Greenwich Peninsula Gardens, London

A complex public landscape project set over three acres on the doorstep of the Millennium Dome for developer Knight Dragon.  This project was detail designed, project managed and planted by Harris Bugg Studio as part of the wider creative design team that included Tom Dixon, Thomas Hoblyn, Marks Barfield Architects and Alys Fowler.

Undulating landforms create places to play, picnic, lunch, romance and take refuge in the green. Rich meadows of UK natives create new habitats, encouraging birds, bees and insects. Groves of trees give shelter from the wind that whips across the Peninsula. Much of the planting is designed as forageable edibles. An open amphitheatre of hexagonal cast concrete forms creates a very special public space for sharing anything from Tai Chi to poetry recitals.

This was a technically challenging project that included toxic initial soil conditions, wind and site exposure and a high volume of users from day one of opening. Moreover, the hard and soft landscaping had to be integrated with the construction programme of a highly ambitious architectural development that was being built alongside it. It was completed within a tight budget and on schedule and is now a much-used green oasis in an area of otherwise intense hard landscaping and traffic.