For Jarred-In I wanted to create a hydroponic garden in which the life support systems used to keep the plants alive could be on display along with the entire organism’s physiology. Growing a garden using hydroponics lets one see the roots along with the leaves and flowers, as well as having a wide set of theatrical possibilities written into its various technologies.

While experimenting with different hydroponic systems at The Exploratorium I found that the plants kept on dying. Eventually I figured out that they had to be enclosed to protect them from the people and endemic pathogens at the museum. Encased within a technologized cocoon, these plants suggested to me a type of space-ship, traveling cautiously and with great assistance through the environment of a human world.

As I considered this idea of 'space plants' I started to feel that the life support pods should be suspended in the air, suggesting that a plant no longer living in the soil is free to explore new ecological niches. A flying alien being.

There are lots of excellent compact florescent light-bulbs that can be used for hydroponics. These are very bright and provide a center stage for whatever might be grown under them. In these drawings I was trying to figure out how to use these bulbs as a decorative element in the pod design.

The final concept required the assembly of many subsystems and components in order to create the garden. I was working with lots of people who new more about how to make this thing than myself, and I used these drawing to think through the various steps for engineering and producing Jarred-In.

Coming up with the concept and plan for Jarred-In took about three years, and I made hundreds of drawings along the way. Most of these look like advanced chicken scratch, but on occasion I would hunker down and make something more refined. I had to think about so many technical specifics in order to build the garden, and taking the time to think about how this might finally look helped in making material and engineering decisions.