Interesting article in the SF Chronicle: Cut the grass, plant an 'Edible Estate'

The first "Edible Estate" regional prototype garden was planted in Salina, Kan., in 2005. Photo by Fritz Haeg, SF Chronicle
















Cut the grass, plant an 'Edible Estate'
Glen Helfand, Special to The Chronicle
Saturday, May 10, 2008


To children of suburbia, the lawn is perhaps our first hands-on experience of nature. It's the green expanse we, as kids, tended, perhaps for a bit of extra allowance, by weeding or mowing. And yet, like so much landscaping, its form is hardly natural, being shaped by American social structures, real estate imperatives, chemical fertilizers and herbicides.

To rethink this front-of-the-house space as the home of more useful plant life brushes up against surprisingly solid foundations, and it's the impetus for "Edible Estates," the eco-activist project and book of architect and conceptual artist Fritz Haeg, who creates transformations of ornamental turf to crop-bearing front yards. With the subtitle, "Attack on the Front Lawn,"

Haeg acknowledges just how revolutionary the idea strikes many American homeowners; there's a place for everything, and the social structure of the suburban landscape places manicured grass front and center.

Read the full article