Cannon Street Roof Garden,
London.

The 2-hectare roof gardens provide places of relaxation and entertainment venues in the heart of the City of London. The inspiration for the landscape design was the creation of a sequence of interconnected parterres and colourful gardens which would have the appearance of a rich visual ‘tapestry’ across the roof when viewed from the neighbouring tall ‘atrium’ building. Additionally the planting would not impinge the strategic views to St Paul’s, which strongly informed the architectural design. The roof gardens had severe loading limitations due to the historic structures and its exposure on the North bank of the Thames meant that the horticultural design had to take into account many factors in its detailed design and implementation. As a result, most of the soft landscape was researched and sourced in the west of Scotland including heathers, grasses, roses and beech and yew hedging.