Reading List: Green Roof Systems

My good friends at Wiley sent me a copy of the long-awaited 'Green Roof Systems: A Guide to the Planning, Design, and Construction of Landscapes over Structure' by Susan K Weiler and Katrin Scholz-Barth. At first glance, the book is not remarkably pretty, which is usually a sign of a reference that aims for substance over style.


:: image via Amazon

A quick page through confirmed this suspicion, as this book is loaded with valuable information. Similar to other must-have references, this is not a book you read cover-to-cover, but zoom into tidbits of information, and check on questions related to all facets of rooftop design and construction. The book provides a bit of preface and context of the larger picture of green roofs from concept and planning - but this is not the strong selling point. That comes in the details.


:: image via Green Roof Systems

And there are details. The structure of the book guides a reader through systems, materials, documentation, structure, bidding and construction, and touching on liability and maintenance. This isn't a cursory discussion either but in depth information on a number of issues and the less fun 'essentials' of sucessful ecoroof design, such as specification writing, O&M manuals, and the nuances of structural systems - all the while providing a broad range of project types and components.


:: image via Green Roof Systems

The book does tend to favor the intensive, inhabitable rooftop terrace as opposed to the more extensive 'eco' roof, which is fine as the complexity is much more immense. I believe the evolution of the genre will further the separation of these deeper rooftops from the thinner systems - although the terminology continues to be fuzzy. There is also a reliance on many iterations of Olin projects (HannaOlin, Olin Partnership, and now merely a single word: OLIN, kind of like 'Cher' or 'Madonna') This is a bit limiting in regional scope, but guess is inevitable. I imagine it's a product of the authors experience, which is pretty comprehensive, but it'd be interesting to see how, say, the WaMu center building detailing stacked up to some east coast examples. Perhaps it merely my west coast bias showing through :)

There are some great items worth noting that are absent in other publications - probably best considered a much-needed update to the seminal work 'Roof Gardens: History, Design, and Construction' by Theodore Osmundson, which has long contained the most technical, albeit dated, information. Two sections that I've had to search for in the past for good information, which are covered in detail include roofing membranes and the connection between rooftop weights and the growth of vegetation.


:: image via Green Roof Systems

As I was at our booth recently for the Ecoroof Vendor Fair, I brought along a large stack of some of my favorite Veg.itecture books, which run the gamut from simplistic to visually stunning to essential. I was somewhat dumbstruck when someone asked me what the one book I would recommend for green roof design was - half because I was thinking 'who only wants to buy one book?' and half because I just didn't have the answer. While to sell the idea and provide stunning visuals and idea generation, other books offer much greater visual stimuli, this may be the only one you should probably own if you are serious about building landscape on structure.

Ecoroof Vendor Fair

It was great to spend Saturday hanging out with an energetic group of vendors and members of the community nerding out on Veg.itecture... good times. Spreading the gospel of the green and GreenWorks.


:: image via GreenWorks

Tonight: Habitats/Veg.itecture

integrating habitats defining veg.itecture

asla oregon - mt. hood section lecture

1515 SE Water Street - Suite 100

April 14, 2008 - 5:30pm

Two current trends that offer myriad opportunities for landscape architecture include trends towards truly integrated habitats and definitions of veg.itecture, the insertion of vegetation into architectural form. Jason King, ASLA LEED and Brett Milligan ASLA will provide an overview of both topics and provide an open forum for discussion of these important trends.

Part I will give a detailed account of their award-winning entry for the Metro Integrating Habitats Competition entitled Urban Ecotones: Transitional Spaces for Commerce and Culture. The proposal provides a vision for how innovative big box development design can regenerate, rather than destroy lowland hardwood forest habitat corridors within the expanding city of Portland. Using the model Nature in Neighborhoods ordinance as a guide, and Landscape Urbanism theory as a framework, the proposal is informed by time based, economic and ecological systems to provide an adaptive development model for the shift from fossil fuel dependency to a more localized economy. Particular attention is given to the thresholds at which commercial development meets natural systems. Rather than seeing these interactions as points of confrontation, they are approached as environments of unique richness—a synergy of both habitats akin to an ecotone: the transitional area between two ecosystems containing more diversity and biotic activity than singular habitats.

Part II will provide an engaging visual investigation of the recent trend of Veg.itecture and its impact on the allied professions of architecture and landscape architecture – including the representative, descriptive, and technical. This concept builds on and transcends our current implementation of simple rooftop gardens, ecoroofs, and living walls to encompass a holistic and integrated approach to design intervention that blurs the lines between landscape and architecture. Topics include a definition of the concept, including the eight common typologies of veg.itecture in action, and how this phenonomenon impacts and expands the practice of landscape architecture. In addition to providing this veg.itectural primer, the presentation will include a survey of recent projects from around the world as featured on Jason King’s blog Landscape+Urbanism including the work of Ken Yeang, Jean Nouvel, Patrick Blanc, Hundertwasser, Urbanarbolismo, James Corner, Mass Studies, and many more.

There will be time at the end for a thorough discussion of both topics, offering the chance to discuss, dispute, expand, and question these exciting topics that have current and future resonance for our profession.

Vancouver CC Green Roof Videos

As promised some more coverage of the new Vancouver Convention Centre and it's massive green roof - this time in a pair of videos. First, a video featuring extensive interviews with the landscape architect, Bruce Hemstock from PWL Partnership, as well as Reece Rehm, planting supervisor for Holland Landscapers. Enjoy.



Thanks James from Radar DDB for the heads up. Another video focuses on the cost overruns on the project - which got particularly boring after a minute or so... anyway, check it out for a bit of info. Via YouTube: "The living roof is going to be something that is recognized around the world, said Campbell, taking part in a ceremonial planting to mark the completion of the 2.5-hectare plant-covered roof, the largest in North America.More than 350,000 indigenous plants and grasses have been planted in a 15-cm deep substrate of sand, organic mulch and lava rock and will be watered by 43 km of irrigation piping.There are more living plants on the roof of the Vancouver Convention Centre than flowers in all of Vancouvers 200 parks."



And a cool time-lapse video of the entire construction process - which is enlivened by the inclusion of the green roof soils and plantings...

VIVA + VIA Sneak Peek

The inevitable issue with taking a break, even for a couple of weeks, from blogging, is that the flows of project ideas and concepts wait for no one and begin to pile up in a somewhat annoying fashion... so I have a massive backlog of projects to show off... and as it's late - a quick peek at some new ones before I get far into the projects. And as there seems to be a predominance of quick visual blogs popping up - I'm hoping to get some good dialogue and information going about both the visual and the realized.

For the (Veg.itecture in Visual Assessment) VIVA - GRAFT Architects and the “ao project” is a fantastic example of how wild the concept of Veg.itecture has come (via The Design Blog - via Designboom for much more). Or on another hand, it's an example of what happens to your glassy modern box if it gets lost in the back of the fridge for a month or so.






:: images via The Design Blog

And for the (Veg.itecture in Action) VIA we have the long-awaited Vancouver Convention Center (or Centre, depending on your location) - featuring the largest green roof in Canada... more on this one soon for sure.


:: image via Jetson Green

Malcolm Wells: Infra Structures

Subtitled "Life support for the nation's circulatory system", the 1994 book Infra Structures by Malcolm Wells offers a chance to revisit the integration of our architecture and infrastructural systems - appropriate for our new found interest in the workings of our society and urbanity. The the juxtaposed pipe/greenery on the cover, the thrust of this book is quite specific from the get-go.


:: image via Malcolm Wells

Wells has a cult following as a purveyor of early ecological design, particularly his notable installations and visuals of underground architecture. The interesting thing about the book is not so much another treatise regarding massive projects and the myriad ways architecture can influence these, but rather how they MUST exert influence to infrastructure in a positive way. The separation of the word into the separates of 'infra' (below) and 'structure' (something constructed) alludes to this architectural dualism.

:: something constructed below - images via Infra Structures

:: Subterranean Shopping Mall - image via Infra Structures


:: green covered boat house - image via Infra Structures

The 'story', if you will, leads us on a tour of future buildings and structures that exist in the not-too-distant-future, strangely enough more a contemporary vision of the early 21st Century. Based on the preponderance of veg.itecture in the world, Wells may have been somewhat prophetic (p.23):

"... I hesitate to make any but the most general of predictions for even the next 50 years. With everyting changing at an ever-faster rate it would be silly to stick my neck out too far. The only thing to do is try to make our buildings adaptable to greatly changed, rapidly changing occupancies. ... Animals and plants will continue to need the out-of-doors in life on earth to be sustained. That means underground architecture for the human species."

Although the words aren't half bad, my favorite aspect of Wells' book is the visuals - a throwback to an era that could've existed anywhere between the 1960s and today - but with a simple pen/ink/watercolor combo that is both illustrative and evocative. While some may bristle at the dated 'look' of the graphics, they are successful in their goal - communicate intent, form, and materials. Call it graphics for veg.itectural non-form. A common theme is ubiquitous infrastructure - such as the highway... snaking through virtually everywhere, the linear path that severs can be re-imagined into habitat corridors and earth sheltered bridges.






:: land bridge - images via Infra Structures

The books' author offers some fun with the text, resorting to comic-book like thought bubbles to illustrate the point, as below (p.21): "It would be nice if animals - as well as plants - could make use of the land-to-land connection bridges offer human travelers. And the all-weather aspect of covered roadways does have a lot of appeal... But an earth-covered bridge? Come on. Next thing you know he'll be proposing underground airports."


:: elements of graphic novel - image via Infra Structures

And there is plenty of infrastructure, including highways, bridges, wastewater treatment, sports stadiums, and the aforementioned underground airport... looking much like a storyboard from The Empire Strikes Back zooming over the mood of Endor.


:: underground airport


:: sub-surface sports complex


:: ferry terminal with under greenery parking


:: city-scale living machine for waste treatment - images via Infra Structures

So what can we learn from looking back at some of the work and visuals of Malcolm Wells? While again we can see the vision of this man who looked at infrastructure as both a design problem and environmental solution - leading the way to what could literally be the emergence of figuratively and literally green architecture. Perhaps it's a nudge to pull out your sketchbook and envision a reality beyond what's sitting on your desk, in your computer, or outside your window, but what could be. Finally, it's a call to arms for architecture (and more broadly the allied arts) to be part of the solution, not part of the problem. From Infra Structures, p. 29:

"What a structure does, that is, how it acts upon the world around it, is far more important that how it looks. That would seem to go without saying, but it appears never to have concerned those of us who have built over our rich America land. ...If a building, a bridge, a dock, or a road destroys land, it's simply not doing its job. A handsome structure that kills land is an enemy, and we are only now slowly coming to realize it. If, on the other hand, the structure is kind to the land, chances are that it will be its very appropriateness be both appealing and beautiful."


:: image via Infra Structures

Meadowlicious: National Wildflower Centre

Buildings that are used to celebrate botanical phenomena seem the most appopriate to become melded into the landscape in more meaningful ways. Aside from abstracted metaphor, there is a direct link between the building and the content and context in which it is meant to reference. A recent competition and subsequent announcement of winners for the UK's National Wildflower Centre had no shortage of both literal and figurative applications of vegetation from all of the finalists. The project envisioned an "...educational, conference and seed production complex at the National Wildflower Centre in Knowsley, part of the Liverpool City Region." The winning entry from Ian Simpson Architects, Adams Kara Taylor Engineers and Hoare Lea Engineers has been announced as winners of the competition for their vegetated and nautilus-inspired design.




:: images via Bustler

As mentioned, the remaining finalists showed off a variety of veg.itectural methods, from the green roofed to the visually veg.itecturally referential in my unofficial ranking of the runner's up. All images via Bustler.

DM3 Architecture


Studio Verna


Urban Salon Architects


Nicolas Tye Architects


Kirkland Fraser Moor


And another runner-up non-shortlisted entry that popped up via World Architecture Community for from Jeeyong Ann - which I liked for the site and building integration (sustainable skin system), some cool graphics, and definitely the name - Ginseng Chicken.








:: images via World Architecture Community

Veg.itecture: VIVA Conceptual 3

Veg.itecture in Visual Assessment (VIVA) continues with some amazing examples (and not to mince word, there are shitloads of them on the web). Perhaps a trend, perhaps overexposed, or perhaps we've finally reached the point where we've transcended the original and just become purveyors of the mundane. A quick snippet of the amount of blog posts showing vegetation on buildings is a good indication of the ho-hum attitude we take towards this still fascinating phenomenon. It perhaps is a bit more fascinating due to it's ubiquitiousness.

So onward, with wild abandon. To start, a building with origins in fantasy, the 'house in never never land', andrés jaque architects offers honest-to-goodness physical models of building. Check out this > 30% preview comes via Designboom.




:: images via Designboom

WAN features the Nya Årstafältet masterplan, 'Arkipelag' in Stockholm, Sweden - with a variety of green roofs - designed by archi5.




:: images via WAN

Inhabitat features a trio of green roofed skyscrapers in Taiwan, by NBBJ Architects.


:: image via Inhabitat

Some Sim-City looking imagery from the roof gardens on plans for Project Green, in Austin, Texas.




:: images via Urban Greenery

Another land-based green roof is for the Asian Culture Complex by architect Kyu Sung Woo is located in Gwangju, South Korea. (via Designboom)




:: images via Designboom

a-lab designed the Statoil Hydro office in Oslo, Norway with some rooftop greenery.


:: image via WAN

And a literal vegetated 'tree hotel' by Tham + Videgard Hansson Arkitekter in Harads, Sweden.




:: images via Dezeen

Nothing like 'green carpet' to elucidate the 'green carpet house' by hiroshi nakamura and NAP architects. A tilted up panel of vegetation extends site to roof.






:: images via Designboom

A very popular entry in the pantheon, the “Shenzhen 4 Tower in 1” Master Plan by Steven Holl has made the rounds lately - due to it's incorporation of many veg.itectural concepts. You name it, it's in there - Vertical Gardens, Roof Gardens, Stormwater and Greywater Collection... as well as a Public Park (via SpaceInvading).




:: images via SpaceInvading

Veg.itect jean nouvel has designed the 'C1' building which offers a rooftop greenhouse (via Designboom)






:: images via Designboom

Morphosis ends with a vegetated rooftop (via Inhabitat) for a building in China for the 'Giant Campus' which is at least some vibrant subtlety (albeit blase renderings) amongst some of the craziness.




:: images via Inhabitat