Failed Moss Wall Build

Moss milkshake mixture - just add water

Just the other day a reader, Andrew, was asking me how to build a moss wall. He saw the idea from A Japanese Moss Wall and was wondering about making his own and wanted to know if I had any advice.

Well it just so happens that I made an attempt at getting a moss wall up so I emailed Andrew back but I thought others might be interested in reading about that so here’s the email. I added in some pictures of what I did as well:

I’m glad that post gave you some inspiration. It’s true that most of the vertical gardening posts cover more leafy plants. As far as the moss is concerned, I recently just tried building a moss wall. I got the moss at mossacres.com and tried to build it two different ways. The moss was a dried moss milkshake.

Simple Moss Wall, just covered styrofoam with moss

The first way I got a piece of food safe styrofoam (from my local grocery store for free.. from what they ship their fish in) and applied the “moss milkshake” of hypnum moss, buttermilk, water retention beeds, etc… right on the styrofoam. Then I hung it on the wall in my living room. That method of construction means you’d have to water it about every day by misting it as there’s no irrigation system or a lot of material to hold the water… just moss applied to something waterproof. The problem would be that the water would leak down on the wall if I watered too much… but I’m sure with practice you could avoid that by learning exactly how much to water.

Now, if you forget to water it, that’s fine, but the moss goes into hibernation. It still looks greenish and stays on your wall though. If you make it go in and out of hibernation too much by watering and then forgetting to water and then watering again, it’s really hard on the moss and it’d likely die. So if you’re going to keep it alive, you have to water it daily, if you’re going to let it hibernate, don’t bring it out of hibernation too often.

Styrofoam cuts for wall planter

The second method I used was I made a whole frame out of styrofoam from Home Depot. Then I used Foam Coat to cover the styrofoam to make it hard and to waterproof the styrofoam resevoir. I used styrofoam because it’s cheap and easy to cut. After I applied the foam coat, I painted it with outdoor paint to finish it. Then I took some hooks from home depot, a small pump and flexible tubing and made my irrigation system. I put holes in the tubing at random intervals at the top of the frame, and put the pump in the resevoir. Then I wrapped a towel around the tubing and applied the moss to the towel. I had the whole frame sitting on its side in an effort to get the moss to adhere well to the towel before I put it upright and ran the pump.

There was only one problem with both those designs.. the moss stunk. Man I couldn’t believe it. I was thinking of all the things that could go wrong, the moss making our apartment smell wouldn’t be one of them. Now I don’t know if it was the moss, or the buttermilk mixture in the moss milkshake or whatever, but whenever that moss was moist, our whole place would stink. My wife wasn’t a big fan =) So it ended up I put both attempts at the moss wall outside. They’re in hibernation because it’s winter. I might try again come spring with them outside.

I should note, putting the moss on a towel wasn’t the best idea I don’t believe. It’s just all I had. Synthetic felt would work better or an appropriate geotextile. Those can hold the water a bit better.

Another thing to note, Patrick Blanc – the main vertical garden guru – encourages moss to grow on his walls. He makes the wall for leafy plants typically, but after a while algae starts to grow on some of the walls. The algae eventually starts to turn to moss. So using that same type of construction (waterproof surface like PVC sheet or styrofoam, felt or water retention mat or geotextile, and a pump, resevoir and tubing) should get you your moss wall.

The caveat is moss takes a super long time to grow, so if you don’t want to wait a couple years to get your wall, it’s best to start by getting pregrown moss.

So.. there’s my failed diy attempt at a growing moss on a wall. I definitely do think it’s doable though. Maybe the post here could give you a better idea of what to do if you attempt this on your own.. or at least what not to do =) A couple pictures of the second setup below:

Ready to apply foam coat

Foam Coat Applied to waterpoof the resevoir

Foam coat painted with outdoor paint

Pump and tubing on wall planter

Towel with tubing behind it

Light covering of moss on planter