Upclose with Patrick Blanc
With his emerald green-dyed hair and long painted nails, French botanist Patric Blanc may look a bit offbeat, but he’s the ingenious inventor of Vertical Gardens—lush, green walls that line museums, malls and even underground parking lots the world over. He talks to Beverly Cheng about how his little aquarium at home inspired him to create enormous fern-covered facades.
HK Magazine: Do you own any plants indigenous to Hong Kong?
Patrick Blanc: I was at the goldfish market in Kowloon, and I bought many plants for my aquarium in Paris. There are many plants I find here that I don’t find back home.
HK: How do you get them past customs?
PB: I put them in my suitcase and hope for the best.
HK: Where did you find your inspiration?
PB: When I was 13 or 14 years old, I read in a German magazine that it’s good to have a biological filter for aquariums. I put more and more plants into my aquarium, and finally I had to fix them onto the walls. At first I put them up with my stapler. Step by step, year after year, it became a vertical garden.
HK: The plants grow without soil?
PB: Even if you go to the Peak, when you take a trail, you see many plants growing on the branches, and on the trees and rocks also—close to waterfalls.
HK: Do you choose plants native to the region?
PB: When possible, I do this. But here in Hong Kong, it’s a pity because in the forest you have many interesting plants, but they’re impossible to find in nurseries. It’s a pity because there are 1,300 native species. I should try to promote this.
HK: Will future green spaces be limited to walls, not parks and gardens?
PB: Of course! Simply because in towns—you know the price of one square meter—you need [space] to have additional shopping malls, additional streets, additional apartments. You see this [concrete building]? It should be green! The bridge over there, it should be green! Everything you see can be covered with plants.