CLIMATESCAPE: MINNESOTA (AKA THE IRRIGATION-FREE LANDSCAPE)
CLIENT / FUNDED BY: THE LONGFELLOW COMMUNITY COUNCIL / MISSISSIPPI WATERSHED MANAGEMENT ORGANIZATION
As the frequency of drought increases, we have become ever more tethered to our hoses and irrigation systems. All of this amounts to increases in time and money spent on maintaining a landscape. To provide a real and visually compelling solution to this trend, we created the first Prairieform Climatescape (then called the Irrigation-Free Landscape), a new landscape type in which plants can grow and thrive without supplemental irrigation after the first growing season. Our first pilot landscape we installed in the Longfellow Neighborhood of Minneapolis. We monitored how much water every plant in the landscape needed for an entire growing season, generating real data on the actual, as opposed to perceived, water needs of plants. These data have served to inform trainings and seminars we have since given, as well as best practices for site and building design, and planting and watering techniques. The landscape was given its last drop of supplemental water the fall after installation and has been going strong, irrigation-free ever since. The photos above follow the landscape's progression over the past several years.