using a regular, timed watering helps insure a healthy vertical garden. Any store bought drip irrigation system will work. We suggest using individually adjustable drip irrigation heads so that each plant gets its own adjustable water source.

7. Vertical Gardening Covers Sins – Vertical gardening also covers a multitude of sins. Frank Lloyd Wright said, “A doctor can bury his mistakes but an architect can only advise his clients to plant vines.” – from Jo Ellen Myers Sharp

8. Always Be Patient – According to the Magnolia Tree Earth Center, “Always remember that gardening in general is a game of patience. If you are patient and persevere, you will soon be amazed at your very own vertical garden. Vertical vegetable gardening focuses on maximizing production potential from very small and constricted spaces. If you live in a city high rise, vertical vegetable gardening may be just the innovation you need to grow your own plants at home.”

9. Check the Shade Factor – This is brought to us by The Micro Gardener, “Depending on where you position your plants, as they grow upwards they may block sunlight from reaching plants behind or below them. Place vertical structures such as tepees and arbors where you need to shade understorey plants otherwise if they don’t get enough sun, they may suffer. Some plants love shade or can tolerate semi-shade so take advantage of these spaces by planting vegetables like spinach or lettuce especially in the warmer months.”

10. Your Plants Need Maintenance Not the Pocket – Pockets don’t need maintenance. They just hang out looking cool. Plants, on the other hand, need love. Water, sunlight and maybe just a little extra fertilizer sometimes, for sure. But they also need a friendly hand to pluck away dead leaves and flowers, a sharp blade to trim unwanted stems and branches, and they also enjoy music and poetry. How about some Walt Whitman?

There you go! Hopefully the tips will help you get started on your quest for a wonderful and brilliant vertical garden!

Photography by Suthi Picotte