Sixth Avenue Roof Gardens

Two rooftop terrace landscapes are among the most distinguishing features of this historic late 19th-century commercial building’s comprehensive commercial-use renovation. HMWhite’s engagement early in the project’s design and planning created an opportunity for a mutually supportive merge between the planned interior uses and the roofs’ landscape development. A variety of exterior and distinct forms of workspaces were derived for seasonal private and communal gatherings within a shady garden setting. The spatial framework and density of each terrace’s landscape enhance its panoramic skyline views experienced from within the building’s interior and exterior spaces. Multi-stemmed canopy trees and drifts of flowering trees punctuate the meandering wildflower meadow and ground cover underplantings. The spatial layering and vastness of the common plant communities and landforms spatially organize the roof terraces’ various workspaces, creating a unifying landscape character that mystifies the garden’s boundaries.

The garden design’s bold topographic forms were seamlessly integrated with the landscape’s supporting infrastructure requirements, informing the scope of the roof structure, waterproofing, drainage, and insulation requirements. Mounded landforms and their undulating meadow garden plantings emerge as erosions of the roofs’ flat paved surfaces. The landscape design’s scale magically blends into its cityscape context. As a slice of nature, these “sky gardens” are a critical component of a reimagined vision for urban office work environments. With the interior spaces’ transparency, the gardens’ dynamic seasonal evolutions influence office workers’ well-being and elevate their enthusiasm for daily workplace routines that yield untapped creativity and productivity.