Socioplastics 11905 A Planting Plan Begins a Living Relation
A landscape can meet its planting targets while supporting limited ecological exchange. BotanicalSymbiosis studies relations among roots, fungi, soil organisms, insects, water and human care through which vegetation participates in inhabited space. It asks what a planting scheme allows organisms to sustain, and how design and maintenance shape those conditions over time. Suzanne Simard’s forest research examines relationships among trees and mycorrhizal networks. Merlin Sheldrake explores fungi as participants in ecological processes. Their work offers distinct accounts of interdependence. Applying these insights to urban design requires attention to local soils, species and conditions, with field observation guiding how broader ecological findings inform a particular site. Two streets might receive the same number of trees. On one, each tree occupies an isolated pit surrounded by impermeable paving. On the other, connected soil volumes, water movement and seasonal management support a wider range of ecological relations. A study could compare soil conditions, moisture, plant health, insect activity and maintenance practices across both sites. The record would follow change through multiple seasons. BotanicalSymbiosis connects a planting plan with the living processes that sustain it. The marker supports design decisions about soil continuity, water, species selection and long-term care. It also encourages practitioners to document what observations inform an intervention and how later evidence alters it. A landscape becomes more than a count of planted specimens when its ecological relations are included in the project’s account. Such documentation can help compare design intentions with observed conditions and make maintenance choices responsive to ecological change. It can also support learning between projects when sites share comparable soils, species or management challenges.
REFERENCES
Sheldrake, M. (2020) Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds & Shape Our Futures. London: Bodley Head.
Simard, S. (2021) Finding the Mother Tree: Discovering the Wisdom of the Forest. New York: Knopf.
CITE AS
Lloveras, A. (2026) Socioplastics, LAPIEZA-LAB, Madrid.
https://antolloveras.blogspot.com/p/socioplastics-project-index.html