Japan's Blue Rose 'Applause' Bows in US | NYC Low Line

Japanese rose growers have achieved the unattainable, and they’re not shy about proclaiming their brilliance and good fortune. The ‘blue rose’ (yes, it looks mauve or purple to us also) will be for sale in both the US and Canada this fall, writes Wired.

Named ‘Applause’, the rose has been genetically modified to synthesize delphinidin, a pigment that’s found in most blue flowers. Researchers at the Suntory laboratory have worked for 20 years on ‘Applause’ which was first released in Tokyo in 2009.

Because they have eluded the best of rose growers for centuries, blue roses have a near mythic quality that’s associated with unrequited love or a quest for the impossible. As is so often the case in life, the solution to breeding a spectacular blue rose was an unassuming, delphinidin-producing gene from a simple pansy. 

The pansy’s genetic pedigree became a true Cinderella story, when she hooked up with an Old Garden ‘Cadinal de Richelieu’ rose. After its Japan debut, ‘Applause’ sold for ten times the price of an ordinary rose.

Perk up girls; most of us won’t be able to afford the blue rose anyway.

NYC Low Line?

The Renderings for the Delancey Underground Park on the Lower East Side New York Magazine

Three urban ­entrepreneurs—James Ramsey, a satellite engineer turned architect; Dan Barasch, an executive at the technology think tank PopTech; and the pedigreed money manager R. Boykin Curry IV have a big idea.

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Keith McNally Farm | Viraj Puri NYC Gotham Greens | Diane Keaton Designs

People

At Home w/Diane Keaton

Diane Keaton Gets Into the Design Game NYTimes

Diane Keaton is going strong, actively involved in preserving, then flipping homes in Southern California. The actress is on the board of the Los Angeles Conservancy, showing off her Spanish Colonial Revival house in Beverly Hills for Architectural Digest.

The latest design venture for the actress is a tabletop collection that she created for Bed, Bath & Beyond.

The stoneware cups, bowls and plates, which are available online and in some stores now, have her trademark whimsy (some are stamped with the words “eat” or “bite”) and lack of pretension (prices start at about $5). But they also reflect Ms. Keaton’s latest obsession: the heartland. The “farm-y, landscape colors” she used, she told a reporter, were inspired by wheat, grass and bark.

NYC Urban Farmer

Fellows Friday with Viraj Puri TED Blog

Viraj Puri’s Gotham Greens was created in 2008 with a mission of providing New Yorkers with local, sustainable, premium quality produce year round. Puri’s associates grow everything, from seed to harvest, in a 15,000 square foot hydroponic rooftop greenhouse.

There are a number of ways to farm responsibly and sustainably. Gotham Greens has selected methods based on a unique geographic, urban location and a largely underused resource of rooftop space. There are plenty of large, unshaded, unused rooftops in New York that may be well suited to some form of urban agriculture.

This interview is brimming with insights from social entrepreneur and social citizen Viraj Puri, who volunteers that he spent years working in Malawi working on the development of fuel-efficient stoves. In 2004 Viraj develop a company that implemented green building and renewable energy installations in Ladakh, India.

A Martha’s Vineyard Escape

New York restauranteur Keith McNally’s island farm ELLE Decor

When New York City–based restaurateur Keith McNally sets up house for the summer on his four-acre farm in Chilmark, he works the land instead of plying the sea. In addition to his wife, Alina, and five children, McNally shares the property with several Berkshire, Tamworth, and Gloucester Old Spot pigs, as well as goats, sheep, lambs, and free-range chickens and ducks. Although they have all the fixings for some pretty great dinner parties (and the famous neighbors to round out the guest list), McNally and his wife like to lead a low-key life on their mini farm. “I have the need to produce my own food when I’m always around people consuming food,” says McNally, who has even taken to making his own goat cheese. “I cook a lot too, sometimes for dinner parties but mostly for the family.”  More photos at ELLE Decor

 

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