My mad, fat empty wall

This rather enticing photo from the excellent NY Magazine's Design Hunting blog has got me thinking about the trickiest wall in the house.

I love the way those slightly untidy hanging baskets soften the vast, empty wall on the right. Tumbling cascades of soft greenery casting interesting shadows... I want some of that on the vast, empty wall in my life. This one.

The wall in question, at the top of the house, has always been starkly empty. It kind of looks un-stark and adorned above. So have another couple of views.

OK. You'll just have to trust me. It's the only tall wall in the building (the house being a low-ceilinged 1960s local authority design), and it's so tall that to reach the skylight at its apex you need a special ladder that has to live outside because it's so long.

I've ignored the wall over the years, intimidated by the ladder issue (where would you put its feet, anyway?). So it has remained empty. A shame as it is a lovely space... for something. And since my boyfriend moved in, he's been sizing up the wall with fresh eyes: "Wouldn't it make a great gallery?" Yep. Though not before an artwork shopping spree first, and those things are best built slowly, not rushed into – like interior designers buying aesthetically pleasing books by the yard for clients: bleak.

But he also suggested a living wall or some hanging baskets, which could look amazing just, I began fantasising when I saw the Design Hunting warehouse flat above – houses simply feel happier when you can get some outdoors inside. And the spot is a total sun-trap so they'd flourish, in theory, even with my knack for plant-murder. But how, so high up, would we water the damn things? And if we went for hanging baskets over full-wall greenery, where or off what – precisely – to hang them?

Any suggestions for this – or, indeed, for other things we could do with this lavishly tall wall?

Post by Kate