Grow Your Own Food: You Can Now Build IKEA’s “Growroom” Vertical Farm Yourself

The Denmark-based company Space10, which is supported by IKEA, has released instructions on how to build The Growroom, an incredible wooden spherical garden for people living in urban spaces.

The Growroom was created to encourage people living in cities to grow their own food locally, bring nature into urban areas and “tackle the rapidly increasing demand for significantly more food in the future.”

According to their website, Space10 is a “future-living lab and exhibition space” in Copenhagen with a mission to:

[blockquote float=”left” align=”left”]Investigate the future of urban living by detecting major challenges that will impact people on a global scale, and exploring possible solutions[/blockquote]

The spherical, layered design has a specific function. According to Space10, “The overlapping slices ensure that water and light can reach the vegetation on each level, without reaching the visitor within and thereby functions as a growth activator for the vegetation and shelter for the visitor.”

Space10 explains that it doesn’t make much sense to start shipping food grown in The Growroom overseas when they’re trying to promote local food production. So, the design created by Sine Lindholm and Mads-Ulrik Husum is now available to the public so everyone can build their very own Growroom.

However, if you’ve ever tried to build an IKEA desk in the past, building this garden may take a bit more work. The 17-step instructions can be found here, but you’ll also need 17 sheets of plywood, a CNC machine, a table saw, two hammers, a screwdriver, these downloadable cutting files, your local fab lab and tons of patience.

Although The Growroom might seem difficult to build, the result is totally worth it. Be prepared to enjoy your very own oasis in the heart of your city.