Vertical Forest (Milan)

This is so exciting!  Green skyscrapers are becoming a reality:

Bosco Verticale (in Milan, Italy) is a vertical forest design that will be open later this year.  It will include 900 trees, oaks and amelanchiers, 500 shrubs, and 11,000 ground plants—the equivalent of 2.5-acres of forest. If each residential unit had been constructed as individual stand-alone units, more than 50,000 square meters of land and 10,000 square meters of woodland would have been required.

Each balcony houses a mini-forest complete with a rainwater watering system and construction costs of Bosco Verticale are only 5% more than those required for the usual skyscraper, which will promote replication in other cities.  It will be the first of its kind - providing vital ecological and energy benefits within the confines of an urban area.

All information/images are from Great Ecology.

P.S.  Check out my latest "urban wild" nature blog: Wild. Here. (2016 update)