The Succulent Garden by Stark Design

ArchiPro Project Summary - A sophisticated roof garden featuring native and succulent plants, designed as a living sculpture with precast concrete slabs that enhance the space's visual appeal and functionality.

Title:: The Succulent Garden
Interior Designer:: Stark Design
Category:: Residential/; Landscaping
Photographers:: Brigid Arnott Photography

Aesthetically, the client sought a dramatic, sculptural, and sophisticated courtyard entrance garden for their home. The most unique aspect of the project was the fact that it is really a roof garden, built on a suspended slab, and the client understood that only native and succulent plant choices would thrive in the hot, harsh, north-west, concreted space.

Our design response was to create ‘a living sculptural garden’. We wanted a bold plant palette which shone at night as well as during the day. An established native narrow-leaf Bottle tree Brachychiton rupestris was retained from the original garden and a second masonry planter box was built to contain a second Brachychiton rupestris to give the garden gravitas, mass and importantly, shade. The trees were teamed with other small native shrubs from Australia and water-wise cousins from South Africa, New Zealand, the Mediterranean areas of Europe and the desert areas of America.

Precast concrete slabs create a series of floating platforms which reduce the number of level changes and give the illusion of a more generous space.

Project Gallery

‘Every day is enriched by the aesthetic of the garden and the subtle changes to the plant’s lifecycle.

The drama of the plant choices is amplified by the lighting at night.

We wanted the garden to be contemporary and to complement our contemporary art collection. We never dreamt the new garden would look so good and bring us such joy.

It is arresting, never stops amazing us – it touches us like a symphony- a symphony of plants!

Knowing how hot and hostile the area is we are always incredulous when we now walk into a lush oasis that is thriving’

~ Client's response

Views and Engagement

Professionals used

Stark DesignInterior Designers

Stark Design

Interior Designers

Crows Nest, North Sydney, New South Wales

starkdesign.com.au

Stark Design. As a design practice, Stark Design treats indoor and outdoor spaces with equal affection. Specialising in designing both residential interiors and gardens, spaces are treated as a unified whole. Principal designer, Jane Stark, had the unique vision to provide a unified and seamless design aesthetic to both the inside and outside of your home. Jane studied with the New York School of Interior Design and completed studies in landscape design and horticulture in Sydney to make this vision a reality. This unique approach is a perfect fit for Australia’s temperate climate and relaxed lifestyle. To deliver such a single vision and service, our practice comprises a team of interior and landscape designers and stylists. Whether we are working with you indoors or outdoors, one design vision is applied by one professional design team. Stark Design is a proud member of the following professional bodies: Design Institute of Australia (DIA) Landscape Design Institute (LDI)