Awesome Grass

Located in Playas de Rosarito Centro, Mexico, the Straw Art Gallery specializes in portraits created by placing thousands of tiny pieces of naturally dyed broom grass into beeswax. We won’t spoil the subject of this particular work, so you’ll have to hit play to see the finished product.

This crazy grass skiing attraction at China’s Wulan Mountain lets riders zoom down a smooth, grass-covered hill on a single-person cart that rides on narrow-gauge rails. The video shows just 11 seconds of the 40-second ride, but it looks like a blast. Apparently, it’s quite the climb back to the top of the hill if you want to ride again.

During a 2020 trip to New Zealand’s famed Wētā Workshop, Adam Savage learned a lot about how they create practical visual effects. Among his experiences was this lesson from Project Supervisor Mona Peters on how to create convincing miniature landscapes by spraying on layers of green flocking with an electrostatic gun.

Aussie developer Matt Newell is working on an interactive plaything called Lushfoil Photography Sim. Matt’s goal is to envelop players in the most realistic grass, trees, and other environmental elements across detailed landscapes. From the looks of this French Alps demo, we think he’s on the right track. There’s an 8K version here.

(PG-13: Language) Keeping your lawn healthy and well-trimmed is an obsession for many in the US, UK, and Australia. But why is it that we insist on maintaining and manicuring this plant in places where it doesn’t naturally occur? Ordinary Things digs into the history of lawns and explains why they’re totally ridiculous.

This delightfully fragrant candle combines the scents of freshly-clipped grass with cedar and green banana. It burns for about 60 hours and is made from 100% pure soy wax. Its packaging is also biodegradable and has grass seeds infused into its paper.

This crazy video loop shows what happens when grass grows on top of boggy marsh. Basically, the water forms a large bubble underneath the turf layer, which can actually be ridden like a wave – at least until you fall through it.