The Daily Blend for Tuesday, July 30, 2013

By Lucy Wang on July 30, 2013 No Comments / 3272 views

The Daily Blend for Tuesday, July 30, 2013

David Tulloch, Associate Professor of landscape architecture at Rutgers, shares some great pictures of public art in city landscapes to draw attention to proposed 49% funding cut to the National Endowment for the Arts budget. The photo above is from El Parc de l’Estació del Nord. (Places and Spaces)

LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE

Adriaan Geuze joined Mayor Bloomberg last week to officially launch The Trust for Governors Island’s campaign to privately fund the construction of The Hills, the centerpiece of the Governors Island Park and Public Space Master Plan, designed by West8. The large hills, which draw design inspiration from Olmsted’s Central Park, will be completely constructed from recycled construction material and provide panoramic views of the Lower Manhattan skyline and New York Harbor. Land8
In anticipation of the upcoming 2013 ASLA conference, GSD professor Tom Ryan, FASLA, writes a love letter on the city of Boston. (IFLA)

Jeffrey Tumlin’s piece ‘How Better Urban Design Makes Us Healthier, Happier, and Sexier’ has been making the rounds in landscape architecture news for the past week. I hesitated to share because, as the comments point out, the article is preaching to the choir. However, there are some interesting points raised in the comments section, so make sure you take a look at the discussion after the article. (GOOD)

& RELATED

Do you Geocache? Geocaching is a wildly popular “free real-word outdoor treasure hunt” that is played all around the world. Not only is it fun, the game also has the potential to bring people closer to the cities around them, by uncovering urban gems and forgotten histories, like in Exmachina’s DC mural-specific geocaching series. (Greater Greater Washington)

Another story of re-adaptive space use: New York City repurposes under-utilized parking garages for swanky bars, art galleries, and music venues. Take a look at the list of transformed spaces, you may be surprised to find that you’ve been to one or two of these places without realizing its architectural past! (Untapped Cities)

If you’re in New York City this Saturday and were waffling on attending (the amazing!) Summer Streets, here’s a concrete reason why you must go: for the first time since the 1930s, the cavernous tunnel will be open to pedestrians. What’s more, the car-free tunnel will be transformed into an incandescent, echoing, interactive art show. (NY Times)

The Daily Blend is Breaking Ground on the Latest in Landscape Architecture. Have any good stories you’d like to share? Post them on Land8’s Story Board section!