PLANNING UPWARDS
The modern lifestyle has brought us from villages to towns to cities. What we’ve gained in convenience, we’ve lost in space. So where rooftop courtyards were once the luxurious haunts of millionaires, they’ve now become practical solutions to urban living.
Roof and rooftop gardens are an increasingly common school of design. Similar to that of courtyard, urban and small garden design, the key challenges are size and space, but there’s one spectacular difference: privacy.
Offering an oasis of seclusion, roof garden design is a space where your imagination can run wild without the trappings of needing to blend into the landscape. Whilst it should chiefly offer additional living and entertaining space, more so than many other styles of garden design, it also gives you a chance to really express the personality of your home.
With space at a premium, roof garden design calls for us to use all of the tricks of the trade. Using architectural planting, creating structures and zones through the use of features, and employing vertical designs to accentuate the height of the space; are just a few of the techniques essential for these projects.
The modern take on roof garden design also brings more than just a contemporary courtyard to an apartment, it can also bring the chance to grow your own fruit and vegetables. Irrigation systems, living walls and other varieties of growing are more than possible in urban rooftop environments, meaning you no longer have to compromise on what you want your garden to be.
