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Photo credit: Philip Arnold In late May, the Landscape Architecture Foundation (LAF) announced McKenzie Wilhelm as the recipient of the 2013 inaugural undergraduate National Olmsted Scholar award.  Considering her accomplishments in school at the Ohio State University, her work as an enterprising volunteer, and numerous extracurricular activities it’s not surprising that McKenzie was awarded the honor, but it is no less impressive.   McKenzie was excited to talk to Land8 about her award-winning project proposal.  In the following interview she described her research project for the Olmsted Scholarship and shared her thoughts on the landscape architecture profession.   Hi McKenzie.  As a National Olmsted Scholar you have been given a great opportunity to pursue independent study and researc...Read More

Did you feel the heat last week? You’re not alone. Above is NOAA’s temperature gradient map of the US with temperatures ranging from 70 to 107+ degrees Fahrenheit from last week. Check out the link for more stats. (Atlantic Cities)   LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE   MNLA’s landscape architect Terrie Brightman sings the praises of stainless steel and cites its strength, uses, and forms in the landscape and beyond. (Metropolis) OMA sweeps to victory in the competition to design the $1 billion Miami Beach Convention Center and the surrounding 52-acre mixed-use development. ArchDaily also has a video interview with OMA’s Shohei Shigematsu on the Miami project. (ArchDaily) Started by a group of architects, landscape architects, and urban designers, Projexity is an online, crowds...Read More

e-architect have been doing guided architecture walking tours since 2000, in cities such as Edinburgh, London and Copenhagen. They have architectural tour guides in most major cities across the world. The latest addition is Palermo (their 55th city) and next up is the central American country of Guatemala, bringing a more offbeat option for more adventurous travellers. The most popular tours are London, Barcelona and Istanbul. Although the typical tours are architectural e-architect have provided tours for many groups of landscape architects over the years. They have quite a few landscape architect guides on their books and most cities have more than one guide to try to accommodate different languages, for example in London there are guides who can speak Spanish, Portuguese, French and Ger...Read More

LAN returns with a new edition in the Top Ten Sketches series. Every time we seek to select the most imaginative and crafty work by our readers. So check out our new edition!     10. by Simon Bussiere This is a view from the train station in Albany, NY. A 10 minute sketch, it started with a nice grease spot from a pepperoni that fell off a slice of pizza I was consuming! The sketchbook page was tilted slightly and the meat slid a few centimetres across the page, starting the light brown streak in the centre of the sketch. I ate the pepperoni and proceeded with my cyan Le Pen to outline the city horizon, then used a light grey, dark grey, and cyan Tombo marker to add some tonal value. 9. by Mahafuj Ali The sketch was an impression of a proposed school hostel in Bhutan. It was desi...Read More

As landscape architecture students, the rapture upon completing a university year is something we all look forward to, and come crunch-time, can often be the shimmering light and the end of a very dark tunnel. The holiday period between each university years is a great time to kick back and relax; after all, you deserve it. But during this stage of quietude, it is also essential to continue the learning process to ensure a cognitive mindset come the new academic year. With all that spare time on your hands, here are five valuable steps to help you stay sharp over the break. 1. Read a book or three (landscape architecture related) Reading has a myriad of positive effects, but during the semester it can often be hard to capture the edification books provide due to the laborious nature of you...Read More

Once in awhile, a great design comes along that creates a physical plane that boosts a community’s already strong spirit. So it is with Kiryat Sefer Park in Tel Aviv, where a spark of nature has not only livened up the built environment, but created a platform for successful community collaborations with landscape architects.   The area was once a garage for the Tel Aviv police, with 12,000 square meters of parking lot, bare ground, and a few large Eucalyptus trees from the British mandate. The unique part of the story of its transformation is that the community started to call it a park even before it became a park. For many years, every Friday afternoon after the parking lot emptied of cars, the community would gather to have picnics. It became a playful place for children to dig and dis...Read More

With the recent article, ‘Architect Jeanne Gang threads nature into urban landscapes’, making the rounds in landscape architecture news feeds, I thought that now might be a good time to highlight one of Studio Gang’s projects, The Nature Boardwalk & Landscape at Lincoln Park Zoo.   The goal of the project was to create a “slice of prairie in the big-city” by revitalizing Lincoln Park’s South Pond at the Lincoln Park Zoo. Led by the design team of Studio Gang Architects,—the first female-led firm to commission a skyscraper in Chicago–and the landscape architecture and sustainable design firm WRD Environmental, the project transformed a once-polluted and neglected urban pond to an educational, family-oriented space buzzing with people and w...Read More

Move over Eiffel Tower, there’s a new eye-catching attraction on the Siene River Banks: a four-meter-tall chrome T-Rex Skeleton. (Inhabitat)   LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE Project for Public Spaces shares ’26 Ways to Make Great Spaces,’ an excerpt from the new e-book ‘How to Design Our World for Happiness.’ A lot of the advice centers on embracing the outdoors, having fun, and staying friendly; tips that could also be applied to everyday life. (Project for Public Spaces)   ASLA releases the latest LAND E-News. (ASLA)   Here are some highlights:   A recap of the 4th Annual Advocacy Summit (link)   Landscape Architecture Public Awareness Reps Take to the Streets (link)   The announcement of EPA’s free upcoming webinar for landscape architects (link)    & the...Read More

 Swiss photographer Gus Petro performs some “Photoshop magic” to blend together the extremes of “emptiness and density” in the U.S. landscape. (The Atlantic Cities) LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE   ASLA honors 33 members to the ASLA Council of Fellows for 2013. (ASLA)  Oakland adds Bird Safety Measures to its building permit requirements, limiting types of materials and lighting in the landscape to curb rising bird mortality rates. (Golden Gate Audubon)   Landscape Forms puts the spotlight on campus planning for the 2013 annual round table. (PR Web)   A look at creating play environments and educational public spaces in zoos. (The Field)   & RELATED   L.A. residents in drought-plagued Southern California have been taking advantage of the “green-for-green trade:...Read More

Design students tackle environmental problems in Electrolux’s “Inspired Urban Living” design competition. (Atlantic Cities) LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE   Rutgers landscape architecture students travel to work on design projects in the Caribbean island of St. Croix. They also created a video (well done, I might add) that covers the students’ love for the field as well as lessons learned. (Rutgers)   ASLA is looking to hire a Professional Practice Coordinator. (ASLA)   Garden historian Tom Turner welcomes the birth of the Royal Baby with a somewhat hilarious plea for its support of a London Greenway Network. (Garden Visit)    & RELATED   Strengthening our urban commons is key to improved city life and sustainable futures. (Switchboard)   Imagine sharing one house with ...Read More

When I was a senior in high school, I went on a student trip to see a performance of a Shakespeare play in the gardens of Vizcaya, an estate in Miami, Florida. Admittedly (and a bit embarrassingly), I don’t remember what play it was or much about it, because I was more transfixed by the moonlit atmosphere of the gardens where the play was staged. My tastes in garden and landscape design have run far in another direction since then, but when I went for a return visit this year with family (followed by mind-numbing amounts of delicious Cuban food in Miami’s Little Havana neighborhood), I remembered why I found it to be such a special place. Vizcaya, which is now run as a museum, was conceived by James Deering, a wealthy industrialist whose father founded what became the giant International H...Read More