Category: landscape
-
Got Moss?
A cool vegitectural proposal from Sam Biroscak in collaboration with Gina Dyches, Stephanie Borchers, Annick Lang, and Anneli Rice is “Mossgrove is a proposal for an architectural pavilion to be built in Times Square during NYCxDESIGN from May 12-20, 2018. It highlights the possibilities of two under-appreciated urban elements: scaffolding and moss. Individually, scaffolding and moss…
-
Plants as Plants
One of my favorite desk elements for years was a simple Lego tree, a plastic deciduous nondescript, species neutral, tree form. Now, in a modern twist, those plants are actually made of plants. See video below:
-
Irish Hunger Memorial
I remember seeing images of the Irish Hunger Memorial in Battery Park City a few years back, and was amazed by the hovering cantilevered structure holding a metaphorical ‘slice’ of Irish landscape. The Memorial, designed by internationally renowned sculptor and public artist Brian Tolle, originally opened in 2002. It is a contemplative space devoted to…
-
Connecting Green
Although not a new idea, the concept of connected green roofs that emerge from the ground on to structure is a persist, compelling idea, essentially blending building and site and maximizing green space, habitat, and square footage through layering of uses. A trio of projects show the variations on that theme. First, via Designboom, the…
-
Living Shorelines
Amidst the political crazy we like to call our United States government, and specifically what seems like a daily dismantling of environmental policies, there’s at least some folks at work on alternatives. Per a recent ASLA Advocacy brief: “On December 1, 2017, Congressman Frank Pallone Jr. (NJ) introduced H.R. 4525, the Living Shorelines Act of 2017.…
-
The Peregrine
While not specifically urban, some reading worth your time is JA Baker‘s slim volume, The Peregrine. Written in 1967, it was one The cover of the 2004 edition I own features an introduction by Robert Macfarlane (who I learned about the book from via his readings). Seemingly simple in format, a short blurb from Amazon gives…
-
Landscape Observatory: The Work of Terence Harkness
I was really excited to learn about the publication of this book Landscape Observatory: The Work of Terence Harkness (2017, Applied Research & Design). Having earned my undergraduate degree in Landscape Architecture at North Dakota State University, our design milieu often focused on the sprawling plains, with design exercises that took us into the realms…
-
Urban Ecology Reading List 2: Landscape Ecology
URBAN ECOLOGY READING LIST – 2 Beyond some of the specific books focusing on the science of Urban Ecology, there are subsets of literature that support this study. This is the first of three posts to expand the reading list that investigate these other, related disciplinary alignments, including landscape ecology, the hybrid books on planning…
-
Why Cities Need More Green Roofs
Nice video from NPR on Why Cities Need More Green Roofs. From the summary. “We took a field trip to the largest green roof in New York City. Then we imagined what the city could be like if all of its roof space was green.”
-
International Urban Wildlife Conference
In early June I was in San Diego for the 2017 International Urban Wildlife Conference. This was my first time at this particular conference, and it was fascinating to experience the breadth of ideas, and the urban focus on wildlife. It’s something that we as designers care about, but struggle with implementation that truly…