Chicago — The Greening Rooftops for Sustainable Communities Conference is the first North American Green Roof Infrastructure Conference, Awards and Trade Show. This event, co-sponsored by the City of Chicago and Green Roofs for Healthy Cities, took place in Chicago on May 29 and 30. The first ever Green Roof Awards for Excellence winners included:

Retrofit Extensive Award — Montgomery Park Business Centre, Baltimore, Md., Owner, Himmerlrich Assoc. Ltd., accepted by Katrin Scholz-Barth Consulting, Washington, D.C. This large-scale adaptive re-use of the Montgomery Ward Catalog Warehouse contains an extensive 30,000-square-foot green roof completed in 2002.

New Extensive Award — Gap Inc., 901 Cherry Offices, San Bruno, Calif., accepted by Kevin Burke, William McDonough + Partners, Charlottesville, Va. The GAP Inc. offices blend into a steeply sloping savanna foothill site. The 69,000-square-foot green roof with native grasses and wildflowers is a defining sustainable design feature.

Retrofit Intensive Award — Garden Room, Shorewood, Wis., Owner, Deborah Kern, accepted by Karen Koberstein, Buettner and Associates, Fox Point, Wis. Atop a rehabilitated retail store this 1,900-square-foot green roof occupies half the roof area and is planted with a wide range of hardy native and non-native perennials, vines, ornamental grasses, trees and shrubs, used for merchandise displays and educating consumers.

New Construction Intensive Award — Ducks Unlimited National Headquarters and Oak Hammock Marsh, Interpretive Centre, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Owner, Ducks Unlimited, accepted by Robert Eastwood, Number Ten Architectural Group, Winnipeg, Manitoba. Two green roofs totaling 28,190 square feet help the 54,00-square-foot, two-story concrete frame building blend into the internationally designated wetland marsh and prairie surrounding it.

Retrofit Combination Intensive/Extensive Award — Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum Green Roof Demonstration Garden, Chicago Academy of Sciences, Chicago, accepted by Bruce Dvorak, Conservation Design Forum, Elmhurst, Ill. The project provides an opportunity for plant survivability research.

New Combination Intensive/Extensive Award — Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints Conference Center, Salt Lake City, Utah, accepted by Susan Weiler, Olin Partnership, Philadelphia. Completed in 2000, the 1.1-million–square-foot structure is one of the world’s largest religious buildings. A multi-level, eight-acre green roof helped meet the design objectives of integrating the building into the landscape.