Roof

A rooftop oasis furthers the outdoor connection. It's planted with red fescue at the client's request for a wild and unmaintained look and an experience akin to "walking through a field."

London’s Cannon Bridge Roof Garden is a refreshing splash of green on an aggressively industrial skyline. Photo via Love Home Swap.

The house is oriented to maximize views of the ocean and Edgartown to the west, and Nantucket and Cape Pogue Bay to the east. Natural sea grasses sourced from the surrounding area cover the roof of the building, providing thermal insulation while also dampening the noise of rain, improving air quality, and helping to manage rainwater flow.

Pulltab’s ingenious skylit lightwells visible from the terrace Marcovitz and Geiger requested for the newly built-out second-floor roof terrace. The outdoor table is vintage Paul McCobb.

Purple thistles, California poppies, clover, and dandelions have all taken root in the roughly 10-inch-deep, lightweight humus and grape-husk soil in this 580-square-foot green roof. Designer Peter Liang says that he "wanted to plant a green roof for its thermal mass, but I wanted it to be as natural as possible."

Living Edge-A home on Austin’s outskirts is integrated into its landscape with a massive living roof that supports nearly 200 species of plants and grasses and innumerable local species. Photo by: Dave Mead

"Pulling the buildings apart allows what is not a big house to feel really big," says architect Jonathan Feldman of the sustainable retirement home he built for a couple in California. "Because of the ways it opens up, it feels much more expansive than it really is."

Architect Will Winkelman and landscape architect Todd Richardson collaborated with client JT Bullitt to design a house that blends into its surroundings in Steuben, Maine. The green roof gives the impression that "the ground just jumped onto the roof," Richardson says.

The roof deck is a place for entertaining, and offers scenic hillside views. During the design process, the team was challenged with preserving these views while adhering to the required 3.5-foot railing height mandated by building code, a height that would block all views while seated. As a solution, the team came up with open metal railings that would maintain safety while preserving the view.

“We have all these different destinations,” says Sardinas, a writer who works from her home office. “I’ll be working, get stuck on a passage, and take a break to go read outside.” On the lower roof, red Vegetal chairs by Erwan and Ronan Bouroullec for Vitra provide moments for repose.

Edgeland House, built on a cliff-top lot in Austin by architect Thomas Bercy for lawyer and writer Chris Brown, is topped by a living roof to help it blend into the landscape. The concrete, steel, and glass house is divided into two distinct public and private halves.

Healy Guest House (Cocoon House) Designed by Ralph Twitchell and Paul Rudolph, 1950

Landscape architects Reed Hilderbrand helped fill out the completed prefab by planting sedge grass on one of the house’s two green roofs to reflect the texture of the surrounding meadow.

According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, food scraps and yard waste make up 20 percent of what we throw away. Composting organic materials keeps them out of the landfill, which cuts down on greenhouse gases, and enriches the soil. To compost at home, make a pile in your backyard, or introduce an indoor bin for throwaways like apple peels and eggshells.

Architect Konieczny lifted the existing ground and wrapped it around the roof and exterior rooftop staircase, essentially making all floors “ground” level.

Covered with wire mesh, the green roof will continue to vegetate over time.

Vegetation from the garden on the lower roof provides a contrast to the backdrop of Gowanus’s rapidly changing landscape.