OPTIMISING BALCONY FOR GREEN SPACES: APPLICATION OF EDIBLE BIOFAÇADE ON URBAN HIGH-RISE SETTING

The trend in vertical sprawl of building have initiated the experts in greening high-rise buildings in the urban setting. This phenomenon has been captured by many scholars in conducting studies on the benefits of greeneries in limited space in urban buildings, especially in the form of biofaçade as one of the Vertical Greenery Systems (VGS). Besides its cooling effects, biofaçade could be optimised as a vertical edible landscape, hence it could also address food security issue in the urban context. In a high-rise building, transitional or buffer space, such as in the balcony, is a space with less economic value. Regardless, thepresence of transitional space is important and could be optimised in the application of biofacade. This paper reviews the potential of biofaçade as one of the methods for urban greening in a limited space. However, there are many factors that need to be consdiered in growing edible plants on the balcony of highrise building. Those factors are the plant type and species, the climatic considerations in high-rise building setting, and the technical and maintenance issue.