Charles Birnbaum, founder and president of the Cultural Landscape Foundation, makes the case that historical preservationists are finally waking up to the glories of modernist landscape architecture.

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How can rural dynamics be employed to adequately cope with the global challenges that we are currently facing and how can these challenges once again turn rural areas into a system that works? The Veenkoloniën (Groningen peat district) is a rural area in the North of the Netherlands that is facing a number of major economic, social and ecological challenges. As an agricultural area, the region is part of a global system. Consequently, its challenges are not caused by internal factors, but by the global food system and this system’s impact on the area, i.e. the social, economic and ecological environment that it creates.

The new agricultural model requires a new production system: an intelligent seven-year crop and livestock rotation that integrates temporary nature areas. Processing is divided into a cooperative network of local, regional and national processing hubs: a choice is always made between transport costs and the benefits of scale. This results in development opportunities at all levels of scale and renewed social significance for the food industry. The infrastructure network is adapted to facilitate these new development opportunities and to ensure that the production area can once again be accessed and experienced by both consumers and producers alike.

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Just a couple of years ago, if you wanted to make something look trendier, you put a bird on it. Birds were everywhere. I’m not sure if Twitter was what started all the flutter, but it got so bad that Portlandia performed a skit named, you guessed it, “Put a Bird On It“.¹

It turns out architects have been doing the same thing, just with trees. Want to make a skyscraper look trendy and sustainable? Put a tree on it. Or better yet, dozens. Many high-concept skyscraper proposals are festooned with trees. On the rooftop, on terraces, in nooks and crannies, on absurdly large balconies. Basically anywhere horizontal and high off the ground. Now, I should be saying architects are drawing dozens, because I have yet to see one of these “green” skyscrapers in real life. (There’s one notable exception—BioMilano, which isn’t quite done yet.) If—and it’s a big if—any of these buildings ever get built, odds are they’ll be stripped of their foliage quicker than a developer can say “return on investment”. It’s just not realistic. I get it why architects draw them on their buildings. Really, I do. But can we please stop?

There are plenty of scientific reasons why skyscrapers don’t—and probably won’t—have trees, at least not to the heights which many architects propose. Life sucks up there. For you, for me, for trees, and just about everything else except peregrine falcons. It’s hot, cold, windy, the rain lashes at you, and the snow and sleet pelt you at high velocity. Life for city trees is hard enough on the ground. I can’t imagine what it’s like at 500 feet, where nearly every climate variable is more extreme than at street level.

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Guangzhou Huadi Fangcun (Flower City), located at Southern China, is a former delta land with traditional horticultural legacy of nowadays Guangzhou. With speedy expansion of the horticultural industry, the current scattered and disorganized land use of the area has pushed back the nature and its eco system is severely polluted. The Guangzhou Government is in search of a sustainable solution to the current problem in the era of rapid urban development. West 8’s winning entry provides the city a masterplan with sustainable vision.

The plan has the site area of 2,050 ha. (20.5km2), whereas more than 450 ha. is wetlands area. It consists of new living and industrial environments with ecological water system, wetlands, distinct division of land use zoning, urban planning with a highlight of cultural heritage and a design of an International Flora Expo Masterplan which will function as a focal point and economic generator for the whole development.

Guangzhou Fangcun Huadi (Flower City), located at Southern China, is a former delta land with traditional horticultural legacy of nowadays Guangzhou. With speedy expansion of the horticultural industry, the current scattered and disorganized land use of the area has pushed back the nature and its eco system is noticeably polluted. The Guangzhou Government is in search of a sustainable solution to the current problem in the era of rapid urban development. West 8’s winning entry provides the city a masterplan with sustainable vision on Fangchun Huadi.

The plan has the site area of 2,050 ha. (20.5km2), whereas more than 450 ha. is wetlands area. It consists of new living and industrial environments with ecological water system, wetlands, distinct division of land uses, urban planning with a highlight of cultural heritage and a design of an International Flora Expo Masterplan which will function as a focal point and economic generator for the whole development

Ecological Cleaning System and Distinctive Land Division

Flower Fields inside the Expo

The Masterplan vision starts with the introduction of an ecological water system network. Implementing this system will rearrange the land use structure on a large scale. It consists of the main ecological cleaning machine imbedded in locations, a Primary Water Collector System, Secondary Water Connector with Water Locks (Inlets/Outlets) and Tertiary Water Network of Small Scale Ditches (canals) which will be streaming along the gridline corresponding to the Guangzhou and Fushan cities historical axis, the Canton axis. It will create a systematic land use for horticulture industry purposes, improve logistics and allow keeping CO2 emission low.

Ecological Cleaning Structure

This strategy also helps to identify a robust structure for healthier urban development. West 8 proposes a zoning plan with distinctive division between horticultural land use and urban area. This involves a careful implementation of the new ecological water system network while preserving the major existing infrastructure, historical monuments and also recent housing development. Although reallocation of the industrial developments and housing areas will take place, distinctive architectural guidelines are given to guarantee the better quality of urban design. Shadow is emphasized; pocket parks and green inner courtyard within city and a riverside park with bicycle lane will be introduced. A Central Park will also be established by hosting the Guangzhou International Flora Expo in the first phase of the development. This Expo will be designed as a compact event. After the year when the expo takes place it will be transformed into a metropolitan park of Guangzhou: the Central Park of Huadi Island.

Resstructured Water Edge

International Flora Expo “Sensations”

The Flora Expo design consists of different theme areas: The compact core area, Flower Fields, Romance Gardens, Hidden / Secret Gardens, The Herbs Garden and Gardens of Sound. One of the key features will be The Palace of Flowers which locates at the centre point of the urban expo Canton axis. West 8 proposed a car-free green village to serve the Flower Expo as service zone. After the Expo event the Village stays with its legacy with museums, hotels and restaurants at the Central Park of Huadi Island as a living icon, where tradition and innovation meet.

Flower Fields at the Expo

All together a coherent recreation and mobility network is created consisting out of boulevards, squares and parks, which fulfill both excellent access and a high quality of life.

client:

Planning Bureau of Liwan District, Guangzhou City People’s Government

team:

Adriaan Geuze, Christoph Elsasser, Edzo Bindels, Attilio Ranieri, Ben Wegdam, Hernando Arrazola, Igor Saitov, Jan Breukelman, Kunkook Bae, Marco van der Pluym, Tanyi Huang, Winnie Poon, Yu-Han Chiu

The competition jury comprised Richard Plunz, Pofessor, Columbia University GSAPP & Director, Urban Design Lab; David J. Lewis, Founding Partner, LTL Architects; Robert M Rogers, Founding Partner, Rogers Marvel Architects; Andrew Simons, Chairman, Gowanus Canal Conservancy; and Joel Towers, Dean, Parsons The New School For Design.

While reviewing the over 150 submissions, the jurors agreed that no single entry fully addressed the multitude of challenges presented by the competition brief and therefore decided to award winners in three categories instead: Urban Ecology, Architectural Design, and Community Programming.

Category: Urban Ecology

Studio TJOA: Audrey Worden, Alex Worden; Brooklyn, New York” src=”http://www.bustler.net/images/sized/images/news2/water_works_winners-02-530×352.jpg” width=”530″ border=”0″ />

1st Place: Water_Works
Studio TJOA: Audrey Worden, Alex Worden; Brooklyn, New York

Pilot Projects: Scott Francisco, James Wilson, Drew Powers; New York, New York” src=”http://www.bustler.net/images/sized/images/news2/water_works_winners-03_1-530×354.jpg” width=”530″ border=”0″ />

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From Archinect

Interdisciplinary teams will focus on the planning, design, construction and retrofitting of urban environments for the 21st century. — cau.mit.edu

Scatliff + Miller + Murray A design sketch for a commercial streetscape. Landscape architects work as part of a design team to ensure buildings appropriately engage the public realm

There is nothing more frustrating than flying into a new city while sitting in the middle seat of an airplane. You stretch to see over the person beside you who’s pressed up against the small round window. You strain to catch a glimpse of the city passing below you, trying to formulate that first impression of the place you are about to experience.

We often seem to rate the urban quality of North American cities in this way, as if we are 1,000 feet in the air. The size of its freeways or the height of its skyline resonate as symbols of civic affluence and vibrancy.

The true health of a city, however, must be judged from its sidewalks. Its urban quality can’t be measured from the height of its towers. It can only be found in the spaces between those buildings. The human experience is not defined by how buildings engage the sky, but how they engage the ground, how they define public space, how they facilitate a social connection between the people in and around them.

The quality of these spaces is what makes a city livable and prosperous. Active parks, sidewalks, plazas and courtyards work together as an integrated network of open space that can attract people to live, work and invest in a city. When done well, they can be a catalyst for growth and development. When done poorly, they can enable crime and promote urban decay.

As cities look to increase density and become more sustainable, the need for quality public space has become vitally important. With this pressure, the voice of the landscape architect has become recognized as a key contributor in the design of healthy cities.

During Winnipeg’s recent growth spurt, headlines have generally focused on the construction of shiny new buildings. Less celebrated has been the role landscape architecture is playing in improving our city’s health and quality of life through interventions at all scales of development.

At the largest scale, landscape design is transforming Winnipeg through a complete renaissance of our neglected regional park system. The most significant project is occurring at Assiniboine Park, which is in the midst of a $200-million redevelopment that has already revolutionized the city’s premier green space. Under construction is the zoo’s Journey to Churchill exhibit that will become a global centre for northern wildlife education, research and conservation.

At a civic level, landscape design in Winnipeg has recently been implemented as a successful catalyst for growth and neighbourhood rejuvenation. The construction of Waterfront Drive along the Red River converted an abandoned rail line into a network of parks, plazas and pathways that provided the spark for hundreds of new residential units, stimulating the economic rehabilitation of the entire Exchange District. Further west, the redevelopment of Central Park has taken a once crime-filled, derelict urban space and transformed it into a proud neighbourhood focal point and public gathering place that has uplifted an entire community.

Landscape architects work as part of a design team to ensure buildings appropriately engage the public realm, strengthening their connection to the human scale. A successful example of this is the urban plaza that creates a transition from the stark glass walls of Manitoba Hydro Place to a sun-drenched public gathering place along Graham Avenue. Similarly, an integrated landscape design will be essential to ensure the introduction of the towering Canadian Museum for Human Rights does not diminish the pedestrian scale of The Forks site. New landscapes can also redefine existing buildings, exemplified by the City Hall Plaza and Steinkopf Gardens redevelopment at the Manitoba Centennial Centre that reconnect austere modernist designs with their urban fabric.

Landscape architecture influences every part of our city, right down to our neighbourhood playgrounds, schoolyards, skate parks, wetlands and retention ponds. As their profile and public responsibility grows, it is becoming important the profession of landscape architecture regulates the skills and qualifications of those who practise in their field. For this reason, the Manitoba Association of Landscape Architects is currently working with the provincial government to secure “name-act legislation.” This legislation would restrict the use of the title landscape architect to those with the education, training and qualifications defined by the association, similar to that of other design professions such as architects, engineers and planners.

Three provinces currently have similar legislation and others are progressing toward it. Professional regulation would help to ensure industry competence and ethical practice by establishing comprehensive standards that work to protect public health, well-being and quality of life, while promoting design expertise that enhances our natural environment and cultural heritage.

The design palette of a landscape architect is composed of living things; things that change each year, things that grow and die and transform through the seasons. The spaces they create redefine themselves over time. They bring us together, encourage social interaction and enhance our connection to the environment. The ability to compose these spaces with a knowledge of how they will live, grow and evolve through the years is the magic landscape architects as professional designers bring to our cities and to our lives.

Brent Bellamy is senior design architect for Number Ten Architectural Group.

bbellamy@numberten.com

Our introductory Green Team blog addressed a common misconception: There is no space left for new landscapes in New York City, the dense urban expanse that is our home turf. In fact, there are available spaces, but they’re likely to come with some complex problems. Finding ourselves wrestling with small, challenging, and limited spaces, we sometimes take an unexpected approach. We look up!

Our initial site analysis for New York projects—and others—entails, in part, identifying ALL available space than can be improved. Crisp, white walls may be de rigueur for the interior artist, but they are far too banal for a vibrant, metropolitan landscape. By using a site’s vertical surfaces, we can expand the benefits of a project to include increased planting areas, aesthetically appealing live or inanimate screens, thoughtfully designed edge conditions, improved views, reduced cooling requirements for adjacent buildings, and the mitigation of urban heat island effect (UHI), thus furthering the definition of “the space.”

The design of exterior vertical surfaces can take on many forms and configurations including green screens, green walls, cable trellis systems, wall-mounted planters, trellises, and planters housingfastigiate (columnar) species, to name a few. The selection of the proper treatment for these surfaces is based on sun/shade conditions, design intent, the structural capacity of the surface to receive the enhancement, available soil volume for plants, and so on. If we propose a woven wire or cable trellis system, we must consider the method of its attachment to the building’s surface as well as whether the receiving wall or support structure can sustain its weight load in addition to the living, twining plants that will grow over the plane. Some factors that influence plant selection, as well as the ultimate success of the installation, are planters, soil volume, irrigation, and solar orientation.

We work with a wide variety of systems and approaches on vertical landscapes throughout the city. At Spring Street Plaza, a 200-foot-long wall abutting the adjacent building was designed and installed to allow us to use a vertical screen system for vines. This wall provided the structural support for the vegetated system while ensuring that no portion of the work was attached to or interfered with the structure of the neighboring property (our post on property lines talks about the consequences of this). Once installed, the green screen, with its dense vine cover comprising six vine species, provided a sense of enclosure for the plaza, acting as a vegetated backdrop to the small “rooms” of the plaza design. The wire grid also provided structure for the installation of custom light tubes into the screen, creating a playful effect of illuminated planting at night. The 10-foot height of the new wall—a pedestrian scale intervention— also helps deemphasize the presence of the adjacent building.

A view south across one of the seating “rooms” of the plaza showing the vine-covered green screen along the western edge of the site. Photo courtesy Elizabeth Felicella

Light tubes inserted into pockets in the wire grid screen accent the vines and illuminate the site. Photo courtesy Elizabeth Felicella

A similar type of installation was completed at Ennead Architects’ new Staten Island Courthouse, where vines and custom screen panels span the four stories of a new parking structure on the building’s east and west facades. A mixture of five plant species was used to provide seasonal interest and texture to its surface.

A wire mesh screen system and vines were used to enhance the facade of the Staten Island Courthouse on Central Avenue.  Photo courtesy Elizabeth Felicella

Wall mounted planters provide an alternative to mesh and cable systems that are typically enhanced by vine planting. The planters allow for a greater variety of plant species and types, but they come with their own constraints. At Time Warner Center, we installed a series of metal planters along the sidewalk and at the building entry. In addition to structural concerns, these planters required a complex irrigation system and lighting installation. Plant selection was determined based on limited soil volume (which restricts the growth potential of a plant), and the largely south-facing aspect of the planters (hot! hot! hot!). The planters required insulation to moderate heat from the sun and from the lighting elements integrated into the design. Due to irrigation and the small soil volume, effective drainage was also a concern. Through careful detailing and consultant coordination, this vertical landscape continues to thrive nine years later, enhancing the experience of the area for passersby.

The wall mounted planters at Time Warner Center enhance the pedestrian level facade by incorporating landscaping on the vertical building surface. Photo courtesy Mathews Nielsen

Vertical landscape interventions are clearly advantageous in providing urban denizens with lush, living surroundings. Such applications proved beneficial to us when we were working on a series ofPrivately Owned Public Spaces (POPS). These are subject to approval by the New York City Department of City Planning, which works with private developers to provide them. The abundant amenities required by the NYCDCP’s regulations often require highly creative uses of available space; we will discuss this in our next post.

Terrie Brightman, RLA, ASLA is a practicing landscape architect at Mathews Nielsen Landscape Architects in New York City with over eight years of professional experience. Since receiving her BLA from the Pennsylvania State University, she has worked on riverfronts in Pittsburgh, private residences in California and Florida, a sustainable community in Turkey, and multiple public parks, plaza and waterfronts throughout New York City.

In a city of the importance and scale of Caracas, offering ample and accessible recreational spaces for the enjoyment of its citizens becomes a social necessity. Protecting green areas for the ecological benefit of the city is also fundamental. The transformation of “La Carlota” airport into an urban park offers a unique and critical opportunity to value, protect and ensure a better social and ecological future for the people of the city.

The proposal is concentrated on three main gestures. The first is to understand the city as a interconnected network of public spaces, recreational areas and green corridors that clarify the city´s legibility and guarantee better pedestrian movement. The second is the concentration of social and programmatic activities into public nodes understood as a “System of Cultural Parks”, where “La Carlota” represents a catalyst toward its conceptualization and implementation. Lastly, attention is paid to the physical organization of “La Carlota’s” 405 acres which evolves through a process of determined phases. The organization of the park is composed of three “layers” that also reveal the history of the site. A line of indigenous trees delineate the topography of the site (the natural state), the runway is transformed into a boulevard (the present condition), and programmatic “cells” become the new addition and layer of the site (the green future).

Many of the existing hangars and buildings are recycled and converted into cultural and educational centers. New bridges over the Fajardo highway north of the site connect the new park with Roberto Burle Marx’s “Parque del Este” and other neighborhoods south and east of the park are connected by means of pedestrian bridges and new access points. Furthermore, two north-south traffic corridors are introduced traversing the park without interrupting the spatial continuity of the surface while significantly improving vehicular and public transportation mobility in the city.

Pista Viva | Caracas Venezuela | Enlace Arquitectura
Pista Viva (Alive Runway) – Revealing the landscape of the “Carlota”

Out of 104 teams, 69 submissions were entered and three teams received winning prices.
Enlace Arquitectura were chosen as one of the winning teams.

Project Team |
Elisa Silva, Ines Casanova, Leonardo Robleto Costante, Sergio dos Santos, Katherine Aguilar, Valentina Caradonna

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The city is our space and do not possess other, Perec writes, but when a place becomes truly our city? And ‘in the cracks of corrugated spaces, polymorphs and changing urban horizon, real and imagined a city in the light of other ideals (from’ intercultural, peace, to-do city ….), who must progress the evolution of places – in the dialogue – against the perimeter of the space, against the logic of belonging and identity that determine closures racism, self-centered and exclusionary visions, to instead help to promote a city-permeable, woven of relational webs, crossed by sociality in motion, where differences give rise to dialogue, rather than to processes of marginalization.

OAM Architecture project a new sculpture/architecture for an art park in Bolzano.