Designer microgardens are the new word in urban farming

As the urban farming trend goes from strength to strength, designers are finding clever ways to accommodate the concept with city living.

"Infarm" is a new design concept which brings the ‘microgarden' indoors, allowing urbanites to grow fresh produce from the comfort of their homes.

Based on the principles of origami, Infarm offers mini foldable greenhouses designed by Swedish design studio Tomorrow Machine.

Currently running as a campaign on crowdfunding website Indiegogo, the Infarm Microgarden uses transparent seaweed based agar-agar gel as a growing medium, meaning the greens never have to be watered as the roots absorb moisture from the gel.

"The Microgarden is the next generation of home farming, where the end result is a mix between a serving bowl and a greenhouse," explains Tomorrow Machine.

The shape of the greenhouse divides the gel in to six slices, meaning users can choose to use one section of the greens, or place the whole ‘garden' on the table to be used as a sort of serving bowl.

"Our inspiration was finger food and we wanted to give the microgreens the same feeling as canapés," say the designers.

The kit comes as a flat pack that consists of three items, a foldable greenhouse, organic seeds and agar-agar powder, and ‘microgreens' are generally ready to eat after between five to 14 days.

Kits are scheduled to start shipping to pledgers in October.