About 5 years after NIMBY moved to a new location in East Oakland I finally made it over there for a fundraiser and got to check out the space. The first thing I noticed that there there were plants everywhere and I was really surprised. Thinking about it now I'm not surprised at all. who better to create gardens from cast off junk than the founder of the largest do-it-yourself industrial art space in the Bay Area? The second thing i noticed was that they have an old metals twisty slide from a Mcdonalds and I WANT IT! Like, really want it. It could totally fit in our side yard and would be awesome.BEHOLD:
But, back to the gardens at NIMBY... one of the first containers of unexpected food were these old ducts filled with kale and then this pink bath tube with more food plants:
Apparently it is very east to get cheap discarded hydroponic/pot grow house equipment like these huge trays:
Love the tree house going up in the background. I saw that out on the playa about a month later. :)I counted about 5 big trays of food plants and many smaller pots scattered about. That's a lot of fresh veggies to share!And here are the beginnings of some aquaponics tanks. I think they could build a decent chicken coop on top of this that dogs would not be able to get in to. A sort of chicken condo, if you will.
Then there was this huge tank filled with beautiful glass sculptures, fish and plants used to a be a huge gas tank. I think? I could be remembering wrong, but either way, it was very pretty and soothing!There were some great succulent gardens as well. I wish I had written down the name of the person who made this lovely wall sculpture with succulents:
And outside, there were these great plastic pipes filled with succulents. I can see this working really well on a back porch or even front yard.
Industrial junk being turned to good use, whether for art or to grow food or to make a playground is always beautiful and inspiring!