The walkway at La Plaza, with the living wall behind
Tournesol Siteworks was delighted to have its VGM Modular Living Wall system chosen by noted multi-disciplinary group Rios Clementi Hale Studios for the newest cultural center in downtown Los Angeles, La Plaza de Cultura y Artes.
What you should know about the location, in La Plaza’s own words:
The nation’s premier center of Mexican American culture, and the newest addition to Los Angeles County’s family of cultural institutions.
Our living wall continuing education course has been a great success thus far. According to the people at McGraw-Hill and Construction.com, over 1300 continuing education credit tests have been taken (and, we assume, passed). Click to continue »
The Fixtures Living showroom in Costa Mesa, CA
We recently received several installation shots from our friends at Instant Jungle in Santa Ana. They worked with Kevin Evernham at Fitch, a leading retail architect in Scottsdale, AZ and Burke Construction on the showroom for Fixtures Living in Costa Mesa, CA. The people at Fitch describe the showroom best:
all images courtesy of Dane Spencer Landscape Architecture
At Tournesol Siteworks, our goal is to manufacture products that allow designers to express their creativity. Landscape architect Dane Spencer took advantage of that and came up with a completely out-of-the-box application for our TerraScreen product at his own office in Sarasota, FL. Click to continue »
Photo courtesy Jim Fitzpatrick, Newport Beach Independent
Mario Batali is at it again! One of our most popular blog topics last year was the installation of an edible living wall at Pizzeria Mozza’s first store in Los Angeles (see posts here and here and here). He and partner Joe Bastianich have expanded their Pizzeria Mozza concept, putting in their second store in Newport Beach, CA. The success of the Tournesol VGM edible living wall at the first store convinced them to make it a motif at the second.
Tournesol VGM modular living wall at Pizzeria Mozza, Newport Beach CA
Jim Fitzpatrick, in a column for the local Newport Beach Independent reported on the new store a few days ago:
A drive down PCH may never be the same. Click to continue »
all images courtesy of Blondie's Treehouse
I was fortunate enough to run into Fran Schreibman, Director of Sales for Blondie’s Treehouse at a recent conference. She was the person responsible for the VertiGreen Hybrid trellis project that Blondie’s installed last spring/summer at a Whole Foods store in Lake Grove, NY. We profiled the installation here and here. It was one of the first VertiGreen Hybrid jobs – in fact, they purchased several of our prototype units because that’s what we had in stock at the time! She shared several images of the wall taken this summer, and much info about how it survived the winter. Click to continue »
VertiGreen 3D trellis at the Rivers Casino parking structure
Tournesol Sitework’s VertiGreen modular 3D trellis system was recently installed at this new casino parking structure project in Des Plaines, IL. The Rivers Casino called on the Elgin, IL office of national parking structure consultant Walker Parking Consultants for the design. Katrina Laughlin of Laughlin Assocs. provided the landscape design. Click to continue »
Second Look - Rolling Stone Lounge in Los Angeles
Last year we provided product to the Rolling Stone Lounge, located in the retail area at Hollywood and Highland in Los Angeles. Our product was primarily used to screen a dining area on a walkway that gets very heavy foot traffic. We documented the project at the time in this blog post. One of the most important ways to judge our product is not how it appears immediately after installation, but how it holds up to everyday use over time. Click to continue »
The bungalow expansion project at the Beverly Hills Hotel started last year, but only was installed in the last month or so. You can see the previous post here (from last October!) showing the sedums growing into the Tournesol VGM modular living wall system.
Installation photos courtesy of Paul Hansen of Pierre Sprinkler
The architect for the overall expansion project was Gensler, and the landscape architect (who specified the VGM wall) was Michael Hee of SWA Group of Los Angeles . The original concept and planting plans are shown below Click to continue »
Tournesol Siteworks is sponsoring a new CEU course, presented by McGraw-Hill at their Construction.com website. We’ve spent the last three years talking about living walls to architects, landscape architects and designers. There has always been a huge interest in the topic, and we thought it would be worthwhile to expand our own efforts to teach the design community.
The course, written by Peter J. Arsenault, FAIA, NCARB, LEED-AP, incorporates both living wall and green facade topics. It draws inspiration as well from the Living Walls 101 Course developed by the Green Roofs for Healthy Cities organization. McGraw-Hill has indicated that there has been strong interest in the course so far, even without much promotion!
We’d love any feedback you might have about the value the course, and the corresponding CEU credit has for you. From our understanding, all AIA approved CEU courses are also eligible for ASLA CEU credits, and even USGBC LEED credits. Let us know what you think.
