The march of the hotel alternatives continues, this time with the arrival of a home-swapping service aimed squarely at the upper echelon of homes. Luxe Home Swap allows people with high-end dwellings to swap accommodation with others all over the world.

“Luxe” homes don't necessarily have to be luxurious, UK-based Luxe Home Swap stresses; rather, they simply need an attractive location and home feel. Examples currently on the site include a 5-bedroom, 5-bath home in Sri Lanka, for example, as well as a 2-bedroom apartment in Gothenburg, Sweden. To use the service, homeowners simply pay a GBP 99 annual membership fee and begin browsing the homes listed on the site. Once they find one they'd like to swap with, they contact the owner to discuss the details via secure messaging and sign a digital contract. Members can make as many swaps as they'd like over the course of a year; Luxe Home Swap even offers a second year of membership free for those who didn't succeed to find a good swap in their first.

Trust is a big part of the success of any home exchange, and we've seen that addressed by focusing on homeowners who work in the same industry or are connected on Facebook. By focusing on wealthier clients, Luxe Home Swap achieves a similar end. (Related: Holiday sublet service offers hotel style amenities — Cutting-edge architectural dwellings for holiday rent — Hotel rooms scattered across the city of Linz.)

Website: www.luxehomeswap.com
Contact: info@luxehomeswap.com

Spotted by: Sunday Times via Sara Al Mulla

Not everyone has an eye for interior design—or the budget to hire a full-fledged, custom service. Enter California-based Avenue Interior Design, which recently launched an online offering that aims to give consumers a lower-cost way to get a professional look for their home.

Consumers begin by choosing the room or rooms they want to make over. They then browse through Avenue's I Heart Design site, which offers nine very different looks chosen by its designers. Each is represented by a door with a corresponding style; when clicked, users can see inside for a closer look. Once they find a look they like, users tell I Heart Design about their goals for the room and any special considerations, such as pets with a penchant for muddy pawprints. Measuring the room comes next, followed by uploading a few photos including any furniture that will be reused. For a fee of USD 3.50 per square foot, I Heart Design will then send out a custom box including two space plan options for each room; a spec card for each piece of furniture the designers selected; a paint card with recommended colours; a window treatment card with recommended styles; and a tape measure and other small tools. I Heart Design chooses items from a mix of flea markets, national retailers and trade-specific vendors, according to a report on Daily Candy. Consumers can buy those they like directly from their personal online design board on the site.

This fall, I Heart Design by Avenue will launch a similar offering aimed at hospitality providers. One to try out on your own hotel or restaurant—or emulate in another part of the world? (Related: 3-D tool helps students decorate (and shop for) dorm rooms — Home enhancement service focuses on senior citizens — Social shopping meets interior design.)

Website: www.iheartdesignbyavenue.com
Contact: service@iheartdesignbyavenue.com

Spotted by: Heidi Heifetz

A full 40 percent of North Americans do not have their own yard space; those who do, meanwhile, often leave it underused. Aiming to match the haves with the have-nots anywhere there's a similar inequity, Sharing Backyards partners with local community organizations to create land-sharing programs in diverse regions around the world.

Similar in many ways to UK-based Landshare, Sharing Backyards is a project of LifeCycles, a Canadian nonprofit dedicated to cultivating awareness and initiating action around food, health and urban sustainability in the Greater Victoria, B.C., community. To help maximize land use in communities far and wide, Sharing Backyards actively seeks out local partners and gives them administration of their own, local Sharing Backyards Program. That includes not just promotional materials but also a forum for interaction with other local partners. Consumers, then, begin by browsing the free site's list of programs already in existence. To find or share land in their area, they can scan an interactive local map for current listings and use the program's internal messaging system to make a connection. Sharing Backyards is working on a downloadable contract to spell out agreements between landowners and gardeners.

With programs up and running in more than 30 communities in North America and New Zealand, Sharing Backyards is seeking volunteers as well as advertisers and sponsors. Gardening-related businesses around the globe: who will be first in your community to stake this highly targeted claim...? (Related: Online gardening service sends seeds when it's time to plant — Gardens for rent by the season, with vegetables pre-planted — Five new business ideas for urban gardening.)

Website: www.sharingbackyards.com
Contact: info@sharingbackyards.com

There's no end in sight to the gardening innovations popping up each week all around the globe. The latest spotting? SproutRobot, a San Diego-based web service that offers regionally optimized gardening plans and sends seeds when it's time to plant.

Aspiring gardeners begin by telling SproutRobot their ZIP code, and the site generates a personalized planting calendar for that area based on historical weather data. From there, users choose whether they want to buy their own seeds and simply receive planting reminders from the site—that service is free—or whether they want to receive certified organic heirloom seeds and instructions whenever it's time to plant. Pricing on the latter option ranges from USD 19.99 per year for a “Patio Garden” service including up to three varieties and a few small harvests per year to USD 59.99 per year for the “Family Garden” service with up to 10 varieties and veggies several times each week for a family. Whichever paid option they choose, SproutRobot then asks them to select which fruits and/or vegetables they want to grow. Once those choices are made, SproutRobot hand-checks the user's planting calendar and sends out the right seeds at just the right time.

Now in beta, SproutRobot currently serves only U.S. users, but it's aiming to expand, according to one of the company's recent tweets. One to partner with or emulate for aspiring gardeners in other parts of the world? (Related: Gardens for rent by the season, with vegetables pre-planted — Remote-controlled farming for city dwellers — Homegrown vegetables, no green thumb needed — More homegrown veggies without the sweat — Five new business ideas for urban gardening — Matching would-be vegetable gardeners with arable land.)

Website:www.sproutrobot.com
Contact: info@sproutrobot.com

Spotted by: R. Steinberg

More than half of humanity now lives in cities, according to the United Nations Population Fund. This rapid and ongoing change presents a raft of new challenges, many of which create opportunities for resourceful entrepreneurs. Here are five concepts that target consumers' increasing interest in growing their own food in the city:

1. REEL GARDENING — Simplifying the process of starting a domestic garden, South Africa's Reel Gardening provides a strip of biodegradable paper carrying correctly spaced, pre-fertilised seeds. The strips are colour coded (e.g. red for tomatoes, purple for beetroot) and carry instructions for how deep they should be planted in your soil. Just add water!

2. THE WIKI GARDEN — Urban gardeners who haven't even got a bed of soil may be interested in the Wiki Garden from Hawaii. It's a metre-long "growing medium" (i.e. sack) containing compost, worm castings, bat guano and more, plus a built-in irrigation system with a hose attachment. The bags can be connected, allowing for an easily scalable system.

3. CLICK AND GROW — Another alternative is to do without soil at all. Estonia's Click and Grow is a hi-tech growing system deploying aeroponics: the plant's lower stem and roots are contained in an air or mist environment, regulated by sensors and electronics to ensure the plant is fed and watered correctly. The pots even feature a USB port to upload new growing instructions.

4. WINDOWFARMS — Rather than selling a particular product, the Window Farms project in New York promotes the production of hydroponic food gardens in homes and offices, using recycled or locally-sourced materials. The founders aim to build a community to share ideas and engender a DIY approach to solving environmental problems.

5. OOOOBY — Based in New Zealand, Ooooby, short for Out Of Our Own Back Yard, is a social networking community dedicated to connecting local food producers and consumers for trade, networking, and sharing ideas. Ooooby also organises stalls at farmers' markets and other locations through which people can buy, sell and barter local produce and small-scale farming supplies.

Spotters: Catherine Corry, Liz Stone, Kristoff Everaerts, Louisa Redshaw