Since 2021, the INSEL Cultural Garden in Wuppertal has been bringing together art, nature, and community—an urban real-world laboratory for climate adaptation and socio-ecological transformation.
- Project participants
- Dr. Uta Atzpodien, Michael Felstau, Franziska Hartmann, organized by Kulturort INSEL e.V. in Wuppertal in cooperation with the und.Institut für Kunst, Kultur und Zukunftsfähigkeit e.V.
- Places:
- Wuppertal
- Contact:
- kulturgarten@insel.news
- Sponsored by:
- Discretionary fund drawn from resources of the urban development program “Stadtumbau West Elberfeld Nordstadt/Arrenberg for the Mirker Quartier area” and volunteer work
Located directly behind the outstanding, transdisciplinary cultural venue INSEL and Café ADA—renowned since the 1980s—the INSEL Cultural Garden has been connecting people of all cultures with the local natural environment since 2021, demonstrating how natural climate adaptation works in an urban setting. Here, public space becomes a real-world laboratory for socio-ecological transformation. Between the boules court, the beer garden, and a green mini-arena, people are actively removing paving, digging, sowing, and planting. Gardening together brings people together. As people create raised beds, tend to the species-rich split-bed garden, and build the integrated rainwater harvesting system, they come into real contact with the earth. A green and colorful rooftop garden has thus emerged on the container housing INSEL’s chair storage. Here, culture is not an outsider but a driving force. Artistic events such as readings, music, dance, and painting, as well as small culinary surprises, explore and celebrate the everyday coexistence of people, plants, and animals. Through our creative appropriation of urban green spaces, we are creating a vibrant space where art and ecology enrich one another. The INSEL Cultural Garden is supported by strong partnerships, including with Performing for Future, the Earth Charter Initiative, and the Kulturkindergarten, as well as other independent cultural practitioners. Together, we are shaping a livable city for today and tomorrow—through gardening, on equal footing with nature.
