A sports car parked in a residential alley, train emerging from a tunnel and helicopter landing next to the Colosseum are all believable sights in Italy’s capital … except in this case they are constructed from LEGO.

Italian photographer Domenico Franco imagines these block-built vehicles at human scale in his series LEGO Outside LEGOLAND, masterfully faked scenes of photo-realistic quality.

In his series, normal conveyances are swapped with LEGO creations that stand out as simplified block forms against the rich historical fabric of Rome.

While some are clearly toys writ large, others are more convincing: a passing glance at a tractor trailer doing road work might not immediately belie its fictional origins.

Landmark buildings and aged cobblestone roads come alive thanks to the contrast created by intervening toys. Ordinary gray-blue weather and aged architecture seems even more real than in a normal photograph.

“The aim is to transform ordinary contexts in extraordinary ones,” says the artist, “thus compelling the toys to get out of the idyllic and politically correct landscapes belonging to their perfect and idealistic cities, with the result of instilling in them those vices, virtues and desires typical of human beings.”

Brooklyn Grange is behind the two largest rooftop soil farms in the world, together growing 50,000 pounds of organic produce per year from 108,000 combined square feet, demonstrating the incredible potential of small-footprint urban farming. Retrofitting an existing roof, the first of their two large projects turned a 40,000 square foot commercial loft rooftop in Long Island City into productive farmland using over a million pounds of soil. In the long run, urban farms have the potential to produce far more food per square foot while using less water and power than conventional fields.

With help from Bromley Caldari Architects, Brooklyn Grange conceived of their initial space as both an in-city retreat but also a functioning laboratory for urban agriculture and source of fresh local greens for surrounding neighborhoods. A series of tightly-packed rows grow a variety of crops, arrayed in between existing rooftop features including a water tower, elevator and HVAC system accessories.

A layer of felt filters and separation fabrics provide a platform for the 8 to 10 inches of soil layered above, all supported by steel-reinforced concrete of the structure below. The farms are currently growing peppers, kale, chard, chicories, ground cherries, eggplants, pac choi, herbs, carrots, turnips, radishes, beans and more (as well as 40 varietals in total).

New York City is home to an increasing number of converted rooftop farms but this remains one of largest in the region and was the biggest such soil farm on the planet at the time of its construction. Brooklyn Grange has since completed a new urban farming project at the Brooklyn Navy Yards that is half again as large as their flagship project featured here (the bigger one is shown in timelapse below).

The rest of the 300,000-square-foot building housing their flagship endeavor  is a loft that has housed businesses in media, architecture, film, fashion, printing, design and other creative industries over the years. Separately from the farm above, the building below was also itself renovated to be greener in the past few years, energy-efficient windows, exterior lighting and signage were added to the structure in addition to plumbing, electrical and elevator retrofits.

From the Brooklyn Grange website: “When we set out to grow food on the rooftops and unused spaces of New York City, our mission was to create a fiscally sustainable model for urban agriculture and to produce healthy, delicious vegetables for our local community while doing the ecosystem a few favors as well. Currently, with over two acres of rooftops under cultivation in Brooklyn and Queens, we’ve sold over 120,000 lbs of vegetables to restaurants, CSA members and directly to the public via weekly farmstands.”

With a series of successes, the group explains its ongoing evolution: “we expanded beyond our mission to grow vegetables: we now keep egg-laying hens and have launched a commercial apiary, cultivating bees for their honey and breeding regional hardiness into their DNA. ” First photo courtesy of Bromley Caldari Architects, second and third via Glen David Andrews and final photograph by Kristine Paulus.

What if we filled the world with nothing but cars, or skyscrapers, or if we simply started building an industrialized mountain (like a modern-day Tower of Babel) that reached forever upward?

Michael Kerbow is a San Francisco explores ways in which a world could end of industry were iterated to a point of near-infinite proportions – his works depict bottomless mines, planets covered (and carved out) with man-made structures and much more.

With titles like Fool’s Gold, Hollow Pursuits, Witching Hour and Diminishing Returns, it seems clear where the artist stands on the issue of endless industrialization in the face of limited resources and finite space.

While he works with assemblage and digitally-manipulated photography, Kerbow’s large-scale paintings in particular show fascinating possible worlds where urbanization has pushed past the limits of reason and sustainability.

Of himself, he writes: “My work explores the way in which we engage with our surroundings and the possible consequences our actions have upon the world in which we live. Through my work I attempt to question the rationale of our choices, and try to reveal the dichotomy that may exist between what we desire and what we manifest. Recently my work has focused upon the mechanisms that power our society and examines how they may influence the construct for a possible future.”

Brazil is no stranger to paint-based urban interventions, of  whichRio de Janeiro is frequently the focus, but the scope and scale of this project in particular truly boggles the brain.

The Favela Painting Project founded by Jeroen Koolhaas and Dre Urhahn of Haas&Hahn (via DesignBoom) has turned an entire neighborhood into a dynamic spectrum of color, coating walls from ground to sky with a rainbow of bright paints.

The project “aims at turning public urban spaces in communities facing social difficulties into monumental works of art. the art of favela painting is not about cosmetically ‘camouflaging’ an area, but rather rejuvenating deprived areas of a city and creating a positive social effect on the general district at hand. it is a means of imagination and rethinking, redesigning and rebranding a community at whole.”

About the artists: “Jeroen Koolhaas studied graphic design at the Design Academy in Eindhoven and has been working as a freelance audio-visual designer and illustrator for the New Yorker magazine since graduation. Dre Urhah has worked as a journalist, copywriter, and art-director and has set up successful companies specializing in different fields, from event management to television production.”