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While this type of wall mainly exists in England and the Netherlands, it is amusing how the English Wikipedia's main arguments are about saving bricks and possi
by jhncls 7y ago
While this type of wall mainly exists in England and the Netherlands, it is amusing how the English Wikipedia's main arguments are about saving bricks and possible military advantages, while the Dutch Wikipedia tell these walls are meant to protect fruit from weather conditions. The fruit would typically be planted at the south side. One of the ideas is that the bricks both protect against wind and keep giving some warmth after the sun has disappeared.
- PhasmaFelis 7y agoYou should update the English Wikipedia with that!
- Cytobit 7y agoDoes the shape of the wall affect either of these uses? Otherwise, wouldn't it be off-topic to start listing general facts about walls for agriculture?
- riffraff 7y agofor the saving bricks, yes, since it's more robust than a straight line single-brick wall, and cheaper than a multi-brick one. I imagine for heating, it's that the trees get exposed to more irradiation by sitting in the focus of the curve rather than in front of a line.
- jessriedel 7y agoBased on this comment, I think the idea is that if you plant trees within the bend of a wall, they are shielded and heated from more than 180 degrees. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21564553 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21564553 You only get this benefit for tree right along the wall, which is not much agricultural area. Seems like a strained justification.
- kevin_thibedeau 7y agoFruit trees were commonly grown against purpose built walls. For flat walls trees would be trained to keep their branches in a plane.
- jessriedel 7y agoThanks. You're talking about espalier? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Espalier https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Espalier I could only find a single picture of something like this on a curved wall. https://images.app.goo.gl/AXPFnXgE47K1vm5U7 https://images.app.goo.gl/AXPFnXgE47K1vm5U7 If the tree is going to be pinned to the wall (as opposed to being free-standing and surrounded by the wall), I don't really understand how making it curved helps with absorbing heat or shielding from weather.
- Razengan 7y agoSlightly tangential, but having lived mostly in bare concrete jungles, there's something so aesthetically pleasing about green things growing on a backdrop of bricks or wood. A soothing harmony of nature and artifice. :)
- tejtm 7y agoDuring that little ice age mentioned elsewhere in these comments, that area right along the wall was your agricultural area so they came up with https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Espalier https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Espalier
- Someone 7y agohttps://archive.is/20120908073039/http://www.parksandgardens.ac.uk/component/glossary/290/view/terms-177/letter-C/crinklecrankle-wall-77/index.html https://archive.is/20120908073039/http://www.parksandgardens..., referenced from the English Wikipedia page says: ”crinkle-crankle wall A wall with serpentine curves for growing fruit” So, at least one English source agrees with the Dutch description.
- kparaju 7y agoFound pictures of this kind of wall in UVA too! Pretty neat. https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~evans/pictures/serpentine/ https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~evans/pictures/serpentine/
- gopalv 7y ago> while the Dutch Wikipedia tell these walls are meant to protect fruit from weather conditions Might also have a historic quirk to it. "The fruit wall appears around the start of the so-called Little Ice Age, a period of exceptional cold in Europe that lasted from about 1550 to 1850." https://www.lowtechmagazine.com/2015/12/fruit-walls-urban-farming.html https://www.lowtechmagazine.com/2015/12/fruit-walls-urban-fa...
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- Scarblac 7y agoIt's also funny that the words crinkle and crankle derive from Old English and are obvious cognate of Dutch _kronkel_. But the Dutch engineers didn't call it a kronkelmuur?