WO2000000013A1 - Device for making islands and floral designs - Google Patents

Abstract

The invention concerns a device for facilitating the production of islands, flower beds and other floral designs with plants in pots or containers, on flat or sloping grounds. It consists of at least one board or sheet (1) with a predetermined outline, designed to be set flat on the ground (7), which board or sheet has over its whole surface a set of orifices (3) with predetermined arrangements and dimensions, each orifice being designed to receive or maintain in place a pot or container (10, 12). Preferably, the board (3) top surface has coloured zones corresponding to the floral design to be reproduced.

Description

 Device for making flower beds and floral decorations.

The present invention relates to a technical device, intended to facilitate the production of beds, flowerbeds and other floral decorations, of all shapes and sizes and on all types of terrain, whether these are sloping, such as embankments, or substantially horizontal . The floral decoration is currently carried out by professionals. These usually determine the location of each plant using lines and measures, in order to reproduce the desired pattern, previously defined according to a plan drawn on a small scale. This traditional process requires a very large number of manual measurements, which are difficult to carry out with precision, and which are carried out according to very variable and sometimes cumbersome methods. Consequently, the complexity of the chosen motif can only be limited.

This work is all the more delicate since the gardener, posted at one point of the flower bed to be made, does not have an overview of this bed. Even while moving away from the massif, the gardener cannot have a global perception of it, especially at the beginning of the realization of said massif.

The high level of professionalism and the time necessary for the development of such flower beds and floral decorations make the cost price high, therefore hardly accessible in particular for small businesses or communities.

In addition, if the same motif has to be reproduced in several places, the work to be done will always be as long and demanding. Finally, floral decoration can currently only be carried out on flowerbeds fitted out for this purpose. Indeed, hence a certain limitation as to the choice and the number of locations suitable for receiving such decoration.

Some documents already describe devices supposed to facilitate the realization of floral decorations, but the solutions proposed so far remain partial and unsuitable.

Thus, the French patent application N ° 2604332 and the German patent N ° 4419402 only reveal perforated plates or boxes, making it possible to position flower pots in height, these pots having their horizontal axis. It is then necessary to provide special means for retaining the pots, and the decorative effect obtained remains very uncertain, because the plants have a natural tendency to develop upwards. In addition, to support the full weight of pots and plants, the device must be thick and heavy, even three-dimensional, and it cannot be presented as a simple light sheet, foldable or rollable. Patent application WO 94/19926 and French patent application No. 2726968 relate to planting aid devices, in the form of large tarpaulins provided with markers, traced or in the form of slots. These devices cover for example the extent of an entire garden, and they are rather intended for planting trees. The handling of such devices, in particular their unfolding and their installation, appear practically impossible, and their use is less rational and more costly than a direct location and planting in the field.

European patent application No. 0448153 describes a complex assembly, comprising a leaf and planters moored on the leaf. Such an assembly is also particularly heavy and difficult to handle and to set up. In addition, it is not designed for the realization of very varied floral patterns, and its field application is limited to planters aligned or arranged in regular grid pattern.

Finally, European patent application No. 0285202 relates to a cover ensuring the maintenance of an artificial soil, which is not at all the objective of the present invention.

The present invention aims to eliminate all the disadvantages or inadequacies previously exposed, by providing a device designed to facilitate the production of flower beds and decorations, so as to allow faster and always precise production, even with less qualified personnel, therefore with a definite saving without any reduction in the quality of the result, whatever the pattern to be produced and even in the case of complex patterns.

To this end, the subject of the invention is essentially a device for producing flower beds and floral decorations, from plants in pots or in pots, which essentially consists of at least one plate or sheet of predetermined outline, intended to be laid flat on the ground, which plate or sheet has on its extent a set of openings of arrangement and predetermined dimensions, each opening being designed to receive and hold in place a pot or bucket. Thus, the basic idea of the invention is to provide a pre-perforated plate or sheet, allowing the positioning and wedging of plants in pots or pots according to a predefined pattern, the openings made in said plate or sheet being a function of the size and shape of the pot corresponding to each plant, and the gaps between these openings being a function of one space required for the maturity of each plant. Said plate or sheet is placed directly on the ground, whether it is horizontal or sloping. Preferably, the plate or sheet has, on its face opposite to that applied to the ground, lines and / or colored zones in correspondence with the floral motif to be reproduced. It is therefore sufficient to place each plant in a pot or scoop, of given color, in an opening in the area of the plate or sheet identified by the same color. This allows an immediate choice of plants, greater precision and certainty of exact reproduction of the desired pattern, and the production of more complex patterns especially with regard to color combinations. The presence of distinctive colored zones thus allows a good perception of the motif being reproduced, whether it is seen from near or far, for the personnel employed in the realization of the massif or floral decoration concerned. It also allows the understanding of the pattern before the plants reach maturity, and then participates in the visual decoration, it being understood that the colored zones remain visible as long as the plants have not, after total blooming, covered the plate or sheet . This plate can be presented as a rigid perforated panel. As a variant, it can also be a more or less flexible sheet, which allows on the one hand storage or transport in a small space, the sheet being folded or rolled up, and on the other hand allows said sheet, placed on the ground, to follow any irregularities on the ground.

Other properties may advantageously be sought, for the plate or sheet in question. In particular, this plate or sheet may be permeable to water, for example by being made of a microporous material, so as not to obstruct the penetration of rainwater or runoff into the soil located under the plate. If this plate is covered with paint forming the colored areas, this paint must also be permeable or porous. An embodiment of said plate or sheet in a biodegradable material is also advantageous, with an ecological concern. The plate or sheet can also have thermal insulation properties, and it can also constitute, by its simple presence, a "barrier" preventing too rapid evaporation of the water contained in the soil. Finally ^{^} said plate or sheet may contain and distribute a soil treatment product, such as fertilizer or insecticide.

In the case in particular of a device in accordance with the invention specially intended for the production of flower beds and floral decorations on a sloping ground, such as that of a slope, the openings of the plate or sheet may have edges belonging to a cylindrical surface whose generatrices are oriented in a direction forming, with the plane of the plate or sheet, an angle other than 90 °. Thus, the pots or pots receiving the plants can be positioned at a different inclination from that of the plate. In particular, the arrangement can be such that the pots or buckets are positioned in an upright position, that is to say with their axes oriented vertically, while the plate or sheet is inclined according to the slope of the slope. The device thus ensures effective retention of pots or buckets on an inclined floor; moreover, it can regularize and stabilize the slope itself.

In this latter application, the device which is the subject of the invention can advantageously be used with cups of generally cylindrical shape, but have an upper retaining rim situated in an inclined plane, that is to say a plane forming an angle different from 90 ° to the central axis of the bucket.

On the whole, we thus obtain a device which allows a simpler and faster installation of flower beds and floral decorations, the realization of which is, therefore, no longer reserved for highly qualified professionals. Thanks to this device, all the patterns even the more complex can be implemented quickly and securely, which makes it possible to envisage new applications, for example in the advertising or promotional field. The reproduced patterns can cover a large area, the juxtaposition of several elementary plates being always possible to cover a large area without having to transport and handle plates that are too bulky or too heavy. Furthermore, a plate with openings in a defined arrangement can be reproduced industrially in any number of copies, by modern methods such as laser cutting and printing by inkjet machines, which results in a gain. significant time and savings, assuming similar plant compositions, to be achieved in various locations. Finally, the part of the plate or sheet, located between the locations of the flower pots, can prevent grass or other undesirable plants from growing. We therefore understand all the practical, aesthetic and economic interest of the device which is the subject of the present invention.

The invention will be better understood with the aid of the description which follows, with reference to the appended schematic drawing representing, by way of example, an embodiment of this device for the production of flower beds and floral decorations:

Figure 1 is a front view of a device according to the present invention;

Figure 2 shows the device object of the invention seen in vertical section, placed on an inclined floor;

Figure 3 is a vertical sectional view, on an enlarged scale, of a detail of Figure 2.

As shown in Figure 1, the device object of the invention, generally designated by the reference 1, is presented as a plate which has an outline 2 of predetermined shape, which can be a geometric shape simple such as a rectangle, or any polygonal or curvilinear shape. Over the extent of the plate 1, are provided openings 3 in greater or lesser number, of arrangement and predetermined dimensions. The upper face 4 of the plate 1 has colored zones 5, separated from each other by lines 6, straight or curved, drawn on this face 4. The lines 6 delimit, for example, with the contour 2 of the plate 1, three zones 5a, 5b and 5c, provided to receive pots or pots of blue, red and yellow flowers respectively. The device thus foreshadows the floral motif to be reproduced, both for the positions of the flowers making up this motif, and for the colors of these flowers. More particularly, in the zone 5a here in the form of a curved strip, the openings 3a are pierced by following the line 6 which delimits this zone 5a. In zone 5b, openings 3b are drilled along the lines 6 which delimit this zone 5b, and other openings 3c are drilled, in a staggered distribution, over the remainder of this zone 5b. In zone 5c, 3d openings are also drilled along the lines 6 which delimit this zone 5c, and other openings 3c are drilled, according to a grid distribution, on the remainder of this zone 5c.

The openings 3a, 3b and 3d can be pre-drilled by means of a follower laser, which follows the lines 6. The colored zones 5 and the lines 6 can be produced using an associated inkjet machine to a computer control system. The plate 1 can thus be produced economically, even if it is a unit production or in small series.

FIG. 2, of which FIG. 3 shows an enlarged detail, illustrates the use of the device and, more particularly, its application to the production of a floral decoration on an inclined floor 7, which can in particular be that of a slope 8, the slope of which is defined by an angle A. The plate 1 is placed flat on the ground 7, its colored face 4 being visible and its opposite face 9 being applied to the ground 7. In the area of red color 5 of the plate 1, each opening 3 receives a pot or cup 10 with a plant producing one or more flowers 11 of red color. Similarly, in the blue area 6 of the plate 1, each opening 3 receives a pot or cup 12 with a plant producing one or more flowers 13 of blue color. The plants are thus positioned, and held in place, according to the floral motif to be reproduced.

As shown more particularly in Figure 3, each opening 3 of the plate 1 here advantageously has an elliptical shape, the edge 14 of the opening 3 belonging to a cylindrical surface whose generatrices form, with the plane of the plate 1, a angle B complementary to the slope A of the slope 8. Thus, when the plate 1 is placed on the inclined ground 7, these generatrices are vertical, which makes it possible to position a bucket 10 with its central axis 15 oriented vertically.

To adjust to an opening 3 of the plate 1, each cup 10 or 12 has a generally cylindrical shape, but is provided with an upper retaining rim 16 situated in an inclined plane, forming an angle C (equal to the angle B previously defined) relative to the central axis 15 of this bucket 10 or 12.

Such a bucket 10 or 12, reported on plate 1, constitutes the equivalent of a flowerpot and contains a certain amount of potting soil 17, which can overcome a lower layer 18 of mineral salts, also forming a reserve of water .

The plate 1 can be made of a water-permeable and biodegradable material, of the paper pulp or cardboard pulp type. Advantageously, the cups 10 and 12 are made of a material of the same kind. While a device constituted by a single plate 1 has been described above, it should be noted that, for the production of beds or floral patterns of large extent, the device object of the invention may be constituted by several plates or juxtaposed perforated sheets.

We would not stray from the scope of the invention:

- by modifying the shape and / or the material of the perforated plate or sheet;

- by changing the number and distribution of the colored areas of this plate;

- using the device not placed on an inclined floor, but placed flat on a substantially horizontal floor, to facilitate the realization of a simple flower bed, in which case the edges of the openings no longer need to be inclined relative to the plane of the plate or sheet.

Claims

1 - Device for making flower beds and floral decorations, on substantially horizontal or sloping ground, from plants in pots or in pots, characterized in that it consists of at least one plate or sheet (1) of predetermined contour (2), intended to be laid flat on the ground (7), which plate or sheet (1) has over its extent a set of openings (3) of predetermined arrangement and dimensions, each opening (3) being provided to receive and hold in place a pot or bucket (10,12). 2 - Device according to claim 1, characterized in that the plate or sheet (1) has, on its face (4) opposite to that (9) applied to the ground (7), lines and / or colored areas (5 , 6) in correspondence with the floral motif to be reproduced. 3 - Device according to claim 2, characterized in that the plate or sheet (1) has openings (3a, 3b, 3d) arranged along the lines (6), and / or openings (3c, 3d) distributed, especially in grid or staggered, over the extent of the colored areas (5). 4 - Device according to claims 1 to 3, characterized in that the or each plate (1) is presented as a rigid perforated panel. 5 - Device according to any one of claims 1 to 3, characterized in that the or each sheet (1) is a flexible sheet, capable of being folded or wound. 6 - Device according to any one of claims 1 to 5, characterized in that the plate or sheet (1) is permeable to water, this plate or sheet being in particular made of a microporous material. 7 - Device according to any one of claims 1 to 6, characterized in that the plate or sheet (1) is made of a biodegradable material. 8 - Device according to any one of claims 1 to 7, characterized in that the plate or sheet (1) contains and diffuses a soil treatment product (7), such as fertilizer or insecticide. 9 - Device according to any one of claims 1 to 8, more particularly intended for the production of flower beds and floral decorations on a sloping ground (7), such as that of a slope (8), characterized in that the openings (3) of the plate or sheet (1) have edges (14) belonging to a cylindrical surface whose generatrices form, with the plane of the plate or sheet (1), an angle (B) different from 90 °. 10 - Device according to claim 9, characterized in that the edges (14) of the openings (3) are arranged so that the pots or cups (10,12) are positioned with their axes (15) oriented vertically, while the plate or sheet (1) is inclined according to the slope (A) of the slope (8). 11 - Device according to claim 9 or 10, characterized in that it is used with cups (10,12) of generally cylindrical shape, but having an upper retaining rim (16) located in an inclined plane, forming an angle (C) different from 90 ° relative to the central axis (15) of the bucket (10,12). 12 - Device according to any one of claims 1 to 11, characterized in that it consists of several plates or sheets juxtaposable, for the production of beds or floral patterns of large extent.