Fayetteville contractor lands green roof project for AWSOM in Bentonville

Fayetteville-based Ozark Green Roofs was recently selected as the contractor for the more than 2-acre green roof for the Alice L. Walton School of Medicine in Bentonville.

Lee Porter, owner of Ozark Green Roofs, said the green roof will be the largest in Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Missouri. It will be similar in size to the 2.5-acre green roof for the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco.

Construction on the 154,000-square-foot school building is underway east of Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art. The multimillion-dollar rooftop project is slated to start in fall 2024 and to be completed by summer or fall 2025, Porter said. Ozark Green Roofs is collaborating with architect Polk Stanley Wilcox and designer OSD on the project. Hydrotech will supply the materials.

Porter said Geofoam will comprise the largest amount of material for the project. The foam will be installed between the soil and the roof deck and will be shaped to create hills on the rooftop. The green roof will include stone terraces, pathways, more than 90 native trees, native shrubs, perennials and a water feature.

“It’s more like a park on a roof,” Porter said. “The roof slopes significantly from the top corner down across the whole building, and at the base, it bleeds into the ground plane. There are trails from the Crystal Bridges campus that will lead you to this campus. You can walk on these trails up the building. If you were engaged in an interesting conversation — talking and walking — you might not even know you’re walking up onto this green roof.”

Ozark Green Roofs will have five office staff and 12 on-site employees working on the project. Porter established the green roof company in 2018.