Shanghai Flowering

[Image: Flowers on display in Shanghai, via Eastday].

I just found an old article I'd saved way back in 2001 about cloned flowers being used to beautify the streets of Shanghai. While cloning plants is nowhere near as ethically complicated as cloning animals—the streets of Shanghai populated with cloned pigeons, say—the specific details of this genetic City Beautiful movement are pretty interesting.

Experts from local universities, we read, "have discovered and studied the cloning secrets of some 60 kinds of flowers and plants, herbs and fruits. 'Those plants are either precious species or on the verge of extinction,'" one such expert points out, giving the project the air of a botanical Jurassic Park. And much of this is inspired by an attempt to escape seasonality: "Through cloning, Shanghai residents will see many rare plants in all seasons, which couldn't be grown in the city's climate before." Indeed, "The cloning will enrich the city because the company has devoted much to studying the secrets of evergreen plants for the city's greenery."

And it gets bigger yet. The same expert quoted above expands on the role that these plants might someday play: "We especially look at psammophytes against sand storms and rank vegetations to deal with floods." This idea, that the streets of Shanghai are lined with cloned flowers—some of which are actually a kind of soft infrastructure, planted as a protective barrier against sand storms and floods—reads more like an article from 2035 than one from nearly a decade ago. Flower labs turning out streetside ornament in new living shades, scents, and textures; Willy Wonka meets Edward Burtynsky by way of Gregor Mendel in an era of science-fictionalized urban design. This also seems like something to look into a bit more over the summer as all eyes are on Shanghai for the 2010 World Expo.