In tough economic times, eco-friendly roofing squares planted with sedums may seem a little outlandish.
This, however, is the Northwest Flower &Garden Show, opening Wednesday for a five-day run in Seattle. Fantastic landscapes will be the norm.
Pragmatists: Keep out.
New York celebrity garden designer Rebecca Cole will make her debut at this year’s show with “Sky’s the Limit,” one of 26 elaborate display gardens.
Working with a local landscape installer and four-time show veteran, Brent Bissell with B. Bissell General Contractors of Snohomish, Cole will mix cutting-edge green roofing technologies with posh outdoor style.
Eco-friendly rooftops made of low-growing plants such as sedums maybe seem like a novelty to homeowners, but they have been catching on nationwide.
That green appeal is starting to reach suburban homeowners with multistory homes who’d like to green up their shed and garage tops for better views from upper stories.
Cole’s decidedly urban garden will simulate the flat roof of a skyscraper with green roofing squares intermixed with patio pavers. Potted plants and a small penthouse workspace topped with solar panels and plants will complete the picture.
Numerous outdoor sitting and dining areas, including a concrete sectional sofa and a glass coffee table underplanted with green roofing squares, will make the rooftop suitable for a garden party.
“When you only have limited space, you just have to use every single inch to plant something,” Cole said. “And that includes our furniture.”
Cole also plans to place green roofing squares on the top of a large outdoor dining table interspersed with ceramic tiles for a checkerboard look.
“If you were sitting down to eat, you’d be sitting between two planted areas and you put your plate on the tile,” Cole said.
Cole, who has appeared on “Oprah” and the Discovery Channel’s “Surprise by Design,” brings a certain celebrity cache to the garden show. But it’s Bissell who is in charge of the garden’s execution.
Earlier this year, when Bissell heard Cole needed a local installer to create her garden, he took on her project. That doubled his load, already heavy with another garden by Karen Stefonick of Seattle, whom he has worked with in previous shows.
Bissell and Cole have been collaborating long-distance for months, sometimes talking five times a day. They’ve never met face to face. In fact, Cole has never been to Seattle.
When Cole’s firm, Rebecca Cole Design, announced she would be doing the garden from afar, she was nearly laughed out of the show.
Without a skilled landscape installation company, it wouldn’t have happened, Cole said.
“Brent, who loves a challenge says, ‘Introduce me to her. I want to do her garden,’” Cole said, adding that Bissell is not only meeting her expectations, but also adding to the garden’s design as it evolves. “He’s constantly thinking of ways to make it better, do more.”
Bissell and his crews are custom building many parts of the garden, including welded metal planters, tables and the garden penthouse, including two 6-by-8-foot green walls for the exterior. Inside the penthouse, a 3-by-5-foot panel of succulents designed by Cole will be hung to simulate the look of a painting.
“Everything I wanted to do, he said, ‘We’ll do it,’ and he’s figured out a way to do it,” Cole said. “When the phone rings at midnight, I know it’s Brent still at work.”
When the Seattle show is finished, all the structural elements of the garden will be shipped to California for the San Francisco Flower &Garden Show.
There Bissell and Cole will help oversee its second installation with a different set of plants.
“This is the best form of advertising,” Bissell said of the show gardens, which are the highlight for many of the event’s 50,000-plus visitors. “We’re trying to demonstrate, basically, a sustainable rooftop garden.”
Bissell, a 2001 Western Washington University engineering graduate, recommends green roofs mainly for new construction projects.
Retrofitting an existing home with a green roof system would be cost prohibitive because of the drainage, structural engineering and, in some cases, irrigation required.
“You can’t just tear the shingles off your house and put up this stuff,” Bissell said.
Green roofing materials play into the 2009 show theme of “Sustainable Spaces, Beautiful Places.”
Though they require minimal maintenance, green roofs have been proven to help with stormwater drainage, insulate against heat and cold, increase wildlife habitat and extend the life of a roof because they minimize sun damage.
Sarah Jackson: 425-339-3037, sjackson@heraldnet.com. Visit her blog at www.heraldnet.com/ecogeek.
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