Redesigned White House Rose Garden / Melania Trump twitter
Landscape Architects Create New Spitzer Scholarship — 08/27/20, Real Estate Weekly
“The three-year fellowship was established by Hollander Design Landscape Architects to encourage and support New York City students from demographics and communities that are historically underrepresented in landscape architecture to pursue the field.”
The Full Story Behind the Controversial Rose Garden Redesign — 08/27/20, Architectural Digest
“Per Eric Groft of Oehme, van Sweden, Mrs. Trump prefers pastel flowers, hence the current abundance of John F. Kennedy and Pope John Paul II white roses, relieved here and there by Peace roses in pink and cream. (Seasonal bulbs and annuals will populate the zigzag borders that front the parterres’ triangular compartments.)”
Revamped White House Rose Garden Lambasted on Social Media — 08/25/20, The Architect’s Newspaper
“Just ahead of the Republic National Convention, Melania Trump this past weekend revealed a refreshed and redesigned White House Rose Garden. And despite some elements of the horticultural overhaul being beneficial or needing time to grow in, reactions from the architecture and landscape architecture community as well as armchair critics on social media has been decidedly not great.”
Amazon and FedEx Push to Put Delivery Robots on Your Sidewalk — 08/25/20, Wired
“In February, a lobbyist friend urged Erik Sartorius, the executive director of the Kansas League of Municipalities, to look at a newly introduced bill that would affect cities. The legislation involved ‘personal delivery devices’—robots that, as if in a sci-fi movie, might deliver a bag of groceries, a toolbox, or a prescription to your doorstep.”
The Therapeutic Power of Gardening — 08/24/20, The New Yorker
“Eight out of ten people in Britain live in a home with a private garden; one in ten at least has access to a balcony, a terrace, a patio, or a communal garden. The national affection for gardening sustains a horticulture industry that is worth about thirty billion dollars a year to the U.K. economy.”
How Decades of Racist Housing Policy Left Neighborhoods Sweltering — 08/24/20, The New York Times
“In the 1930s, federal officials redlined these neighborhoods in Richmond, Va., marking them as risky investments because residents were Black. Today, they are some of the hottest parts of town in the summer, with few trees and an abundance of heat-trapping pavement.”
While Americans are focused on the pandemic and racial injustice, the vast majority still think climate change is a critically important issue. Americans increasingly believe climate change is real, happening now, and caused by human activity. They believe it will negatively impact their lives and those of future generations if nothing is done to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. According to a new survey, a large majority of Americans want to see some form of action from governments and businesses to reduce emissions. And 25% of Americans have become an “issue public” on climate change, meaning they consider the issue of “great personal importance” and are likely to “vote based on candidates’ climate policy platforms.” The issue public for climate change is at an all-time high.
The representative survey of 999 respondents in the U.S. was conducted by Stanford University, Resources for the Future, a Washington, D.C.-based environmental research organization, and ReconMR, a survey research firm. The survey, which has been conducted since 1997, offers a unique perspective on changes in beliefs over time.
Some key findings from the survey:
The vast majority of Americans believe the planet has been warming and will continue to warm
In 2020, 81% of Americans believe that the Earth has been warming over the past century, the largest percentage since the survey began. Furthermore, 76 percent believe the planet will continue to warm over the next century if emissions aren’t reduced. Of that group, 68% feel very certain about this.
According to Alan Krupnick, a senior fellow at RFF, this is a promising development for those seeking greater action on climate change mitigation and adaptation. “That this percentage is so high is indicative of bipartisan support, as the fraction of Americans who are Republicans is higher than 20%.”
Americans blame human activity for climate change, which they think is “bad”
The survey found that 82 percent of Americans believe human activity is the primary cause of climate change, approximately the same as in 1997. There has also been a notable increase in the number of Americans who think climate change is “bad”: 67% of respondents said it was “bad” in 2020 in comparison with 51% in 2012. And when asked a question about a hypothetical future warming of 5°F by 2095, 70% of respondents said that too would be ‘bad,’ an increase from 61% in 1997.
More Americans than ever before think they are knowledgeable about climate change
Since the survey began 23 years ago, Americans believe they have “become more and more knowledgeable about global warming.” This year, respondents who said they knew a moderate amount about climate change was 75%; in 1997, it was just 42%.
The vast majority of Americans think they have seen climate change happening
75% said they have “personally observed the effects of global warming.”
The researchers found that local climate impacts — such as drought, wildfires, flooding, extreme heat, severe storms, and sea-level rise — are indeed changing opinions about climate change.
“In eastern North Carolina, 30 inches of rain fell and major highways were turned into rivers. After the storm, a poll from Elon University noted that 52% of North Carolinians believed that a negative impact to coastal communities from climate change was ‘very likely,'” an increase over 45 percent from the previous year.
A slight majority of Americans think climate change will directly hurt them, and a large majority think it will hurt future generations
Interestingly, just 53% of respondents believe global warming will hurt them, at least by a moderate amount, which is down from 63% a decade ago. Another 28% expect “global warming to help them personally at least a moderate amount,” an increase of 15 percent since 2015.
This indicates that greater communication efforts about the expected impacts of climate change on communities are needed. Any perceived benefits — such as milder winters in colder climates, or extended agricultural seasons — are more than offset by expected negative impacts.
When asked about future generations, 74% of respondents, a clear majority, agree that global warming will hurt them a “moderate amount.”
The vast majority of Americans think government and businesses need to take at least “moderate action” to fight climate change
In 2020, 82% of respondents agree that the U.S. government “should do at least a moderate amount about global warming,” which is an all-time high in terms of public opinion on climate action. Between 35-45% of respondents think the U.S. government, foreign governments, businesses, and the average person are currently accomplishing even a moderate amount.
25% of Americans consider climate change their #1 issue
The researchers found that for most policy issues, there is a group of people who form the “issue public” and consider the issue of utmost importance. “These are the people who pay careful attention to news on the subject, think and talk a lot about it, and give money to lobbying groups to influence policy.”
In 2020, the global warming issue public make up an “all-time high” of 25% of Americans, a large increase from 9% in 1997. This demonstrates that a “growing body of people care deeply about climate change and may be likely to cast their votes based on candidates’ climate policy platforms.”
In an article in The New York Times, Jon A. Krosnick, professor of communication, political science, and psychology at Stanford University and lead researcher on the project, explained that an issue public is the “people who make things happen on the issue.”
Dr. Krosnick told the Times that climate change, with an issue public comprising 25% of the U.S. population, is now only second to abortion, which has an issue public of 31%. The group of people who are very passionate about gun control is around 17%, and capital punishment, 14%. (The researchers didn’t state the percentage of Americans who form an issue public for ending racial injustice).
The research team concluded that “considerable and sometimes huge” majorities of Americans hold “green” views on climate change and related issues that cross party lines. Where contention remains: the exact policies and regulations — the carrots and sticks — to be used to combat the climate crisis.
Transforming Landscapes: Michel Desvigne Paysagiste / courtesy of Birkhäuser
The French landscape architect Michel Desvigne isn’t well-known in the U.S. but a new monograph of his firm’s work from the publisher Birkhäuser should help change that. Transforming Landscapes: Michel Desvigne Paysagistebeautifully conveys Desvigne’s simple yet striking parks, plazas, and master plans. There is a sense of clarity in his work that emerges as you look through the book’s many rich color photographs.
The book is entirely focused on Desvigne’s public projects, which is where his passion lies. As he explains on his website, his firm’s goal is “to play a part in the formation of common territory, transforming landscapes produced by society. Past and present traces of society’s activities inspire and help foster the design.” Desvigne aspires to “give an area meaning, at least legibility.”
At the same time, he does so with great restraint. He says his landscape designs have an elementary, even dumb composition. The landscapes “do not entail any heroic feats of execution or any extravagance.” These places are distinguished by a “certain poverty” or rustic quality. The landscapes are a bit austere, even just under done.
The purposeful minimalism perhaps enables people to more easily inhabit these landscapes and bring their own meaning. But he adds that his firm brings rigor to the design of these seemingly simple landscapes. In reality, simplicity takes hard work to achieve.
Transforming Landscapes begins with a photographic essay by Patrick Faigenbaum that immerses the reader in Michel Desvigne Paysagiste (MDP)’s landscapes. At first, it’s hard to tell what is a natural or agricultural lansdcape and what has been designed.
As Francoise Fromonot explains in the introduction, “the ditches and ponds, roadbeds and rubble, paths and valleys sometimes merge to such an extent that the current earthworks are no longer distinguishable from the agricultural land from which the work has molded the contours of a new public space.”
In Fromonot’s introduction, we get a sense of the intelligence of Desvigne’s landscapes, how he works at an urban scale, combining different strategies. Desvigne wants intersecting layers of landscape design at different scales to accrue into a landscape-driven urban design.
These layers include large park systems like the Emerald Necklace, designed by Frederick Law Olmsted in Boston; new parks and recreational areas that bring back nature to the city; and tiny pocket parks that give a city “its porosity and comfort of daily use.”
The 10 case studies in the book feature master plans in France, the Middle East, and the U.S. that are realized through multiple scales — bigger parks and boulevards, and smaller parks, plazas, and green streets. Desvigne himself describes how the pieces cohere.
The first case explores his firm’s work in the Old Port and public spaces of Marseille, France. As part of a team with Foster + Partners, MDP created a framework plan for adding green public space to Marseille’s city center through multiple layers.
The plan envisioned a “chain of parks” to complement the remodeling of the port landscape, which was to be “uniformly mineral,” meaning without greenery. Desvigne explains that the space is “treated like a vast stone plateau, simple and homogeneous. Proposing vegetation here would have made no sense historically. It would have almost been a desecration!” Unfortunately, that means the space is blazing hot during the day time in summer.
A new landscape for the Old Port of Marseille removed parking and brought people up to the water. / MDP, courtesy of Birkhäuser
Before, 75 percent of the quays were used for parking and just a third accessible to the public. The design team made the entire perimeter of the port open to the public.
New landscape brings visitors up close to maritime life in the Old Port of Marseille. / MDP, courtesy of BirkhäuserNew landscape at the Old Port of Marseille focuses on the “mineral nature” of stone. / MDP, courtesy of Birkhäuser
Green spaces surrounding the port act as a counterpoint to the expansive stone quays. Further into the interior of the city, MDP created a plan for creating or revitalizing many small green spaces and boulevards.
Plan for Old port of Marseille and surrounding green spaces. The Old Port is at the center right of this image. / MDP, courtesy of Birkhäuser
In another case, Desvigne explains his work in Lyon since 1999 with various partners, including urban designer Francois Gerther and architecture firm Herzog & de Meuron. Over more than a decade, a succession of projects at the confluence of the Saône and Rhône rivers transformed a peninsula. An abandoned industrial area, crisscrossed by railway tracks and once rife with prostitution and drug dealing, became a new green, livable urban district. MDP accrued green spaces by “progressively establishing ‘filaments’ of vegetation running toward the interior of the peninsula.” The peninsula became a “ramified park” — ramified meaning branched.
Ramified park elements green the inside of the the Lyon peninsula, found at the confluence of two rivers. / MDP, courtesy of Birkhäuser
As described in the Bordeaux Rive Droite case, MDP also created green filaments extending from the City of Bordeaux into the Garonne riverfront. What is amazing though is that he persuaded the mayor, local policymakers, and developers to abandon their plans to urbanize riverfront land that had been set aside for development. Instead, some 50 hectares (123 acres) of land adjacent to the river was “delisted and made unbuildable,” so that those green fingers could terminate at a grand park.
Filaments of green space lead to a new riverfront park (at left) in the city of Bordeaux / MDP, courtesy of BirkhäuserScientific analysis on ecological succession was conducted in the new riverfront park in Bordeaux. The park also included a nursery to grow its own trees. / MDP, courtesy of Birkhäuser
In Burgos, Spain, MDP partnered with Herzog & de Meuron again to create Bulevar del Ferrocarril, a new 9-kilometer (5.5 mile)-long urban boulevard where was once a railway. Abandoned railway infrastructure, including disused warehouses, marshalling yards, and other parcels, became the basis for new neighborhood development. These impactful before and after photos show the range of people-friendly transformations along the length of the project.
Before and after photos of the Bulevar del Ferrocarril / MDP, courtesy of Birkhäuser
And, lastly, in a case that underscores the ambitious city-making scale of MDP’s work, we once again see how small and large green spaces form a new layer of green urban design. MDP created a series of urban parks along the coastline of Doha, the capital of Qatar, in the Middle East. There are striking landscapes around major new museums such as the National Museum, designed by Jean Nouvel, and Museum of Islamic Art, designed by I.M. Pei.
Desvigne’s landscape around the Museum of Islamic Art, designed by I.M. Pei / MDP, courtesy of Birkhäuser
And in the Lusail marina district, the Emir of Qatar first wanted to MDP to design a prototype landscape at 600 meters (1,930 feet) long. Once the prototype was approved, the rest of seafront was developed in the same lush patterns.
Simplicity, Qatari-style in the Lusail maritime district / MDP, courtesy of Birkhäuser
The same sense of clarity as found in Desvigne’s other work can be seen here, but adapted to the landscape forms and native plant palette of Qatar.
LA’s Chief Resilience Officer on Pandemic’s ‘Reveal’ of City’s Vulnerabilities — 08/11/20, The Planning Report
“Having a more reliable energy and water system is important, and not only because it’s more efficient, but it’s more equitable. When the power is cleaner and we’re putting less pollution into the air, it leads to better outcomes for those who are more vulnerable right now.”
Bogotá Is Building its Future Around Bikes — 08/10/20, Bloomberg CityLab
“In February, López announced that the city’s development plan for the next four years would add a total of 280 additional kilometers of bike lanes to the existing 550-kilometer network.”
Trump Signs Landmark Land Conservation Bill — 08/04/20, The New York Times
“President Trump signed into law the Great American Outdoors Act, a measure with broad bipartisan support that guarantees maximum annual funding for a federal program to acquire and preserve land for public use.”
Over two days, approximately 500 online participants together set the agenda, formed and dissolved discussion groups, and shared knowledge and resources. With the assistance of an “open space” facilitator, this is how Cut|Fill, a virtual “unconference” on landscape architecture, unfolded.
Organized by the Urban Studio and Ink Landscape Architects, Cut|Fill was meant to “raise questions we all want to discuss,” explained Andrew Sargeant, ASLA, a founder of Urban Studio. One of those important questions: “how can landscape architects design with empathy and end dismissive behavior towards people of color?”
The goal of these questions was to get designers to think harder about how to stop intentionally or unintentionally erasing communities of color, which are often purposefully made invisible, and instead get them to truly see these communities, co-design with them, and empower them.
“Imagine the place you love is erased. This has happened to people of color for generations,” said Justin Garrett Moore, executive director of the New York City Public Design Commission, during the opening panel.
Moore said that erasure, which has taken the form of urban renewal, displacement, and gentrification over the past few decades, “takes work.” Some group of people need to invest time and money to make a community disappear.
He also spoke of the pain of feeling personally erased. A video was produced of a planning and design panel he was on with a number of white speakers. “The organizers cropped the video so only the white panelists remained. It took work to do that — it was done with intention.” He called these erasures, both personal and communal, “death by a thousand cuts.”
For Maria Arquero de Alarcon, an associate professor of architecture and urban and regional planning at the University of Michigan, erasures of communities can be combated through new ways of teaching planning and design. One important methodology is “co-creating and co-producing knowledge together in spaces of inclusion.” Online technologies also now offer opportunities to become “radically inclusive” with marginalized communities.
In many places, erasure has been happening for many generations, but there are cultural remnants if you know how to see. For example, “there is so much of Africa in the landscape of South Carolina,” commented Austin Allen, a founder of DesignJones, LLC and associate professor of landscape architecture practice at the University of Texas at Arlington. Slaves brought from Africa also brought their rice farming knowledge, which shaped the southern American landscape. Allen said landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted, on his tour of the South, traveled through South Carolina’s rice plantations and wondered, “what is this place?”
Despite erasures, the legacy of marginalized peoples remains waiting to be rediscovered. Allen said this upcoming generation of landscape architecture students is exploring intersectional issues related to race, landscape, and memory with a “new level of openness.”
In the next panel, the discussion moved from erasure and invisibility to empowerment.
“If you inhabit a black body or are disabled, you are so invisible. That is until you’re not. In an instant, anything you do can be the focus of critical feedback. You could be eating skittles or going on a jog and be made very visible,” explained Tamika Butler, director of planning in California and director of equity and inclusion with Toole Design Group.
She added that Black people are used to “sliding in and out of a space invisibly,” but to “stay where we are, we need to claim space.”
For Ulysses Sean Vance, an associate professor of architecture at Temple University, who focuses on universal and inclusive design, the planning and design world has created massive “voids of erasure.” Too often, “involvement is done to a community; engagement is done to them.” He added that places that experienced generations of erasure aren’t ruins, but places to be inhabited and re-inhabited.
In these communities, “we can instead intentionally unbuild disenfranchisement.” To accomplish this, communities must be real participants in the planning and design process, and their input must be reflected in outcomes. Through inclusive processes, the feeling of being invisible and marginalized can be overcome, and “people can feel comfortable and confident.”
Butler elaborated on the concept of intersectionality, which came up a lot during Cut|Fill and is a key framework for creating more empowered visibility. “On streets, intersections are where conflict, friction, and struggle happen.” If there is a poorly designed street intersection that is leading to pedestrian deaths, “we aren’t like, this is just too complicated. No, we go in and solve the problem.” To solve intersectional social and environmental justice issues, diverse designers and planners need to create “brave spaces, not safe spaces” that open up the difficult conversations.
Architect Steven Lewis, a principal at ZGF, offered a meaningful perspective on the entire discussion. “There is self-realization as a young Black person that jars you. You realize you are not like the white characters you watch on TV. You become aware that you are different. You realize that there is a parallel Black universe and you now need to navigate between white and Black universes.”
George Floyd’s death created a “wormhole in which everyone was sucked into the Black universe,” Lewis said. “The walls crumbled, and we’re all in one place right now.” (Butler added that “constantly transitioning between these two universes can be exhausting. We are tired and can make some mistakes.”)
While “white people have work to do and need to become comfortable with being uncomfortable,” Black people can be “sherpas or guides in the Black universe,” Lewis said. “If white people have their heart in the right place, we can be patient and loving.”
He believes “empathy and caring” can lead to “learned and gained familiarity and then love for each other.” But he cautioned that this process of developing empathy and understanding requires life-long effort; there is no quick “prophylactic or therapy.”
As people have retreated to their homes, fish have recolonized Venice’s canals, coyote have been spotted in downtown San Francisco, wild sheep occupied a Welsh town, and deer have started using crosswalks in Japan. And now nature is at least temporarily taking over arts institutions.
The closures of opera houses and museums have offered an opportunity for artists and arts institutions to create charming conceptual works that recognize nature’s new privileges.
Earlier this summer, conceptual artist Eugenio Ampudia partnered with the Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona, Spain, to stage a performance of Puccini’s Crisantemi — The Chrysanthemums. But this time, instead of thousands of Barcelonan opera lovers enjoying Puccini’s melodies, the audience was nearly 2,300 ficus trees, palms, and Swiss cheese plants from a local nursery.
Gran Teatre del LiceuGran Teatre del LiceuGran Teatre del Liceu
Perhaps the flora-themed music performed by the UceLi Quartet appealed to the plants on some vegetal level.
Gran Teatre del Liceu
Ampudia told The Guardian: “At a time when humankind has shut itself up in enclosed spaces and been obliged to relinquish movement, nature has crept forward to occupy the spaces we have ceded. And it has done so at its own rhythm, according to its patient biological cycle. Can we broaden our empathy and bring it to bear on other species? Let’s start by using art and music and inviting nature into a great concert hall.”
Victor Garcia de Gomar, Liceu’s artistic director, called the piece “a visual poem, both a subtle metaphor but one which makes us smile.”
After the concert, all the house plant attendees were donated to Spain’s frontline healthcare workers so they can provide some much needed stress reduction benefits at home.
With both the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art and Kansas City Zoo in Kansas City, Missouri, closed due to COVID-19, administrators at the museum had an idea: Why not invite Humboldt penguins from the zoo to visit?
In the video, Randy Wisthoff, the zoo’s executive director, said: “we’re always looking for ways to enrich their lives and stimulate their days. During this shutdown period, our animals really miss visitors coming up to see them.”
According to Julián Zugazagoitia, the museum’s director, Humboldt penguins, which are native to Chile and Peru, seemed to “really appreciate” when he spoke to them in Spanish. As they waddled from room to room, they are seen pausing at some paintings but not others. “They seemed, definitely, to react much better to Caravaggio than to Monet,” Zugazagoitia said.
Humboldt Penguin admiring a Caravaggio / Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art
Landscape architects, urban planners, and architects can build solidarity with the social and environmental justice movements by creating conferences that use diversity, equity, and inclusion as a guiding framework. This is what we did with the 2019 ASLA Florida Chapter Conference in Orlando, Florida, where I was given the privilege to lead a diverse team of ASLA Florida volunteers as the 2019 conference chair.
As a member of the Puerto Rican diaspora residing in Orlando, I focused the conference team on the role landscape architects can play in moving forward social and environmental justice. ASLA members and allied professionals were invited on Common Ground (the theme of the conference) to discuss these issues. With the support of the ASLA Florida Chapter executive committee, we partnered with Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) and women leaders in landscape architecture who could guide us through the hard conversations.
During his keynote speech at Common Ground, Walter Hood, ASLA, a landscape designer, artist, and founder of Hood Design Studio, said, “some words are hard to hear.” But it was the words of these diverse leaders that increased member attendance by 25 percent and vendor participation by 27 percent in comparison with previous state conferences. These gains in attendance and engagement are evidence that national planning and design organization need to commit to a diversity, equity, and inclusion framework.
I have highlighted three commitments that you can adopt in your conference planning process:
Commit to Creating a Platform for Diverse Voices
BIPOC designers are not a monolith. We cannot check a box for diversity and assume diversity, equity, and inclusion has been achieved. Including the voices of Latinx, women, and Black landscape architects and educators was a conscious choice that we understood would enrich the conversation.
However, the four days we had for the conference was not enough. When we talk about inclusion and diversity, we cannot add one or two people of color to a panel and think we have accomplished our goal. This is why the majority of our keynote speakers needed to be people of color and women.
Meghan Venable-Thomas, Gina Ford, FASLA, Diane Jones Allen, FASLA, Kofi Boone, FASLA, Walter Hood, FASLA, Christina Hite, ASLA, Kimberly Garza, ASLA, Kona Gray, FASLA, and Emily O’Mahoney, FASLA, represented different perspectives as keynote speakers. They nourished our hunger to learn about our roles in social and environmental justice, but their voices weren’t drowned out.
Commit to Making Our Leaders Accessible to BIPOC Students
Conferences often highlight gaps between us. But a conference planned around diversity, equity, and inclusion bridges those divisions, especially for BIPOC students. A big step is removing financial barriers for students by making conferences free for student members. We committed to making it free for all registered students to attend.
Just like the fight for curb cuts in 1972, which increased access to people with different abilities, we needed to fight for a conference culture that cuts through the invisible barriers that separate BIPOC students from accessing leadership.
To address those invisible barriers, we created a volunteer position within the conference committee for a mentor to train student volunteers ahead of the conference. Students were eager to volunteer even though the conference was free. With professional training and access to leadership within ASLA, the students saw the incentive to attend the conference and volunteer. The result was record student turnout.
Commit to Stewardship
When I was a student, perhaps the idea that most attracted me to ASLA was, by joining, I too could become a “steward of the land.” In my student chapter, we co-opted this title and called ourselves “stewards of the land in training” because we understood that as aspiring stewards, we had to facilitate the change we want to see.
Now, as an emerging professional, I believe conferences are an opportunity to practice stewardship in a contextual manner. The conference committee reached out to local Black artists — two painters and one poet. We hired them to interpret who we are through their art. Jamile B. Johnson and Genevieve DeMarco painted eight scenes depicting the Black experience in our parks and public spaces. Blu Bailey, the poet, gave the gift of words with a powerful recital for Walter Hood (see video above).
The threads that binds these commitments are leading by stepping aside, elevating marginalized voices, and empowering the future leaders of our profession. Planning conferences with diversity, equity, and inclusion will help us do just that.
Daniel Rodriguez, Associate ASLA, is a landscape designer with Destination by Design, a multi-disciplinary economic development firm based in Boone, North Carolina.
