The Golden 1 Center features seven different section of green walls.Photo: LiveWall
The NBA’s Sacramento Kings call the Golden 1 Center home now and it is also the world’s first LEED Platinum certified indoor sports venue.
As part of its commitment to sustainability, the Kings’ new arena focuses on energy efficiency and water conservation. It also features seven green walls constructed with the LiveWall System, a subsidiary of wholesale nursery Hortech Inc.
“Unlike any other arena, the beautiful Golden 1 Center is the catalyst for the region, built on the foundation of the city’s ideals and values, a purposeful effort to think about our environment and resources, and profoundly impact the economy in Sacramento and beyond,” said Chris Granger, president of the Kings. “The entire project is a model of sustainability. Our green walls are a prominent feature of the arena and represent the fulfillment of our vision.”
The seven sections of green wall total 4,800 square feet and used 2,700 LiveWall modular planters. The green walls hold a total of 18 different plant species and 5,400 plants. All the flowering plants selected bloom in shades of the Kings’ signature color purple.
The Golden 1 Center is the world’s first LEED Platinum certified indoor sports venue.Photo: LiveWall
“The inspired idea was to make the building look as if it rests on the green wall, grounding the arena on the landscape and extending the landscape from the plaza up to the walls of the arena itself,” said James Haig Streeter, landscape design lead with AECOM. “As people come up to the arena, it appears to emerge from the landscape. They see vibrant bands of green that change, as different sections utilize different plants based on the varying patterns of the sun and shade around the building.”
AECOM designed the Golden 1 Center and searched for several critical factors for a green wall system to be considered successful.
“We wanted a proven, tried and true system with well-engineered components that could scale up,” Haig Streeter said. “It was important for the green wall design to provide adequate soil depth and volume to protect the plants and keep the walls from drying out in the heat of summer.”
LiveWall uses aluminum VertiRails that are installed on the building wall. Then, horizontal RainRails are used to irrigate each row of planters with spray nozzles. WallTer inserts are used to hold the plant containers, giving the client the option of switching out seasonal annuals.
The Sacramento office of BrightView was hired to handle the installation of the green walls while Florasource Ltd., an independent horticulture supply company and LiveWall distributor, supplied the plants. When the green wall was completed in September 2016, the plants were hearty and ready for installation.
AECOM and Florasource collaborated to find species that would grow large enough to cover the green wall components and were native to the area or had similar aesthetic qualities.
