Walking on Broken Glass?

A Challenge for Our Imagination

Recycled materials and some imagination are all you need to produce a beautiful and productive garden environment. Recently an offer too tempting to refuse has got us scratching our heads and running to the drawing board in an effort to prove our point. 

The offer;  An endless supply of broken glass, at a rock bottom rate. Perhaps this offer doesn't sound to appealing yet, but we intend to turn that around, and once again we have been working hard together to convert a waste product into in integral part of our garden design.

Bringing Glass back to LIfe

At the centre of the garden will be an area designated for seating and flowering plants.  Being at the very centre of the garden, this area will act as its heart, the core from where all paths radiate.  The idea is to allow for a calm space which will encourage visitors to stop, relax and ultimately to process the concepts of organic production going on around them.  In this space we intend the ground surface material to be crushed glass.  Taking our inspiration from the properties of glass, we hope to create a space of light , texture, and reflection.

With glass as our inspiration, deciding to incorporate this beautiful resource into our garden was the easy bit, the point of difficulty is in its conversion from junk to treasure.

In search of a smart solution to our new challenge, we have recently become greatly inspired by the concept of biomimicry - in other words - imitating the systems and models of nature and using these designs and processes to solve human problems. Here at the garden we are quickly learning that in copying natures processes and functions are able to see our problems in an entirely new way.  With this in mind we took the erosive capacity of the sea as our prefered way of making our rather dangerous sharp glass into beautiful smooth pieces.

This research and new approach supported our goal, showing with the aid of movement, sand, water and rocks, we could mimic the erosive actions of the sea, and in turn we could use glass as a viable material with which to make a new ground surface in our garden...so, as usual here in the garden, in the name of experimentation we have created something slightly different.

Construction

Our first job was to head to the workshop and convince the staff there to help us with our experiment. Always happy to support our crazy ideas, the mechanics and welders helped us seek out some disused metal to morph into our new "glass smoothing" instruments. 

A few operations later and we had attached a handle, a hook and a metal paddle to a very heavy steel pole. We had created our new stirrer.

The next step was to construct the stirring environment, in effect our own little erosive sea. We placed a metal drum underneath an A-frame, to which we attached our brand new “stirrer”.

The metal drum was filled 1/9^th water, added 30kg of rock,   1 bucket of sand and 20kg of broken glass. 

The idea is to create a product not unlike the glass you find washed up on the beach, smooth, safe and attractive. In utilising the drum filled with sand, water and rocks, we have taken the concept of the natural smoothing process but hope to accelerate it with use of our new stirring instrument and a confined space.  We are taking the processes of nature and bringing them to the human scale to solve human problems - biomimicry in action.

Let the Experiment Begin

The last step in our glass conversion is the manual mixing of the materials. This step is speculative; we are not sure how long we will need to manually mix the glass, sand and rocks in order to create a safe product. We are not sure if this experiment will prove a success or leave us to begin our search for a cement mixer.  This is after all the Philippine Organic Garden Project, so of course we are willing to try and to experiment and we are confident that our natural and organic approach to garden design and resource use will prove an overwhelming success. 

As always we are open to all ideas and suggestions...

One Boot in Front of the Other

A turbulent week saw a key member of our party make a hasty return to their home country, leaving behind a great contribution and a grateful team. The crew have since pulled together to keep spirits high and progress moving in the onward and upward direction. With a change in contributors comes a change in perspective and it has been inspiring to watch as new ideas and directions have come to the fore.

Mud Baths and Skin cleansers

One hundred meters of edging has been created and is well on its way to being carefully secured into position. With waterlogged conditions the going is tough and muddy. Fortunately for us we have carpenters, muscle and an endless supply attitude to put these “once were palates” into their place

 Maintaining a straight edge has proved problematic, combining the sheer scale of the project, varied sizes in the edging material and the varied elevation of the site itself... its slow and precise work. Not to mention, the onset of the rainy season has seen us combat an ever expanding clay soil as our supporting material. Certainly challenging, not impossible and the resulting clean finish are proving to look very sharp indeed!

The Organic Agriculture department is under total reconstruction, with the near completion of the new building which will house the Organic Agriculture display area, meeting room and office space the potential for this site is very exciting. The interior of the building is set to echo that of the garden; sustainable, locally sourced and created from recycled material. In other words, the next project is already looming on the horizon and we have high hopes for what will result.





The soils at the work site are heavy clay and situated at a lower elevation to the immediate environment, this means the area is highly susceptible to water logging, cracking, compaction and erosion. All elements which will lead to decreased soil fertility and decreased production volume and quality.

To combat the less than perfect soil conditions we have agreed on creating a garden of raised beds. Using the “No dig” concept, we will utilize the process of decomposition, a wide range of locally sourced ingredients and a good carbon to nitrogen ratio. The idea is to create our own soil above the original. Considering we have nearly 700m2 of raised beds waiting to be formed, the scale of the project and the scale of material can be sobering. It’s important not to get overwhelmed, one boot in front of the other.