Green Roofs (and Brown Roofs and Green Walls) are a new way of making the built environment more sustainable, in that they provide habitat for wildlife in a space which would otherwise be bricks, concrete, tiles, or lead, by giving temperature and noise insulation, reducing rapid water flow and flooding into our storm drains, and by absorbing CO2.
There is a well-established garden created by David Matzdorf on his gently arching roof (accompanied by exotic tropical garden at ground level) at 1a Hungerford Road, N7, which is open under the NGS Open Garden Scheme this year (2011) on Sunday 12 June. Details of location and photos can be seen atwww.ngs.org.uk/gardens/gardenfinder/garden.aspx?id=16950
David's thoughts and experiences creating the roof garden and more technical construction and plant info can be found here:
www./livingroofs.org/20100319205/single-articles/mexican-hillside-green-roof-london.html
Another spectacular roof garden has been created at a new building at Islington's Newington Green.
Architect Justin Bere has recently completed his new award-winning ecologically designed home and office building at The Muse in Poets Road at Newington Green. The building was opened to the public in September as part of the Open House Greens Skies event, and what particularly fascinated IG's roving reporter was the stunning roof garden, or rather, gardens, shown below. These are on several levels with naturalistic features including an area of wildflower meadow. "Naturalistic" includes colourful naturalised items like species fuschia (from South America) and crocosmia (from South Africa), as well as, surprisingly, various small trees including hawthorns. More about the building and Justin's design work will be viewable on his blog site www.bere-blog.co.uk.
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Other examples in Islington follow.
The green roof at Freightliners' Farm, Sheringham Road N7 built by the Highbury Builders' Collective:
This is an open classroom which provides shelter for groups visiting the Farm when it is too hot or raining. The structure is timber frame and cordwood construction, and was put up six years ago. The roof has been left for nature to take over.
The next three roofs belong to an Islington Gardener, and the first of these can be replicated by anyone with a shed with little difficulty. We await with interest the report on how these sedum roofs develop over their first summer and which insects, and possibly birds, they attract.
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Islington Council are conscious of the environmental benefits flowing from green roofs, and in 2007/8 encouraged the installation of nearly 7,000 square metres of green roofs on new developments.
In addition,the Council have installed a green (possibly more brown) roof on their Municipal Offices at 222 Upper Street, N1, as shown below. Part of the roof was retrofitted with an "extensive substrate biodiversity based green roof". The roof substrate is a growing medium of mixed crushed brick, concrete, clay particles, sand and organic matter which has been used with varying depths of 40 -150 mm. A pond liner was also used to create a small raised edge in the centre to act as a water reservoir. The roof was seeded initially with a wildflower mix which gave a display of corncockles and cornflowers over the summer of 2007. It is planned to install some standing rotten wood and plug plant some other wildlife friendly species as well as to allow areas to self-colonise in the following seasons. The Council cite one of the benefits of a green roof as an extended roof life - the waterproof membrane underneath it is protected from damage from UV rays; another benefit is the recycled nature of the materials used (the crushed porous brick etc) which would otherwise have gone to landfill.
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Islington Council are also experimenting with a green wall, at the Children's Centre, Paradise Park, shown below. The plants are a mixture, including euphorbias, bergenias, geraniums and grasses. Unfortunately there have been teething problems with the watering system which have not been resolved as at February 2008.
Subsequently, in 2008 the Council have set up green walls at Highbury Corner and St Gabriel's Church on the Holloway Road.
The Highbury Builders' Collective have an extensive section on green roofs on their website www.beehouse.org.uk and there is another selection of very grand green roofs at www.livingroofs.org.uk
We will be delighted to feature more Islington green roofs and walls so if anybody knows of one please email susan(at)lees.org.uk with details and if possible an electronic picture.