Traditionally food growing is an inseparable part of human daily activity. Since industrialization began to monopolize food production, and not forgetting to mention the fast speed of urbanization, food growing is set apart from the urban environment. Through creating a parasitic and metabolic system of vertical ecological forest, the project aims to seek the possibility of merging the food growing system with urban context, while revitalizing the neighbourhood with a new possibility of public common space.

The goal of the ecological forest is the coexistence of different types of food including wheat, chicken, and vegetables that can be beneficial and supplemental to growing chicken and wheat. This helps with increasing biodiversity of this system. The aim is to create an enclosed loop, even self-sustained system in this eco forest.

The project was developed during the Master of Architecture at the University of Melbourne.

KOOZ What prompted the project?

MM&JK This project was developed under the architecture design studio ”Cities without Country ”, led by Laura Martires at the Melbourne School of Design under the topic of urban vertical farming called. Based on the analysis of the current supply chain related to food in Melbourne, a comprehensive site analysis in the suburb of Fitzroy and the expectation of the future food industry, students were free to choose food types and critically put forward problems in the process of food production. We are using architecture as a medium to bring food production back to urban space and reflect on the benefits that the spatial combination of the two may get to local communities. Initially, both of us started with different types of food as our research starting point. Mingxun was looking at wheat production, and Jing researched the modern poultry industry. We then sought new methods of food production for Melbourne’s urban environment. Our team was established around the middle of the semester (week 6) and decided to include egg and wheat production as well as other types of food to make it more like a future urban food system that produces all sorts of food ecologically.

KOOZ What questions does the project raise and which does it address?

MM&JK Since long ago, food production has been an integrated part of humanity’s history and development. However, the rapidly expanding urbanization caused the farming or the food production industry to be driven away from the city. Also, the food production line usually extends horizontally, and we cannot afford to have substantial traditional farmland or factories in an expensive urban area.

It raises awareness to the issue that some people waste food because they didn’t have a chance to see the production process called “from farm to table” and ignore the cost (financial and ecological) of food production. Therefore, we attempted to address these questions by bringing the food production system into the urban environment without destroying any existing building on site. We intend to reconnect the urban fabric and food production chain through a structured architectural language. We are also hoping to attach the new parasitic structure to the original unused urban leftover space. While creating a new community communication space, we believe that “buildings should tell the truth”. Therefore, people can see that the industrial food production chain is composed of machines, assembly lines, and future farming technology such as hydroponics. It could help with rebuilding the connection between people and food. We aimed to celebrate the structure and let the public see the process of food production to awaken the public’s crisis awareness of a series of environmental problems caused by food production.

KOOZ How does the project challenge and re-define our relationship to food consumption?

MM&JK Nowadays, the consumers are separated from the food production process. People are not aware of the price we pay for food, like how much water and fertilizer required, how much greenhouse gas emission to raise a cow. Capitalism has been endless advertising people to buy more and more, even something that we might not need or like. We are encouraged to purchase and consume what is advertised to be “Delicious”. However, we must understand the price of food is the dollar we pay for it and how much resource it takes to produce. How many tonnes of water, fertilizers and pesticides does it require? Most of us are not educated about it, which eventually leads to a food waste issue. Therefore, we are doing here to bring the food production and recycling system back into the city, partly for education purposes. So that people would understand the process from farm to the table.

KOOZ What are in your opinion the benefits which can arise from the integration of the food industry within the urban environment?

MM&JK The advantage of vertical farming, powered by technology, is that food can be grown anywhere, any time, due to the controlled environment. Perhaps, in this case, the socio-political significance of having a food industry in an urban environment is to help countries that are highly urbanised or those with limited land size for farming, gradually reduce reliance on food imports, and truly achieve “Cities without Country”.

The Vertical Ecological Forest is a developable and adaptable system to accommodate the future change in food requirements. They are a set of standardised, prefabricated structures, which can be duplicated. The entire design will slowly develop in the city based on the pre-designed “ECO Urban Point” modular system in a cycle of 5-10 years. This development model can provide services to different communities and can operate as a benefic ‘parasite’ in the area. Use and obtain raw materials from other food production projects in Fitzroy to generate new benefits. After analysing the new site, the system generates a new parasitic frame based on the required functions. This model, although designed for Fitzroy, could be deployed anywhere in the world.

KOOZ How do you imagine this redefining the neighbourhood and its communities?

MM&JK We didn’t destroy any original houses on the site in this project but let the new structures and historical buildings coexist through parasitism. According to the Pritzker Prize winner Mr Wang Shu, Architects need to be very careful about design and destruction. When you make a building, people will have to live there for decades. We believe the demolition of the original buildings on the site equals the destruction of the residents’ lives and special memories.

Living in a suburban area like Fitzroy Melbourne, which is composed mainly of independent low rise housing, often lacks connectivity between the residents within the neighbourhood. The Ecological Vertical Forest project might help with raising community awareness by building up a communal identity. It is probably due to the emotional attachment between people and food. Some People might think the food grown in the backyard tastes better than the food we bought from the market.

The Vertical Ecological Forest aims to invite the residents in the neighbourhood to witness and even participate in every stage that the food is grown. The idea of living in a community that consists of a food production system might assist with building up communal pride, that the new food production system will link everyone.

KOOZ Within the era of the anthropocene, how does the project approach the role of the architect?

MM&JK To understand the role of architects, we should be clear of our expectations for architecture. Architecture is not purist. It is complex and composite as it extracts ideas from many fields. The approach to architecture could have numerous starting points, such as energy crisis, environmental challenges. We realised how human activities such as food production had changed the environment drastically. While we celebrate the automatic and highly efficient food production chain, we respond to these issues by creating a micro-ecological system in the Urban Vertical Forest to raise awareness. As an experimental typology, this project might be seen as an alien interference of the current urban context. Instead of referencing contemporary or historical architecture, we want to look forward and test out how architecture would be like in the future. Architects combine many things in one project, abstracting them and reconverting these back into three-dimensional space. We made a living collage to describe a lively scene of the public ecological area in the not too far away future.

KOOZ What is for you the power of the architectural imaginary?

MM&JK Both of us believe architects should be a group of people who are passionate and open-minded. For us, architects can accept an architecture that may not even look like a building. Our architectural imagination, in this case, is powered by science, technology, environmental concern, the art of mechanism and many fields. Architects always can create things that are beyond the time they are living.

Admittedly, some crazy designs in our project might not be built even in the future. Our effort today is to explore this typology of vertical farms, and in the future, when someone happens to see our work, it might inspire them. Enlightening others is valuable for us, even if we are not in the same time and space. Therefore, the development of architectural design is not contributed by a few people but by a generation. What we did was to be more experimental than the existing architecture. We keep challenging ourselves and ask ourselves what we can do to address societal issues and create a better future. We truly believe in dreams and imagination, and this is what powers us.

Bio

Mingxun MA is an architectural master degree student at the University of Melbourne. He completed his architectural bachelor degree at Xi’an Jiaotong Liverpool University and obtained the BDP Farrell prize in 2019. Then he went to Hangzhou, China, to work in Studio Qi architecture firm. In 2021, after a short-term internship in Shanghai Woods Bagot, he went to the University of Melbourne for MArch. At the University of Melbourne, Mingxun focuses on the combination of frame architectural language and mechanical systems. At the same time, he also pays attention to the impact of architecture on social attributes. He is very interested in Archigram and believes that buildings in the future will have more vital environmental adaptability and network interconnection ability.

Jing KANG is a student of the Master of Architecture program, in the University of Melbourne, currently works as an intern in the AECOM, China department. She completed her Bachelor of Design in architecture, in 2020, in the University of Melbourne as well. Before that, she had 6 years experience of studying in Singapore. The experience of living in a multicultural society, she developed interest in social issues such as a sense of identity and how this could be addressed by architectural design. This semester, she is interested in mechanical systems and Archigram, exploring the possibility of architecture adaptation in the future world.