THE MIRACLE WALL - The Green Life is Right in Your Home

Votes: 17
Views: 2653

This project is a conceptual design of a rotating garden wall concept named "MiracleW all." This wall, when unlocked, can be rotated 180 degrees manually or by mechanical means. With planters attached to the wall, light gardening for food or hobby would be possible for high-rise dwellers in high-density metropolis. Unlike gardening with planters on the balcony, this wall allows year-round gardening—even in the winter by rotating the planters to the inside at night; or keep growing plants outside by having the weather control system. Also, with the convenience of having the garden on the inside when needed, the job of planting and harvesting is that much easier. With this wall, everyone can grow delicious, organic herbs and vegetables even if land for gardening is not available. Since the garden wall can expose the inside of the dwelling to the external environment, especially when it's rotating or partially open, weather seal and safety are also part of the design consideration.

Detail:
- Planter design: Planters can be mounted on the wall in a variety of ways to suit the style, imagination and planting needs of the metropolis gardener. Commercial shelving systems and planters are readily available at home improvement stores, or they can be easily built by the gardener.
- Shaft design: The shaft is the main load bearing component of the wall and must be designed properly to assure operation safety. Sizing of the shaft and the bearing depends on the geometry and mass of the wall section to be rotated and must be done by a qualified structural engineer.
- Deadbolt and Weather stripping: Needed to prevent the wall from accidental rotating and to seal the gaps between the rotating and stationary wall sections. These items are readily available from local hardware stores.
- Safety balcony: A balcony is required to prevent planters, people and pets from falling to the ground. The balcony is sized to allow unimpeded wall rotation.

It seems that a rotating garden wall can be easily be designed and built into a newly constructed apartment building. Retrofitting an existing building could be cost-challenged. But if this rotating garden wall concept can be made practical and cost effective, having a little garden and a small green wall inside the house would be possible for high-rise dwellers or townhouse owners in any big city.

Future research:
• Design improvement
• Full scale sizing (requires structural analysis)
• More features: self-watering system, lighting, power turning, weather control
• Commercial price and cost-benefit analysis of retrofitting existing buildings with rotating garden walls

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  • ABOUT THE ENTRANT

  • Name:
    Huong Ngo
  • Type of entry:
    individual
  • Profession:
    Student
  • Huong's favorite design and analysis tools:
    Fusion360
  • Huong's hobbies and activities:
    Reading, traveling, camping
  • Huong is inspired by:
    My little living space.
  • Software used for this entry:
    Fusion360
  • Patent status:
    none