A lot of living wall installers in their zeal to sell living walls will tell you there is no maintenance once the living wall is installed. I’m guilty of this myself. And it has been true on some walls. But for the most part living walls need maintenance, and sometimes they need a lot of maintenance.
I’ve found that the amount of maintenance a wall needs is directly connected to how well the wall was installed. If the wall was installed correctly, with the right amount of light and water, then chances are it needs very little maintenance. Take the wall below for example. We installed it and right away had a watering issue. Some plants died. We fixed the issue and then we didn’t come back to visit the wall for an entire TWO years!
The reason we had to come back is that somebody turned off the water by mistake. Human error is often the reason we have to come and maintain a wall. But the wall was installed correctly. It has ample light and the watering schedule is perfect for the plants’ needs. So if left alone it grows and stays healthy.
The following wall below we haven’t touched for four years. It just keeps doing it’s thing. It’s beautiful.
These are the exceptions though. Most living walls, especially during the first six months, need maintenance. Not a lot hopefully but at least some. When you take a plant from a pot and stick it onto a wall it is a traumatic experience and not all plants make it. That is why we guarantee our plants. A plant dies, we come and replace it during this critical time. If it was installed correctly the wall will find it’s rhythm and not need much maintenance after that.
Unfortunately some walls are not as easy. And the reason is almost always one of two things: water and light. In our eagerness to install living walls affordably we often push the limits of light and try to install a green wall in a place with low light. Sometimes too low. In this case the plants slowly die and we have to come back and do what we should have done in the first place: pay the extra expense and install artificial lighting. That usually solves the problem.
The second thing is water. Either too little or too much. Up until recently we relied on client feedback on how the wall was being watered. Unfortunately by the time the client realizes there is something wrong it’s too late and a lot of plants are already dead. We have just developed a sensor that we put in the soil around the plant and it sends us a notice to our phone what the moisture level in the soil is. We are hopeful this will help a lot. We are constantly improving our installation technique and that does a lot to reduce future maintenance.
Then there are the nightmare walls. They don’t have enough light. You fix the light. The water is too high. You reduce the water. The water is too low. You increase the water. The pump breaks. You replace the pump. And each time one of these things happens plants die. It is frustrating. We have tried to reduce the frustration to the client by guaranteeing all of this. If any of these things happen we come in with fresh plants. The logic is that we are the professionals and should foresee these things happening. We do most of the time but we’re not perfect. But we do try!