Up a Wall

Not everyone loves architects. Some people, in fact, curse architects daily, self-righteously saying foul words about the designers of window-deprived apartment buildings, flat storefronts, and failed concept projects someone has to call home. Such people may gain new insight at “Vertical Gardens,” an exhibit of photographs and installation work highlighting the overused yet poorly defined term “green building.” For example, if a hobbit built an office complex, it might look like the work of Friedensreich Regentag Dunkelbunt Hundertwasser, an off-leash Austrian genius architect. He’d pull stunts like embedding wide, grassy spiral ramps in the structural plans of his buildings, so that an unsuspecting sheep could easily graze up to the roof from the ground. Dozens of existing and planned projects are featured, designed by hordes of architects with visions of food growing up the walls, hanging gardens, cistern irrigation, and green roofs up the wazoo — these ones seem to acknowledge light and air; we must encourage this new trend.

An opening reception for “Vertical Gardens” starts at 6 p.m. on Feb. 25.
Feb. 18-April 30, 2010