Green Apple Pie » Victor

Living Wall Step-by-Step

David Sheen — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 17:45:56 +0000

DO YOU THINK IT’S just a coincidence that the Green Apple Living Wall went up exactly twenty years to the day after the Berlin Wall came down? Neither do I, there must be mystical significance to that fact. Let this Living Wall be a powerful symbol for health and equality and freedom, and let it be the cornerstone upon which we build new ecological lives. May we be reminded of relations with the plant kingdom, and may we honour and love them as we honour and love ourselves. Amen! Now, here is a slideshow video of John, Victor and Bob putting up the Green Apple Living Wall. This is how we do it, baby! The accompanying musical track is the instrumental for the song “Be”, by Common. Enjoy!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=UT1-a656wXw

Bring on the Green Stuff!

David Sheen — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 23:20:57 +0000

YEAH, YEAH! USUALLY, it’s a bummer for us when it rains outside, because it puts us behind schedule, since we aren’t able to get any outdoor work done. But when it started to precipitate late night, none of us were very upset — just the opposite — because it meant that we could move forward on the indoor Living Wall project, which is very near and dear to our hearts. Today, Victor and I went to pick up the 120 individual plants, six score from 16 different varieties. And wouldn’t you know it, just when we’re loading up to transport the tropical plants across town, it starts to snow outside! Well, no matter; instead of laying them in the back of the flatbed truck, we packed the plants with us into the crowded cabin, and hightailed it back to Green Apple HQ. Big thanks to Musa, plant prophet, for all of the help picking and choosing the plants that are most appropriate. Stay tuned to see what we did with them…

Green Pioneers

David Sheen — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 15:05:03 +0000

IT RAINED BUCKETS ON FRIDAY, so we finally had a chance to work on our own living wall here at Green Apple headquarters on Northwestern Avenue. It took us far less time to construct than we had originally anticipated, a testament to the skill level of our team. We’re all really excited to be a part of this, something big, something important. Right now, I’m looking at the wall directly in front of me, and it’s good to go; all it needs now is some of the green stuff. Here are a few photos of the guys in action, putting the structure together.

Dressed for Excess

David Sheen — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 14:01:28 +0000

WORK HARD, PLAY HARD: that’s our motto. When Halloween falls on a weekend, there’s absolutely no excuse not to let your hair down and put out your freak flag. Dressing up and acting up is fun, it lets us try on different ideas of being, unencumbering ourselves from expectations. Look, Peter’s baby boy Caiden is only a month old, and even he got into the action… he’s even rocking a pose! Hope you all had a happy Halloween…

Staying Warm in the Winter

David Sheen — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 13:12:22 +0000

YIKES! IT’S COLD OUT THERE! Welcome to winter… When we’re doing particularly vigorous work, we work up enough steam to stay warm. But when the temperature dips down low below double-digits, a meal of fresh vegetables just won’t cut it, we need hot soups and stews to warm our bodies up from the insides. So Victor has started coming to work with a Coleman camping stove, and reheating leftovers from yesterday. Great idea! And as you can see from the photos below, John has also been putting the stove to use. Here he is, warming his bones by the open gas fire after getting soaked up to his ankles while floating concrete. Good looking out, guys!

Rock Solid

David Sheen — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 15:37:53 +0000

I JUST GOT THESE IMAGES of the Green Apple team hard at work from our talented designer Andrea. The job on Golfview Avenue was particularly challenging, seeing as the property is sloped, and there is only a two-foot-wide gap along the side of the house for transferring materials back and forth. Two months ago, I even made a short video of the crew using conveyor belts back to back in order to move hundreds of bricks. A couple of days later, the guys were hauling much larger rocks onto the property and positioning them precisely, no small feat. Notice that it takes four strong men working together to maneuver even one of these babies! Impressive… Let’s just say that I’m not too worried about our work order guarantee; I highly doubt that any of these gargantuan rocks are going to be moving anywhere, anytime soon! Good job, guys.

Pour It On

David Sheen — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 05:17:15 +0000

LAST WEEK AT A JOB on Spadina Road, the Green Apple crew installed concrete foundations in the front and back yards of the property. Cement isn’t exactly the most environmentally-friendly of materials, to say the least. To turn limestone into a powder that can be re-hardened into whatever shape your heart desires requires a massive amount of fossil fuels, and releases large quantities of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. So we don’t take concrete lightly. Sure, it can be used in certain circumstances when other materials can’t cut it, but under the current building system, it is used far too often on jobs that simply do not require it. We decided that the Spadina job demanded it; we’re not purists, but we are trying to push the envelope, and to push ourselves, as well.

IN ANY CASE, ONE OF THE characteristics of concrete is that it hardens quite quickly. If you want it to look good, you’ve got to move fast. So when you’ve got a lot of concrete to pour, you call in the reserve units to have as many people as possible out on the site. And that’s why I found myself ankle-deep in grey soup last Friday, alternating between freezing my buns off and drenched in sweat, at 7:30 in the freaking morning! Actually, it was good to get a decent workout and be outdoors during the daytime for a change, and it was fun to be out in the field with John, Victor, and Bob. In the end, the pour went without a hitch. Many thanks to Julio who came through with the cement truck, and wasn’t shy about picking up a shovel and lending a helping hand!

Caught Green-Handed

David Sheen — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 15:28:25 +0000

IT TURNS OUT THAT the Google van rolled through the East Beaches when we were working in the neighbourhood on Kingmount Park Road, and they caught us on film! You can easily identify the Green Apple truck, and even though the software censors have blurred their faces, you can still recognize John, Victor, and Carlos. Ha! Hey, what are you doing there? This isn’t a coffee break! Get back to work! I’m watching you! Just kidding, these guys are real hard workers. I’m sure that the in-house pixel-pushers at Google just Photoshop’d the heavy equipment out of John’s hands. Yeah, that’s it…

Working Away

David Sheen — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 15:12:35 +0000

THIS WEEK, our crew is in the Beaches neighbourhood of Toronto, transforming a home on Hambly Avenue. Here are some photos of John, Victor, and P.J. on site, working away. If you’re in the area, feel free to drop by and say hi to the guys! Click on any image for a higher-resolution version.

: Left to Right: John / P.J. / Victor