Ecojar

"It's still alive!" (as of 2016) Photo credit: Bill Tomlinson

This "eco-cube" is currently housed in the Green IT Lab at UC Irvine. It was originally sealed in June 2010.

A reforestation fundraising event, santiago art district walk, 2010.

Inspired by the natural self-sustaining processes in ecology and the ongoing project Biosphere 2 in Oracle, Arizona, I began to develop my own fully self-contained artificial ecosystem. It didn't take long before friends and families began purchasing my terrariums for themselves and as gifts. In late 2008, I founded Ecojar Lab and our studio philosophy is "to produce innovative and fully self-contained terrariums through improving our understanding of botany and plant ecology in miniature, while finding new ways to add a little green to our urban lives." Ecojar has not only become a natural sustainable home decor, but also an artistic inspiration.

In 2012, we began to discuss the possibility of introducing ecojar not only as art, but as an education tool. We have received several e-mails from school teachers who expressed their interests in utilizing ecojar to teach basic concepts in ecology and plant biology. Conventional diagrams and figures are not sufficient to convey complex ideas about organism interaction, and the long-term consequences of a minor change in ecosystem. Ecojar thus has become a very useful kit to complement existing education tools.


Please visit Ecojar Lab's blog for more information.

We are also on Facebook and twitter.

Ecojar as an ecology educational tool.

An art auction to stop human trafficking, UC Irivne 2010

Biosphere 2 interior