Clifford "T.I." Harris gave us his best Cliff Huxtable impersonation when he and his family posed for a Cosby-Show-themed magazine cover last year, and in a recent outing with CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta, the rapper appeared to be getting his Michelle Obama on.
T.I.'s quest to put his troubled past behind him has landed him in his own backyard this time around, where he, Gupta and two of his children got a lesson in planting veggies from Urban Farming founder, Taja Sevelle.
"When our next guest reached out, I was a little surprised because he's a gardener and a hip-hop star," Gupta admitted, before heading out with the group to plant boxes of arugula, lettuce and carrots at T.I.'s Atlanta home.
The exercise demonstrates not only how easy it is to grow fresh vegetables with limited space, Sevelle says, it also offers some practical tips on cutting down on your monthly bills and teaching kids about how to eat healthy.
"In Northern states, you might want to consider an edible wall or a nice planter... and just make sure it gets a lot of sunlight," Sevelle said.
From Detroit to Boston to Oakland, urban farming initiatives have been picking up steam, with many projects benefiting from an influx of corporate bucks.
According to Mashable, Whole Foods' non-profit arm, the Whole Kids Foundation, recently teamed up with PACT, an organic apparel company, for an Indiegogo campaign aimed at building 100 urban gardens across the U.S.
"As the non-profit arm of a major brand, Whole Kids Foundation probably could have funded the gardens itself," Mashable explains, but this approach better helps the organization accomplish its goal, they go on to say -- the goal of increasing accessibility and consumption of fresh produce in local communities and equipping community members with a working knowledge of gardening in order to sustain them.
See how one community is helping grow its own inner-city garden in the video below.