blog GAMIL: an insider look at design » Natural Environment

Monsters in Raleigh

aly — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 14:02:36 +0000

Raleigh has had two monsters show up recently – both created by man and our roadways. The Barrel Monster was created by Joseph Carnevale. See this thread from NewRaleigh.

Meanwhile, in very close proximity and under the street, city workers searching the sewer system with a video probe found this compelling video of a life form feeding off of the nutrients flushed by the cheery folk of Cameron Village.

It seems like it’s time for a showdown to see who REALLY owns the streets outside Cat Banjo.

Plants can Twitter

britt — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 14:27:51 +0000

Wouldn’t it be awesome if your plant could tell you if it were thirsty, or drowning? With this little DIY Plant Twitter Kit from botanicals, you can give your plants a voice through their own personal twitter account! Check out @pothos on twitter!

Botanicalls is an ongoing collaborative project about communication between plants and people started by 4 former graduate students of NYU’s Interactive Telecommunications Program. Last fall (September 2008), Kati London (one of those 4 former graduate students) participated in an Ignite show, Pecha Kucha styled presentations, in NYC.

Plastiki: setting sail on the 2 liter fleeter

kelly — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 14:56:48 +0000

This summer British explorer and environmentalist David de Rothschild will set sail with a crew of scientists from San Francisco to Sydney, covering approximately 12,000 nautical miles. His boat, Plastiki, is a high tech 60 foot research catamaran made from reused plastic bottles and recycled plastics.

Plastiki hosts solar panels and turbines to power it’s electrical needs. There is a hand operated water desalination system to supply fresh water and it uses a nitrogen-extracting waste system that composts waste and kitchen scraps into fertilizer for deposit at ports.

The goal of this expedition is to raise awareness of our ocean’s unsolicited challenge of accommodating our plastic waste, which by some estimates creates an island of debris as large as 600,000 square miles!

The boat is being built at Pier 31 in San Francisco and is scheduled to set sail this August.

Local Cotton Tshirts for Local Store

britt — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 14:46:59 +0000

I love living in Raleigh, and believe it is important to support local buisness and local products. Great Outdoor Provision Company is our local outdoor retailer, and they have just received a shipment of new GOPC logo T-shirts. These aren’t just any T-shirts though… they were grown and manufactured right here in our own state as part of Cotton of the Carolinas.

image from Cotton of the Carolinas website

image from GOPC's website

cricket: The Green Tea Cola

britt — Fri, 15 May 2009 14:17:17 +0000

I came across cricket today in my morning internet wanderings, and was immediately drawn to because of its simply/happy/friendly feeling packaging.

Cricket is a Green Tea and Kola Nut Brew. None of those chemically ingredients such as the phosphorics or high-fructoses are included in the Cricket formula.

charity: water + twitter = TWESTIVAL

britt — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 15:58:40 +0000

This week charity: water drilled another well in Ethiopia… this one with funds raised from an event called Twestival (Twitter plus festival). In just 2 months, the 100% volunteer effort raised funds from all over the world and has completed the first well for a northern Ethiopian village.

To watch the videos (there are 4) of the drilling visit charity: water, Twestival event site.

seen on eco-modernism

Aerial Shots of Tulip Fields

britt — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 14:28:26 +0000

It seems like it has been forever since we have seen the sun here in Raleigh, so this morning I looked for a little Spring cheer. I found just that in the northern Holland Tulip fields. What a great color inspiration for these dreary days.

photos from DailyMail

Green School, Bali

britt — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 15:04:23 +0000

The Kul-Kul Bridge over the Ayung River, an iconic symbol of the school

Green School aims to connect learning and creativity in an inquiry based approach to education. The campus is built of sustainable materials (Indonesian bamboo, traditional mud walls, local alang-alang grass) and is cooled/powered by sustainable energy solutions (micro-hydro power, solar power, bio-diesel, and natural air-conditioning).

Find out more about Green School from their website

or read the Green School Classroom Blogs

Mepantigan Center

Children at the Ayung River

photos from Green School’s photo gallery

Virus Season

aly — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 09:51:51 +0000

Well if you want to know why you’ve got the sniffles, you can now zoom in on what’s going on. Thanks to Dr. Michael Rossman and his colleagues at Purdue University, a “scientifically correct” film has been made to show the T4 Bacteriophage virus infecting an E Coli bacterium…

Thing is – where is the Kleenex?

Google Google Mars.

kelly — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 20:49:28 +0000

Really, do it. It’s amazing, even if it has no street views yet.

NASA and Arizona State University have joined forces to compile unbelievable images of Mars. It includes beautifully colored elevation maps as well as visible and infrared views. Google Earth 5.0 now features Earth, Sky and Mars options with 3D terrain views. Not to mention Google Ocean with complete with trips below the surface. Wow!