환경과조경

Gary Comer Youth Center Green Roof

2010 ASLA Professional Awards General Design 부문 Honor Awards 수상작

개리코머 청소년센터 옥상정원은 일리노이주 시카고에 위치한 방과 후 수업공간으로서, 인근에 거주하고 있는 청소년들과 노인들을 위한 공간이다. 작년 한 해에만 학생들과 지역 레스토랑 및 중심가의 카페에서 소비된 유기농 식품들 453㎏ 이상을 생산해냈다. 전형적인 노동중심적 채소정원이 아름답고 한 숨 여유를 느낄 수 있는 공간으로 풍성하고 생생하게 탈바꿈한 것이다.

Hoerr Schaudt Landscape Architects는 꽃과 채소원이 포함된 옥상정원에 대한 비전을 발전시키기 위해 건축가 John Ronan 및 기부자들과 긴밀하게 작업했다. 그들은 교육프로그램 개발과 유지관리를 위해 상주하는 정원관리인을 고용하도록 센터측에 제안하였으며, 그 결과 이 정원은 원예수업을 하거나, 환경에 대한 의식고취 및 식량생산을 위해 상당히 창조적인 방법으로 이용되었다.

옥상정원은 기후 조절 비용을 절감하고, 야외 수업공간을 제공하며, 원예도구를 이용해 감자나 당근을 캐는 열정적인 아이들을 길러낼 수도 있다. 양배추, 해바라기, 당근, 양상추나 딸기 등의 실절적인 식량생산을 위해서는 45~60㎝의 토심이 필요했다. 지표면의 온도와 지붕 위 토양표면의 온도간의 확연한 차이는 지붕층이 다른 기후에 속한다는 것을 의미하며, 이는 겨울에도 이용이 가능하다는 것을 의미하는 것이다. 정원은 3년밖에 되지는 않았지만 결실을 내고 있으며, 여전히 진화하고 있다.

The Gary Comer Youth Center Roof Garden is an after-school learning space in Chicago, IL, for youth and seniors in a neighborhood with little access to safe outdoor environments.  Last year alone, it produced over 1000 pounds of organic food used by students, local restaurants and the center’s cafe. Sleek and graphic, it turns the typical working vegetable garden into a place of beauty and respite.

Located in Chicago’s Grand Crossing neighborhood, the Gary Comer Youth Center offers a safe, welcoming after-school space for indoor activity. Its 8,160 square foot green roof is a model for using traditionally-underutilized space for urban agriculture and exceptional in its balance of an aesthetic vision with practical needs.  The garden provides the crowning touch to an award-winning building recognized for its bold architecture.

Hoerr Schaudt Landscape Architects worked closely with the architect, John Ronan, and donor to develop a vision for a green roof to include a flower and working vegetable garden, and suggested that the center employ a full-time garden manager to enhance educational program development and manage maintenance. The result is a garden used in extremely creative ways for horticultural learning, environmental awareness, and food production.

While reducing climate control costs and providing an outdoor classroom, the green roof is able to withstand enthusiastic children digging for potatoes and carrots with garden tools. Soils 18-24 inches deep allow for viable food production, including cabbage, sunflowers, carrots, lettuce and strawberries. Sharp differences between ground temperatures and those on the roof mean that the rooftop is in a different climate zone and can be utilized throughout the winter. The resulting garden, only three years old, is still evolving.

Located on the second floor over the Center’s gymnasium, the garden is surrounded by the circulation corridor and classrooms of the third floor. Floor to ceiling windows transform this working garden into a highly-graphic viewing garden as students move from one classroom to another. Plastic lumber made from recycled milk containers forms pathways within the garden that align with the courtyard garden’s window frames.

Landscape Architect _ Hoerr Schaudt Landscape Architects
Architect _ John Ronan Architect
Structural Engineer _ Arup
Client _ Gary Comer Youth Center
Location _ Chicago, Illinois, USA