First and foremost, what landscape will you be planting? Tropical, high veld, or desert? This will determine the enclosure, open or closed, this will also determine the amount of sunlight and water it will require.

Choose a glass big enough for your hands to maneuver around, tall enough for plants to stand and grow and spacious enough for vapors to evaporate and condensate.

Layering of soil is not a pretty gimmick but a functional one. In the follow order from bottom to top, pebbles, activated charcoal and soil. Pebbles prevent water from being spoilt, activated charcoal filters the water and soil is not only a medium for the plants to grow on but captures heat to allow for evaporation.

As night falls water drop from the condensation around the glass and sinks to the bottom of the glass and sit alongside the pebbles. Why pebbles? As the sun rises, the temperature increases and water begin to rise throughout the activated charcoal through the soil into the plants and evaporates until it’s trapped along the glass roof and the cycle repeats at sunset.