Landscape Architecture: The Latest Architecture and News

Are tree covered buildings really in tune with ecological and sustainable principles, or are they just a form of greenwashing? This is the question posed by Kurt Kohlstedt in his essay, Renderings vs. Reality: The Improbable Rise of Tree-Covered Skyscrapers, for 99% Invisible. The author notes that vegetated designs come about for myriad reasons – the appearance of sustainability, better air and views, investment intrigue – but that most of these concepts will never leave the realm of paper or virtual architecture. For as many reasons that these buildings have become popular, there are detractors for why they simply cannot be built, including daunting construction hurdles (extra concrete and steel), vast irrigation systems, added wind load complexities, and the trees themselves having difficulty adapting to their vertiginous conditions.

We see opportunities for collaboration for art and architecture students and NuPath. We would love to engage the students in a potential competition project of creating sculptures to the name of those who were part of NuPath. The project is to design a single sculpture or installation that could be dynamically multiplied on site. The outdoor space is located on the back green space of the building, located in 147 New Boston Street in Woburn, MA and it is currently being planned as the Outdoor Sculpture Park. With the innovative and creative ideas from art and architecture students, we can help memorialize people that were part of the NuPath family.

Husqvarna invites you to take their survey, The Future of Parks, and share your insights into how parks will look and function in the year 2030. The UN has set a goal to make cities more sustainable in the coming decades, and parks will play an integral role in making that happen. Together with students from around the world, you will help to co-create a vision of what is to come!

At last year's Moscow Urban Forum, Charles Renfro discussed Diller Scofidio + Renfro's design for Zaryadye Park in Moscow. Located in the heart of the city, the park employs Wild Urbanist principles, which seek to emulate Russia's diverse landscapes – tundra, steppe, forest, and wetland – against a backdrop of architectural landmarks that includes the Kremlin, Red Square, and St. Basil’s Cathedral.

Platform 8 catalogs a curated selection of work generated in the past year at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design. Alongside final products of design education, Platform 8 places particular emphasis on collecting and documenting the people and artifacts that shape research-driven design practices. Here, design is presented both as process and as a final product. Indexical structure, punctuated with a collection of portraits, presents a comprehensive picture of the school. Platform 8 shows the intention, direction, and passion seen and experienced every day at the GSD.

The Brazilian artist Roberto Burle Marx (1909-1994) is one of the most prominent landscape architects of the twentieth century. His famous projects range from the remarkable mosaic pavements on the seaside avenue of Rio de Janeiro’s Copacabana Beach to the multitude of gardens that embellish Brasilia, one of several-large scale projects he executed in collaboration with famed architect Oscar Niemeyer. Although his landscape design work is renowned worldwide, the artist’s work in other media remains little known. Roberto Burle Marx: Brazilian Modernist therefore explores the richness and breadth of the artist’s oeuvre—from landscape architecture to painting, from sculpture to theater design, from tapestries to jewelry.

The Land Art Generator Initiative is delighted to announce that LAGI 2016 will be held in Southern California, with the City of Santa Monica as site partner. This free and open call ideas competition invites individuals or interdisciplinary teams to design a large-scale site-specific work of public art that also serves as clean energy and/or drinking water infrastructure for the City of Santa Monica.

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Update #4 (3/17/2016): We have received the following statement from the organizers of this competition, the Third Mind Foundation. Below the updates, you can read the new competition brief. ArchDaily is in no way affiliated with the competition itself or its organizers.

The International Biennial of Landscape Architecture is an international event, that takes place every two years in Barcelona, gathering architects, professionals, students and professors from all over the world.

The architecture drawing gallery Tulpenmanie invites talented young authors (max 30 years old) from all over the world to submit an unpublished drawing about architecture, landscape and the city. During the next Salone del Mobile Milano 2016 the best works will be part of the exhibition 30<30.

James Corner Field Operations has completed a nearly 6,000 square foot rooftop garden located in the heart of the DUMBO neighborhood in Brooklyn. The garden is located on top of a seventeen-story apartment complex designed by Leeser Architecture and developed by Two Trees Management. The Dock Street Rooftop Terrace allows residents to view the panoramic scenery of the Brooklyn Bridge, Manhattan Bridge, East River, and Manhattan Skyline.

UC Berkeley's College of Environmental Design is now accepting applications from prospective participants in the 2016 Summer [IN]STITUTE in Environmental Design. This six week intensive summer program gives students the opportunity to test their enthusiasm for the material and culture of environmental design.

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Beylikdüzü Municipality has announced “Valley of Life International Competition” in Beylikdüzü district in Istanbul. The competition is searching innovative and sustainable ideas for the development of the valley in Beylikdüzü. Competitors are invited to develop visionary concepts that focus on the whole valley and on the focal points determined. These concept descriptions should include an operational idea for the area and a description of the ecological corridor with transportation connections, bicycle routes, services, functionalities etc.

Lateral Office’s work follows its namesake, looking horizontally at problems and solutions across various fields. Exploring the intersections of systems, environment and architecture, the Canadian firm often situates its projects in unusual climatic and topographic conditions, finding ways to consolidate multi-disciplinary problems with multi-disciplinary solutions.

Lateral Office’s exhibit at the Chicago Architecture Biennial, “Making Camp” looks at strategies of city planning and adapts them to the wilderness, forming new typologies of the traditional campsite. Like their previous project, Arctic Adaptations (special mention at the Venice Biennale), “Making Camp” explores the way architecture can respond to, and take advantage of nature, simultaneously preserving and using the natural environment.

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After announcing five finalists in August of 2015, the World War I Centennial Commission has announced the winner of its National World War I Memorial competition: The Weight of Sacrifice by 25-year-old architect Joe Weishaar and sculptor Sabin Howard. The design focuses on the sacrificial cost of war through relief sculpture, quotations of soldiers, and a freestanding sculpture. Visitors are guided through the memorial’s changing elevations by quotation walls that describe the war from the point of view of generals, politicians, and soldiers.

The University of Oregon John Yeon Center for Architecture and the Landscape and Design Week Portland invite proposals to define, design, and bring to life Portland’s proposed “green loop”—a six-mile pedestrian/bike urban promenade linking the city’s east and west sides.

Deep Ellum developed in the late 1800s as a residential and commercial neighborhood on the east side of Downtown Dallas. The early 1900s flourished with industrial development, serving factory facilities for the Continental Gin Company and Henry Ford’s Model T. Deep Ellum’s real claim to fame was found in its music. By the 1920s, the neighborhood had become a hotbed for early jazz and blues musicians, hosting the likes of Blind Lemon Jefferson, Huddie “Leadbelly” Ledbetter, Texas Bill Day and Bessie Smith. Following WWII, the success of Deep Ellum started to fade. The ever-growing availability and use of the automobile led to the removal of the Houston and Texas Central railroad tracks -- to make way for the Central Expressway-- and by 1956 the streetcar line had been removed. Businesses closed and residents moved, and in 1969 a new elevation of Central Expressway truncated Deep Ellum, completely obliterating the 2400 block of Elm Street.

The 6th annual AZ Awards is now open for submissions! The competition is open to architects, landscape architects, interior designers, product designers, clients, manufacturers and students for work completed before December 31, 2015. Entries will be juried by a panel of international design experts. (Keep an eye open for the jury announcement soon!)