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Despite our tendency to favor urban living, we still appreciate and seek out nature. Rooftop gardens and green roofs remain a dream for most of us, as architecture works to reach a perfect balance between building and nature in construction. These 25 Houses With Awesome Rooftop Gardens will increase your envy, but will also allow you to learn about new sustainable technologies and the aesthetic pleasure of a good garden, wherever it may be.
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Tangga House
Tangga House
Location: Singapore
Architect: Guz Architects
With an elevated swimming pool spanning throughout two sides of the house and encompassing rooftop gardens, the Tangga House is a dream for a nature lover. The architectural elements were designed to alleviate the extreme heat of Singapore's weather.
H House
H House
Location: Seoul, Korea
Architect: Bang by Min – Sae Min Oh
The terrace gardens of H House successfully create a residential space for three generations without cramping spaces or affecting lighting or air quality. While plants decorate the terrace areas on the second floor, grass covers the roof of the house and leaves space for a skylight.
Villa Savoye
Villa Savoye
Location: Poissy, France
Architect: Le Corbusier
Villa Savoye incorporates all of Le Corbusier's Five Points of Architecture, including the flat roof terrace. The architect created a series of ramps leading up to the rooftop garden, connecting the lower levels with the roof while crossing through the spaces that lead there.
Grow
Grow
Location: Tokyo
Architect: APOLLO Architects & Associates
Located on a very small plot of land, the house features a bare concrete facade with minimal windows facing the street. However, its other window placements, including skylights, provide plenty of natural light to the interior while giving access and views to a rooftop garden.
Fertile House
Fertile House
Location: Loire Valley, France
Architect: MU Architecture
A vegetable garden is located on the second-story roof of the Fertile House, created to act as an outdoor room for its residents with a passion for gardening. The garden also acts to cool the home in extreme heat, while it maintains a plot of green in a vastly developing residential area.
Residence in Filothei
Residence in Filothei
Location: Athens, Greece
Architect: GEM Architects
Outdoor terrace areas work with the rooftop garden to improve sustainability for this residence. While ventilation and insulation is enhanced, the vegetative areas help the home's response to sun and rain.
Stone House
Stone House
Location: Vietnam
Architect: Vo Trong Nghia
Featuring a spiraling shape, the Stone House inclues a rooftop garden that works with a circular courtyard at the house's center to contribute to energy efficiency. The courtyard includes a small pool of water and a tree, while grass covers the roof of the house and further helps with cooling temperatures.
The Park House
The Park House
Location: Singapore
Architect: Formwerkz Architects
An extensive garden surrounds and passes through different spaces around this house, while bedrooms are covered for privacy and shade beneath the vegetation. The canopy divides private spaces in the bedrooms located on the first floor from the more public, shared living spaces on the upper levels.
Maruma House
Maruma House
Location: Mexico City
Architect: Fernanda Canales
Concrete and glass are the main materials decorating the facade of the house, but its terrace areas add an element of green to the home. Instead of simply having a separate area adjacent to the house, outdoor gardens are directly accessible from the inside through large glass windows.
Hampstead Lane
Hampstead Lane
Location: London
Architect: Duggan Morris Architects
Hampstead Lane is renovation of a 1960s home that includes the addition of a new green roof. The sedum-covered roof creates a small habitat and ecosystem for local wildlife, making the house a home to many.
Nurai
Nurai
Location: Nurai Island, Abu Dhabi
Architect: Dror
The residential designs involved in the making of Nurai, a resort development, feature rooftop gardens each with its own spa pool. Both the Shoreline and Seaside estates each have impressive amenities including their own private beach and infinity pool, while time away from the water can be enjoyed on the roof.
Split Level House
Split Level House
Location: Philadelphia
Architect: Qb Design
The house does not follow traditional structural designs in planning its floors, and provides another split between the city and the home with a rooftop garden. Located on a street lined with brick houses, the house includes two shades of brick that extend to encase the roof deck area.
House S
House S
Location: Tokyo
Architect: Keiji Ashizawa Design
Based on the site of an old samurai residence, House S is surrounded by pine and zelkova trees. Its front facade is bland and dark, but past the wooden doors is a three-story home with garden access on each level. Wooden interiors and connecting areas to the outdoor terraces create a bright living space with its privacy protected by surrounding trees and plants.
Mill Valley Hillside
Mill Valley Hillside
Location: Mill Valley, CA
Architect: McGlashan Architecture
A single green roof unifies this hillside residence built for three generations. Covering two separate structures, the roof houses native and drought-resistant plants that contribute to conserving energy and water, while insulating the home and blending it in with the surrounding hills.
Euclid Avenue House
Euclid Avenue House
Location: Toronto
Architect: Levitt Goodman Architects
The Euclid Avenue House is the first of its kind to include green roofs in Toronto, with an impressive, nearly non-existent environmental footprint. Each level features its own garden, providing views from the interior, while the vegetative surfaces also help with insulation and improving the air quality.
House In Lisbon
House in Lisbon
Location: Lisbon, Portugal
Architect: Luís Rebelo de Andrade / Tiago Rebelo de Andrade / Manuel Cachão Tojal
The three-story house is a huge vertical garden, with flowers propagating a variety of scents throughout different areas of the home. A narrow rooftop swimming pool accommodates solo laps, while enjoying whiffs of the botany encompassing the structure.
Maximum Garden House
Maximum Garden House
Location: Singapore
Architect: Formwerkz Architects
The house features planters not only on its main roof, but also throughout walls and smaller, more unconventional surfaces for planting. While the main garden is built on top of the garage area, a sloping roof aims to provide comfortable relaxation.
Cluny House
Cluny House
Location: Singapore
Architect: Guz Architects
The Cluny House is a highly technological house that embraces the aesthetics and incorporation of nature. Its roof gardens collect and recycle rainwater, while various sustainable technologies have been included in the cooling and ventilation system throughout the home.
Eco-Sustainable House
Eco-Sustainable House
Location: Paris
Architect: Djuric Tardio
Using only Finnish larch as its building material, the house features not only an open rooftop, but also an open roof. Allowing for rain and sun to reach the terrace, the roof functions as a pergola for growing fruit while several outdoor areas and sliding walls intertwine activities throughout the various spaces of the home.
Floating House
Floating House
Location: Seoul, Korea
Architect: Hyunjoon Yoo
While rooftop gardens are sometimes created to accommodate small spaces and a lack of access to nature, the Floating House features both a large grassy yard and views of the Bukhan River. Its elevated construction allows for the river to be viewed from any level of the house, including the third-floor rooftop garden, while a guesthouse conceals unwanted views of neighboring restaurants and motels.
Villa Rotterdam
Villa Rotterdam
Location: Rotterdam, The Netherlands
Architect: Ooze- Eva Pfannes & Sylvain Hartenberg
As part of a redevelopment project, the Villa Rotterdam was given a new look while retaining its existing structure. Consisting of structures pieced together through three phases of building, the house includes a strange patchwork design. Using some of these shapes, architects have incorporated sedum green roofs inspired by traditional Dutch farms.
La Maison-vague
La Maison-vague
Location: Reims, France
Architect: Patrick Nadeau
Using a rooftop garden for insulation and design purposes, La Maison-vague, which translates to the "Wave House," takes on the shape of a hill. The wooden house is still in construction as part of an affordable housing project, while it boasts a technologically and aesthetically advanced layout.
Stacking Green
Stacking Green
Location: Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
Architect: Vo Trong Nghia
Its facade may suggest that this is a home for plants, but it is actually a home for humans. With rows of concrete planters covering the front and back surfaces of the rectangular structure, both the exterior and interior views can benefit from the rich greenery surrounding the living quarters. The planters include automatic watering pipes, while partition walls, an exterior staircase, and a rooftop garden provide multiple spaces to blend indoor and outdoor living.
House S
House S
Location: Wiesbaden, Germany
Architect: Christ Christ
Adding new structures and spaces to the roof of an existing bungalow, Christ Christ architects have created an outdoor cinema next to a rooftop garden. As the master bedroom was moved to the newly added second floor, vegetation was also expanded to the elevated space and includes a magnolia tree.
Sky Garden House
Sky Garden House
Location: Santosa Island, Singapore
Architect: Guz Architects
The house features three rooftop gardens on rising levels and a swimming pool that can be viewed from the basement, doubling as a stone-lined human aquarium. With terrace areas including a pond and visually-pleasing plantlife, the structure offers access to nature while remaining in privacy.