This article is part of The GOOD (and ReadyMade) Guide to Slowing Down, from GOOD Issue 18. Read more of the guide here.If you believe the Supremes, and we think it's only wise to, you know that you can't hurry love. Another thing you can't hurry is a plant. Flowers and vegetables pretty much grow at the speed nature intended, and that's one reason gardening is such an, ahem, grounding pursuit in a world where we're always being exhorted to do everything more quickly. You don't need to till an acre of yard, either. Urban dwellers can get in on it by starting a container garden.1. If you have access to an outdoor fence, create a growing wall by cutting the tops off of empty plastic bottles, filling them with soil and fertilizer, and fastening them with wire to a fence. (Don't forget to make drainage holes in the bottom of your bottles.)2. If you're blessed with a fire escape or a little bit of outdoor space, play around with container-gardening options. Container gardening is a great way to repurpose household items that would otherwise be junked: old rubber work boots, woven plastic tote bags, plastic sandbags, worn-out pots, old wooden boxes, decorative tins. Remember to drill drainage holes in any nonporous containers.3. If you're an apartment-dweller, look into Window Farms, an open-source gardening experiment initiated by two Brooklyn-based artists named Britta Riley and Rebecca Bray. Their vertical, hydroponic system, which uses cast-off plastic bottles and a small electric pump, can be as simple or as complicated as you want it to be. Visit windowfarms.org for tips.Our Good Guide to Slowing Down was a unique collaboration with our friends at ReadyMade magazine. Check out their good work at ReadyMade.com, and follow them on Twitter at @ReadyMadeTweets.Illustration by Tim Lahan
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