What is green water?

...the space between the soil particles and in the bodies of the microscopic creatures which live in healthy soil. How much water? I don’t know, but the real answer is, enough. Plants acclimated to your local climate (natives or similar), living in spongy, healthy soil don’t need supplemental irrigation. Not even in the summer. (Drip line doesn’t occur spontaneously in the wild, after all.) Conversely, in times of heavy rainfall, healthy, spongy soi...

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Asphaltum as a Wood Stain

...en there, this park consists of a paleontology museum dedicated to ancient creatures that got stuck in the tar as well as a fenced off and stinky pond with a tarry waterline and occasional methane bubbles. The large expanse of grass surrounding the pit was sparsely populated on the weekday we visited. In the distance I could see the ongoing demolition of the LA County Museum of Art. As I said goodbye to the high 60s modernist art museum cafeteria...

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There is Something Beyond the Straw Bale

...ow vegetables without also considering their relationship to other plants, creatures and human beings. Bale, pomegranate tree and mess I need to clean up. Please note the raccoon poop zone on the slightly subterranean garage roof. Our vegetable garden right now is just one straw bale in the process of conditioning and our philosophy has always been that vegetable gardens need to be surrounded by a native “hedge row” that supports beneficial wildli...

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I Made an Enzo Mari Table and So Can You

...s fantasy plays out in the furniture I’ve build for the inside of the house. Such is the fate of attempts at revolutionary design within our post-modern age. Everything gets subsumed within a vast parade of styles and one can easily imagine this table on sale at Urban Outfitters at your local mall. Mari, who we lost to COVID in 2020, had the genius and grace to acknowledge the contradictions in his own work while not letting this discourse get in...

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Permaculturalist Paul Wheaton in Los Angeles

...y/Time Sunday, March 3rd 10am to 8pm Location Daytime Events @Institute of Urban Ecology 3896 N Fair Oaks Avenue, Altadena , CA Evening Paul Wheaton Lecture @Armory Center for Arts 145 N Raymond Ave Pasadena, CA 91103 Registration (click here to register) $5 for 1st ticket $1 each add’tl ticket Sponsoring Organizations Institute of Urban Ecology RIPE Altadena La Loma Development EcoWorkshops.com Oh Happy Days Natural Foods Market Whole Foods Marke...

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