Your Guide To Green

ur-ban-ite • [ur-buh-nahyt] – noun

Any piece of broken concrete used as a building material. When you see a pile of broken concrete lying around, do you think hip new building material or something to haul to the dump? If you yearn to give new life to your old concrete driveway, count yourself as a trendsetter.

Urbanite is gaining great respect as a 21st century building material, with pieces of our fragmented culture being salvaged for use in sidewalks, walls, floors and courtyards. It’s an explosion of recycling genius, where artistic meets thrifty to create professional looking masterpiece. The best part is, that in most cases, urbanite comes to us simply for the cost of picking it up.

For inspiration on how to use urbanite, just look around. The Virginia G. Piper Writing Center at Arizona State University’s Tempe campus showcases a mosaic of urbanite cast in its garden, used as stepping stones and a patio, with a smattering of perennials growing in the soil in between. The Phoenix Indian School Park features a plethora of uses, with chunks of urbanite integrated into the retaining walls of the spiral meditation walk. Even more impressive is the way the creators of the landscape used urbanite to build the waterfalls that line the walkways throughout the park.

At the Urban Farm, I have incorporated urbanite throughout my newly remodeled back patio and outdoor kitchen, using it as retaining walls and flooring throughout. Plus adding to the fun, we incorporated pieces of red and green colored urbanite to add a splash of interest.

As a bonus, I collected the edging from a friend’s swimming pool when it was being remodeled, which perfectly caps the urbanite retaining wall in my backyard, creating a natural place to sit. Urbanite is not something that you can find at your local building store. It usually sits in piles in front of your neighbors, waiting for a one-way trip to the landfill. So get your truck and start dreaming about all your possible uses for this free building material.