Virtual views to help overtaxed teachers see the future in nature-based play spaces.
By Timothy A. Schuler
Muntazar Monsur designed virtual walk-throughs to allow educators to access high-performing outdoor environments. Courtesy Muntazar Monsur.
When Muntazar Monsur and his wife emigrated to the United States from Bangladesh in 2011, they enrolled their then 18-month-old daughter in childcare for the first time. They were both starting PhD programs at North Carolina State University, and the childcare center their daughter attended was an early demonstration site of the Natural Learning Initiative, established in 2000 at NC State to demonstrate the importance of nature in children’s development and play. “She went to that childcare center for three years, and I was one of the parents who saw how the daily life of my daughter changed,” says Monsur, now an assistant professor of landscape architecture at Texas Tech University.Continue reading Log In to Log Off→
Books, tech, and lots of pens to set the newly minted designer up right.
By the LAM Editorial Advisory Committee
Well, it’s finally happened. Your family member/friend/mentee/colleague has graduated from a BLA or MLA program, and they’re ready to start their journey as a landscape architecture professional. Now that they’ve finished school, you want to buy them a gift that shows them you get what they do and why they’re passionate about it.
A University of Kentucky graduate exhorts her fellow students to “Be the change.” Credit: @uky_landscapearchitecture/University of Kentucky (UK) Landscape Architecture.
Nothing excites Anna Thurmayr and Dietmar Straub, ASLA, more than bringing high-concept landscape architecture to places where it is traditionally absent—remote communities, inner-city schoolyards, peri-urban land awaiting tract homes. Continue reading Have Van, Will Garden→
Installing plants at a Test Plot site with USC student Yiyi Peng, studio instructor and USC Test Plot lead Jen Toy, and local resident Maria Arroyo, a member of the Abuelas de Parque. Image courtesy USC Architecture.
In 2018, after discovering that city arborists planned to plant Australian and South African plant species in response to a future of sustained droughts, the Los Angeles landscape architecture studio Terremoto launched Test Plot, a small-scale scheme designed to engage community groups in growing native plants in city parks and ultimately show that residents can play a role in maintaining the city’s landscape. “There’s a fear of maintenance,” Jenny Jones, ASLA, a partner at Terremoto, says. “We want to celebrate the maintenance.” Continue reading The Lab in the Backyard→
LAM is highlighting studentand professional winners from the 2021 ASLA Awards by asking designers to share an outtake that tells an important part of their project’s narrative.
Yuehui Gong, Courtesy LAF.