Open Access

Lotus Garden

Upper West Side, Manhattan

Credit: Lotus Garden

Sun, October 20th, 2024

10:00am — 2:00pm

Designed by Carrie Maher and Mark Greenwald in 1984 and perched atop the salmon-brick Columbia condo tower’s parking garage, this oasis in the sky features varied flowers, fruit trees, shrubs, and lotus ponds inhabited by schools of fish. The 1/6th-acre paradise, with three feet of dirt underfoot and multiple birds’ nests tucked overhead, is among the city’s oldest rooftop gardens. The Lotus Garden wows people who climb the short flight of stairs with its colorful and fragrant abundance surprisingly wedged between apartment buildings. Experienced gardeners will be on hand on Sunday to explain the site’s past, present and future, to describe the plantings, and to share how this oasis is maintained.

Visitors must go up one flight of stairs to access the garden. The garden paths are mulched and may be uneven.

1984; Carrie Maher and Mark Greenwald

Harlem, Manhattan