We design, manufacture and install natural living walls: live plants on a technical envelope with its own substrate, irrigation and drainage. Our Fytotextile® system was developed with the University of Seville and has more than 17,000 m² installed across 22 countries. We work with architecture practices, contractors and developers from the design stage onwards.

All three look alike in a photograph, but they are not comparable in performance or service life. Only one of them is a living system:

	Natural	Artificial	Preserved
Vegetation	Live, growing plants	Plastic replica	Stabilised plant, no longer alive
Irrigation	Automated, with fertigation	Not required	Not required
Maintenance	Scheduled inspections and pruning	Surface cleaning	Stable environment, no water
Air quality	Filters NOx and particulates, fixes CO₂	No contribution	No contribution
Thermal regulation	Shading and evapotranspiration	No	No
Outdoor use	Yes, with selected species	Limited: fades in sunlight	Not suitable
Service life	Indefinite with maintenance	UV degradation	Years, indoors only

An artificial living wall answers a decorative need. A natural living wall also answers an environmental and energy need of the building, and it is the only one of the three that can contribute credits towards certifications such as LEED, BREEAM or WELL.

What sets live vegetation apart is not how it looks, but that it works. These are the four effects that are actually measured in a project:

You can see each effect developed in full on our living wall benefits page.

The system is built up in layers, fixed to an auxiliary structure that is independent of the supporting wall:

1. Auxiliary structure: profiles anchored to the wall that separate the system from the substrate and create a ventilated cavity.
2. Waterproof membrane: isolates the building fabric from the moisture of the planted system.
3. Fytotextile® textile support: felt layers that host the root ball. They distribute water by capillarity and keep the assembly lightweight.
4. Vegetation: species selected according to orientation, solar exposure and the local climate.
5. Irrigation and fertigation: programmed drip lines delivering water and nutrients in precisely the right dose.
6. Collection and drainage: a bottom channel that recovers the surplus and returns it to the circuit or to drainage.

Indoors, where natural light is rarely enough to sustain the vegetation, the system is completed with auxiliary lighting sized to the photosynthetic needs of the chosen species. The two main applications are the outdoor living wall and the indoor living wall.

There is no universal palette: it is decided project by project from orientation, solar exposure, climate and wall height. As a reference, these are the families that perform best:

• Outdoors in a Mediterranean climate: Carex, Liriope, Lonicera, Trachelospermum, Rosmarinus and Teucrium, for their tolerance of strong sun and water stress.
• Outdoors facing north or in shade: Heuchera, Bergenia, Hedera, Vinca and hardy ferns.
• Indoors: Nephrolepis, Asplenium, Philodendron, Spathiphyllum, Chlorophytum, Epipremnum, suited to low light and stable temperatures.

The criteria are not only aesthetic: species of different habit and growth rate are combined so the wall covers quickly and stays dense over the years.

A natural living wall does need maintenance, and it is worth saying so plainly: it is a living system. What is true is that this maintenance is scheduled and bounded, not a daily chore.

• Irrigation and nutrition: automated. The controller adjusts dose and frequency by season, and fertigation supplies the nutrients the system cannot draw from natural soil.
• Technical inspections: periodic visits to check drip emitters, plant health and evenness of coverage.
• Pruning and replacement: containment pruning to keep the designed volume, plus occasional replacement of failed plants.

With a proper maintenance plan the service life of the system is indefinite: the vegetation renews itself and the textile support does not expire.

Pricing is calculated per square metre of planted surface and covers the system, the plants, the irrigation and the installation. As an indicative reference, a natural living wall starts at €450–1,000/m².

Two factors push a budget towards the top of that range: artificial grow lighting in interiors with little natural light, common in corporate lobbies and office floors, and reinforcement of the irrigation system where summer exposure is severe. Maintenance is contracted separately, as an annual service, and is worth budgeting for from the start.

A natural living wall starts at €450–1,000/m². The range depends on the system, the total surface area, whether it is indoors or outdoors, and how automated the irrigation is. Indoor projects needing artificial grow lighting sit at the top of the range.

The natural one is made of live plants with substrate and irrigation, and it improves air quality, regulates temperature and supports biodiversity. The artificial one is a plastic replica: no watering, no maintenance, and none of those environmental effects either. Outdoors it also fades under ultraviolet radiation.

It depends on orientation and climate. Outdoors in a Mediterranean climate, Carex, Liriope, Lonicera, Trachelospermum, Rosmarinus or Teucrium work well; on shaded facades, Heuchera, Bergenia, Hedera, Vinca; indoors, ferns such as Nephrolepis and Asplenium alongside Spathiphyllum or Epipremnum.

Irrigation and nutrition are automated and monitored. Human maintenance comes down to periodic technical inspections, containment pruning and occasional plant replacement, within a scheduled annual plan.

Yes, and it is one of its two main applications. It requires a prior study of solar exposure and orientation in order to select species suited to the real conditions of the site. You can see how we approach it on our outdoor living walls page.

It can contribute credits towards those certifications through its effect on indoor air quality, thermal comfort, water management and biodiversity. It is the only one of the three variants — natural, artificial and preserved — that can, because the other two have no biological function.