Terrace Garden in New Delhi

Independent houses in Delhi's older, low-rise colonies typically keep a usable roof terrace, unlike most flats in Gurugram's high-rise stock, which counts close to 1,900 towers with little private outdoor roof space. A terrace garden design in the city makes the most of this remaining space, with planters, a small lawn area and seating laid out around the terrace's actual drainage points rather than reworked around a slope added later.

Timing the planting to the monsoon

Delhi's monsoon typically arrives by the end of June or the first week of July and continues into early October, giving new trees, shrubs and lawn grass roughly three months of natural rain before winter's dry, cold stretch. A terrace garden planted at the start of this window establishes with far less manual watering than one started in the dry heat of May.

Part of South Delhi's own green cover

South Delhi's administrative district carried about 20% green cover as of 2009, spread across parks, biodiversity parks and the private gardens and terraces of its many independent houses. A terrace garden on one of these houses adds to that existing green cover rather than competing with a green belt planned by the city, since the two sit on different kinds of land entirely. This is simply a description of how the district's green space adds up, not a reason to plant differently, since a terrace garden is still designed around the household's own use of the space first. A terrace that already gets full sun through the day needs less supplemental plant selection adjustment than a shaded one hemmed in by taller neighbouring buildings.