Landscape Architecture in the News

ASLA Green Roof
Nancy Somerville
Outdoor Illumination
Outdoor Illumination Selected for ASLA Green Roof Project
Lawn & Landscape 
The American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA) has selected Outdoor Illumination, Inc. to design the outdoor lighting for its green roof in downtown Washington, D.C.   “Outdoor Illumination was selected to help create an enjoyable environment for nighttime use of our green roof," says Nancy Somerville, executive vice psident and CEO of ASLA. "As an ASLA member and a leader in the landscape lighting field, Outdoor Illumination has been generous in sharing their experience and technical expertise with our design and construction team.” …The ASLA green roof demonstrates the environmental and aesthetic value of green roofs; encouraging more widespad use of green roofs locally and nationally; and showcasing the value landscape architects bring to this type of project.

Kathryn Gustafson, ASLA
Beirut's Forgiveness Garden, Slated for 2008, on Wartime Hold
Bloomberg
Now that Hezbollah rockets and Israeli bombs have momentarily stopped falling, I thought again of the 3.5-acre pit that zigzags between three churches and three mosques in central Beirut. It had been in the process of becoming Hadiqat As-Samah: the Garden of Forgiveness. It might now be seen as the landscape of a shattered ideal…Landscape architect Kathryn Gustafson and architect Neil Porter had intended to install planted areas in the rooms traced by ruined walls. The shrubs and trees would not disturb the remains, but their colors and scents would evoke the shared memories of people intermingled over millennia…With her husband, she lived through the Lebanese civil war. In her work with refugees and international aid organizations, she questioned how Lebanon -- ``a land of milk and honey and of kind, warm, hospitable people'' she wrote -- could be transformed ``into a jungle of dozens of militias.''

Laurie Olin, FASLA
Open Space in the AtlanticYards Development
Gotham Gazette (New York, NY) 
"A Garden of Eden grows in Brooklyn," announced the glossy brochure Brooklyn residents received in their mailboxes promoting the controversial Atlantic Yards development in Brooklyn. The brochure borrowed the words of former New York Times architecture critic Herbert Muschamp to promote developer Bruce Ratner's publicly subsidized mega-development slated to rise at the intersection of Atlantic and Flatbush avenues…Atlantic Yards includes seven acres of open space on top of a deck to be constructed over the Vanderbilt rail yards. The designer is Laurie Olin, the highly regarded landscape architect who designed Bryant Park and Battery Park City. All of the park space would be in the interior of two large blocks containing ten high-rise residential towers. The open space plans include two playgrounds, a half basketball court, an active play area for bocce and volleyball, a large oval lawn, and trees, but no baseball or soccer fields. A curving walkway would continue the street grid through the middle of the space.

Mike O'Brien, ASLA
Susan Goltsman, FASLA
American Society of Landscape Architects
Landscape Class Cultivates Access
Los Angeles Times (Los Angeles, CA)
The first thing to understand," Mike O'Brien told students in his landscape architecture class, "is that you do not know how to use one of these things. They can be very, very dangerous."  And then another admonition: "Do not pop wheelies!"  O'Brien had just pulled two wheelchairs from the back of his car inside a parking structure at UCLA's Westwood campus, and he called for volunteers from the 30 assembled students enrolled in Human Factors in Landscape Architecture. There was a loaded pause, then nervous laughter.  "OK, I'll get it out of the way," said Christine Skagland, 39, who, like the other students in the UCLA Extension course, is what O'Brien dubbed a "so-called able-bodied person."…The rise of user-focused design since the 1960s — along with laws such as the Disabilities Act and its pdecessors that require more-accessible buildings — have led to a change in teaching methods, according to Susan Goltsman, a Berkeley-based landscape architect who has taught about accessibility issues for the American Society of Landscape Architects.  "I call it good design. You study how people actually use the physical environment," Goltsman said in an interview. "Spaces have to work for people."

Craig Flandermeyer, ASLA 
Schmidt Associates
Up on the roof, gardens will be soon growing
Indianapolis Star (Indianapolis, IN)
When leaders of the Southeast Neighborhood Development group look at their building's old black roof, they see green.  If all goes well, their Fountain Square headquarters, the former Wheeler Building boiler house, could be transformed by year's end into a rooftop garden -- with a goal that reaches far beyond aesthetic improvements… But can installing green roofs really make a difference in the city?  Given the area's problems with sewer overflows and difficulty meeting federal air-pollution standards, it's worth a try, advocates said.  "It's all part of the big picture," said landscape architect Craig Flandermeyer of Schmidt Associates. "It's one way to help improve the environment and quality of life."  The concept of using green roofs to help solve environmental problems already has taken root in other cities.

Sasaki Associates of Boston
Fine Tuning: Utah State University Performance Hall by Sasaki Associates
ArchNewsNow
With its opening in January 2006, the new, 420-seat Manon Caine Russell and Kathryn Caine Wanlass Performance Hall at Utah State University brings world-class architecture and acoustics to Logan, a quiet college town in pdominately rural northern Utah. Designed by Sasaki Associates of Boston, the hall is only the first step in an envisioned School of Arts master plan, also ppared by Sasaki, for the eastern portion of campus that will bolster the school's reputation as a leading arts institution in the Intermountain Region. The 20,000-square-foot, $10.5 million hall features sculpted, geometric forms that evoke the look of the surrounding mountains.

Lisa Roth, ASLA
Avalon Planners Kick Sand in Face Of Would-Be Dune Developer
Cape May County News (Cape May, NJ)
Two board members stepped down, one member of the audience got a police escort from the building, and it finally ended well after midnight, although no fat lady sang.  The Avalon Planning Board denied Seven Mile Island, LLC's application for two variances to build a new home after demolishing the one at 5109 Dune Drive, without pjudice to the applicant to file a different application… At the request of the board in July, Seven Mile submitted revised plans and had its landscape architect, Lisa Roth, of Devon, Pa. available to testify and answer board questions. Brian Murphy, the applicant's engineer, also psented additional information on storm water drainage.

Chris Lannert, ASLA
Lannert Group
`Urban village' concept hailed for field in west Elgin
Chicago Tribune (Chicago, IL)
Elgin City Council members were excited but cautious this week about a proposal to transform a 575-acre cornfield in the city's booming far west area into an "urban village."  Developers, who have an agreement to buy Yenerich Farm (between U.S. Highway 20, Plank Road, Russell Road and the future Corron Road extension) on Wednesday psented plans that include single-family homes, town homes and apartments…. Planner and landscape architect Chris Lannert, owner of the Lannert Group, said traffic studies would be conducted and project leaders will meet with Kane County officials next week.

Mayor Richard M. Daley, Hon. ASLA
Greening of Chicago Starts at the Top Floor
Washington Post (Washington, DC)
Boston Globe (Boston, MA)
CHICAGO -- Atop the scalding eighth-floor roof of the Chicago Cultural Center, workers dripped sweat as they planted row upon tidy row of hardy plants, the latest signal of one big-city government's determination to be green.  On other downtown rooftops, tall corkscrew-shaped turbines will bridle the winds that race across the plains. A new roof on Chicago's vast convention center will channel 55 million gallons of rainwater a year into Lake Michigan instead of overburdened storm drains.  Skeptics snickered 17 years ago when Mayor Richard M. Daley added flowers and trees to the city's honey-do list. They scoffed at the apparent folly of beautifying a sprawling, gritty urban landscape, figuring Daley for a modern-day Potemkin.  A few tulips, they figured, would be the end of it.  But the city-kid mayor raised on the rough-and-tumble South Side stuck with it. The greening project grew strong roots, giving Chicago a reputation as one of the nation's most committed environmental cities of any size. The company it keeps is not Newark and Detroit, but Portland and Seattle.

Dunbar/Jones
Iowa Chapter
People and businesses on the move 8/14
Des Moines Register (Des Moines Register, IA)
Dunbar/Jones received a 2006 Merit Design Awards from both the Central States Region and the Iowa Chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects. Dunbar/Jones was recognized for its work with the "Edible Sustainable Landscapes, a Digging Deeper Community Food Project."

Ken Smith, ASLA
Mia Lehrer, ASLA
New York Artist Mary Miss to Create a 'Living Laboratory' at the ...
PR Newswire

IRVINE, Calif., Aug. 9 /PRNewswire/ -- Great Park Design Studio artist Mary Miss announced today she is taking the lead in developing the concept of a "Living Laboratory" -- a place where hydrologists, sociologists, artists and others will work together to explore ideas and create new concepts for environmental and social sustainability -- at the 1,700-acre Great Park in Irvine, California… Mary Miss is collaborating with landscape architect Ken Smith, environmental ecologist Steve Handel, architect Enrique Norton, and landscape architect Mia Lehrer on the Master Plan for the Orange County Great Park. The team won an intensive, international design competition to become Master Designer in January, 2006.

Design Workshop
American Society of Landscape Architects
Master plan topic at CVIC open house
Nevada Appeal (Carson City, NV)

Residents will get a peek at proposed revisions for Douglas County's master plan at a special open house, conducted by consulting firm Design Workshop on Wednesday, from 4-7 p.m. at Minden's CVIC Hall.  In addition to that pview, the meeting will provide a chance for residents to make final comments concerning the direction Douglas County is taking with respect to everything from open space and growth, to pservation of agriculture and economic stabilit… Their work has been recognized with more than 70 awards from numerous organizations, including the American Society of Landscape Architects, the American Planning Association and the Urban Land Institute.

The Florida Chapter Design Awards
Goetz & Stropes Landscape Architects Inc.
WCI Communities Inc.
Real Estate Briefs: August 13
Naples Daily News (Naples, FL)

Landscape honors earned --The Florida Chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects has psented its Annual Design Awards. This year, the Florida Chapter received a record 63 award submittals from professionals and students. Area recipients of the 2006 Chapter Awards included: in the pservation & Conservation Category, Award of Merit, Goetz & Stropes Landscape Architects Inc., Naples, for restoring Mina Edison's Moonlight Garden in Fort Myers; in the Residential Category, Award of Merit, WCI Communities Inc., Bonita Springs, for Escada Grand Estates at Tiburon in Naples; in the Technological Advancement Category, Award of Honor, The Landscape Workshop at Johnson Engineering Inc., Fort Myers, for an innovative recruiting psentation using iPod Video titled Wish You Were Here.

Dennis Carmichael, FASLA
American Society of Landscape Architects
EDAW
Crossing the lines
AZ Central.com 
Some designers say forget about balance and straight lines. The principle is asymmetry and it's how nature made us.  Glass artist Dale Chihuly's unruly flowers take growing instructions from some errant strand of artistic DNA…Asymmetry, says Dennis Carmichael, psident of the American Society of Landscape Architects, "doesn't mean chaos. It means a different way of achieving balance...There "was a moment in the 1980s and early '90s when classical architecture had a renaissance and we were doing these classically informed gardens, plazas and streetscapes where symmetry became important," says Carmichael, vice psident of EDAW, the landscape architect for the grounds of the new headquarters. Today, he says, "We are in a more organic mode."  The office complex, scheduled to open in two stages beginning this fall, "epitomizes the sea change," Carmichael says. "It is a wacky building. There isn't a straight line [in it]. It has a curvy, whirly, fractured geometry to it. There's no formal language to it at all, except for the functionality. It breaks every rule that you can imagine," he says. "Our landscape is as wild and crazy and wacky as the building. It curves and flies around, up and down the building."

American Society of Landscape Architects
Janna Tidwell, ASLA
Water shortage requires landscape changes
KERA (Public Radio and TV, North Texas)
Catherine Cuellar, KERA 90.1 reporter: Texas Parks and Wildlife urban biologist John Davis works at Cedar Hill State Park among native trees and grass. He believes this type of vegetation can help solve the region's drought problems...Cuellar: Part of Davis' job is to educate the public about conservation. The American Society of Landscape Architects is trying to do the same. Janna Tidwell is the society's DFW section chair.   Janna Tidwell, landscape architect: It's just become habit that we all like nice, neat, maintained green lawns with the perfectly manicured, trimmed hedges and I think we're really getting to the point where we're going to have to minimize the amount of lawn that we have in our landscapes.

Dan Weeks, ASLA
HadenStanziale
So long, rural byways
Wilmington Morning Star (Wilmington, NC)
It's all about the traffic. And some developers are betting that a new bridge and thousands of new homes will create just the kind they need…Dan Weeks, a land planner and landscape architect from HadenStanziale in Wilmington, repsents the developers on both sides of N.C. 211.  With 98 acres to work with, the Midway Station property is more than double the size of Westfield Independence mall, which covers 44.2 acres in the middle of Wilmington.  "We see a hotel site, a professional/medical office, retail and home improvement," he said.  Weeks said construction of the commercial centers would take from 2006 until 2012 or perhaps longer, depending on factors such as the pace of residential growth and road improvements. Across the road, the smaller commercial project could house a grocery store, a drugstore with a drive-through window and a bank branch, among other things, Weeks said.

Robert Marvin, FASLA
A lasting Hardin greeting
Rock Hill Herald (Rock Hill, SC)
Glencairn Garden's dogwood and azalea blossoms are long gone, but former Rock Hill Mayor John Hardin, resplendent in a bright yellow sports jacket, provided plenty of color at a ceremony naming two brick planters in his honor Monday…Harold Peeples, chairman of the Glencairn Garden Advisory Committee, told how the city, in 2001, became concerned about the garden's state of repair. After a series of public meetings, the committee devised a plan to restore the garden and complete the original master plan by landscape architect Robert Marvin of Walterboro.

Christina Lathrop, ASLA
Dream Home Back Yard
Central Florida News 13 (Orlando, FL)
The Southern Living House in Deland sports a for sale sign this summer, while the back yard is still full of a million dollars worth of ideas.  Landscape Architect Christina Lathrop, ASOA, said, "One of my favorite parts of the house is this whole exterior back patio area. It was designed as a total extension of the house."  Southern Living House in Deland, has an asking price this summer of $1,150,000 but we found there are lots of free ideas there.  It is very simple. Less grass means more time for the pool. The pool flows into a 'disappearing edge' where the water ends up in a spa.  Landscape architect Christina Lathrop designed several containers full of vibrant color.

John Hershey, ASLA
Derck & Edson Associates
Changing ChurchTowne
Lancaster Newspapers (Lancaster, PA)
Broken electrical wires hang from the front of condemned houses. Trash lies scattered along the streets. Several sidewalks are uneven -- bruised and battered by the hands of time…The project consists of a 10-point revitalization plan that includes introducing traffic-calming measures, adding streetlights, increasing parking, turning vacant lots into miniparks and community gardens and creating more business and recreational opportunities.  The plan was revealed, in blueprint-form, to residents at a community meeting in July and was designed by architect Bruce Evans of Cox & Evans Architects of Lancaster and John Hershey of landscape architects Derck & Edson Associates of Lititz.

Kudela & Weinheimer
Landscape architecture firm expands to San Antonio
San Antonio Business Journal (San Antonio, TX)
A Texas-based landscape architecture firm has opened a new office in San Antonio initially to support developments for local real estate firm Koontz McCombs LLC.  Kudela & Weinheimer's new office is located at 100 Sandau Road, Suite 303, in North Central San Antonio. The company is based in Houston.  The company is providing landscape design services for The Montecristo Apartment Homes, The San Miguel Apartment Homes and The Broadway Condominiums -- all developments of Koontz McCombs… Founded in 1991, Kudela & Weinheimer provides landscape architecture, site planning, master planning and urban design services to architectural, engineering and development firms throughout the state.

Gund Partnership
Bohlin Cywinski Jackson
Hillier Architecture
$212 Campus Grows Outside Philadelphia
Interior Design
One of America’s oldest educational institutions—the 220-year old Episcopal Academy—will soon have a new 123-acre campus. Designed by Venturi, Scott Brown & Associates, the Gund Partnership, Bohlin Cywinski Jackson, and Hillier Architecture, the campus is slated to open in the Fall of 2008 in Newtown Township, Pennsylvania.  Hillier Architect is master architect for the facility, which will be located along Philadelphia’s western Main Line. Responsible for the development of the overall master plan and design of the Lower School, Middle School, Upper School, and Science Building, in addition to the renovation of three historic farm buildings, landscape architecture, and exterior and interior signage, the firm will serve as design coordinator for the project.

DHM Design
Final psentation Goes to Council September 19
Telluride Watch (Telluride, CO)
The goal of making downtown Ridgway more “safe, fun, easy and memorable” will likely become a plan of action by late September, now that the design process for a streetscape plan is nearing completion. DHM Design, a Denver-based landscape architecture, land-planning and urban-design firm, and the Snowmass-based Elk Mountains Planning Group, were hired by the town to conduct several community meetings and workshops this summer, including interactive sessions with sketching and brainstorming of additional streetscape ideas. The design team psented the first sketches of the pferred design options last week.

Yaggy Colby Associates
Girls like building, too
Lake Country Reporter (Hartland, WI)
They haul construction materials, crunch the numbers for projects, design buildings and put up walls. "It is unique for women to be in construction," said Susan Jaske of Fairway Transit Inc., a material-hauling company in Waukesha…It took six years and Nelson became a registered surveyor in 2002.  After moving to the Oconomowoc-Dousman area, she started working for Yaggy Colby Associates in Delafield, a company that does landscape architecture, architectural design and engineering. "When most people think of surveyor they think of outside, the people in the field," Nelson said. "I'm inside working with the field crews ptty closely.”

Marieke Lacasse, ASLA
Green Factor would change urban landscape design
Seattle Daily Journal of Commerce (Seattle, WA)
Proposed city program would require vegetation for new development in neighborhood commercial areas.  By MARIEKE LACASSE and SHANEY CLEMMONS, GGLO  As awareness of the environmental impact of metropolitan areas grows, sustainability takes on a decidedly urban flavor. Regulators have responded with a variety of zoning code proposals for increased density, structured parking, pedestrian-friendly streetscapes and most recently, landscape requirements. Last month, the city’s Department of Planning and Development released a draft of the Seattle Green Factor program, which involves landscape requirements for new development in neighborhood commercial areas…Marieke Lacasse, ASLA, and Shaney Clemmons are both LEED Accredited Professionals and part of the Landscape Architecture Group at GGLO.

JoAnn Beck, ASLA
Catwalk on Middle Falls dam will link river trail
Rochester Democrat and Chronicle (Rochester, NY)
One of the last remaining gaps in the Genesee Riverway Trail will close soon with a crossing of the Middle Falls on the Rochester Gas and Electric dam.  City Council will consider accepting easements from RG&E at its Aug. 22 meeting, clearing the way for trail construction to begin soon after… "It's something that has been in the works for a long time, more than 10 years," said JoAnn Beck, senior landscape architect for the city. "Obviously it costs something, quite a bit, to make this connection. There were many options that were just too expensive, so we never got there."

ASLA Student Awards
Mehdi Khalesi, Student ASLA
Morteza Adabi, Student ASLA
Iranian students win ASLA award in US
IranMania News
Payvand 
Two Iranian students from Shahid Beheshti University won the 2006 Award of the American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA) for a joint plan on restoration of damaged buildings, MNA reported.  Students of the Faculty of Architecture and Urban Planning Mehdi Khalesi and Morteza Adabi received the award in Student Collaboration, one of the eight categories in the competition. Their plan surveys restoration of a building damaged in the December 2003 earthquake that struck Bam in Kerman, southern Iran.  It was the first time students from the Middle East have won an award in the competition.  Founded in 1899, ASLA annually gives the awards to the best in landscape architecture from around the globe, while the ASLA Student Awards program gives us a glimpse into the future of the profession.

Jeff Korhan, ASLA
QUICK TIPS Get Your Company Name in the Headlines
Lawn & Landscape 
As the saying goes, all publicity is good publicity. Jeff Korhan, CLP, ASLA, psident of Treemendous Landscape Co., Plainfield, Ill., explained the virtues of public relations during his psentation “Marketing Beyond Products and Services,” at the Professional Landcare Network Specialty Symposium in Milwaukee on Aug. 5. “It’s nice to tell your customers what you do,” Korhan said, “but it’s better to get other people to say it for you.”  The former corporate marketing executive shared these tips for getting pss coverage, or what he called “a third-party endorsement” from the local paper:

Jack Carman, ASLA
Gardening that works for all
Philadelphia Inquirer (Philadelphia, PA)
Veeda Johnson has cerebral palsy, and until she discovered the Ralston Center garden, she had to settle for indulging her green thumb inside her apartment - with houseplants.  Now, she putters around outside, repotting, watering, deadheading to her heart's content, easily maneuvering her wheelchair around the garden's raised beds and planters packed with bright flowers and pungent herbs…”The garden should be a familiar, comfortable place," says Jack Carman of Medford, a landscape architect who designs therapeutic gardens.  He believes that with more seniors wanting to stay in their own homes, the demand for adaptive or universal gardens will only grow.

San Diego Chapter
ONLINE CALENDAR Things to do
San Diego CityBEAT
AMERICAN SOCIETY OF LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTS at the Museum of Contemporary Art, La Jolla, 700 Prospect St. At 6 p.m. every second Tuesday, topics will include the things all designers and the public need to know about historic pservation, green design and smart growth. (www.asla-sandiego.org)

ASLA Green Roof
Nancy Somerville
Green Buildings
Washington Post (Washington, DC)
Would you spend more money on your home if you thought it would cause less damage to the environment? If so, you're like the vast majority of Americans. A January poll by the American Institute of Architects showed that 90 percent of respondents said they would be willing to pay $4,000 or $5,000 more for a house that would use less energy and protect the Earth…Want to experience green building in action? Here are a few locations to check out:  AMERICAN SOCIETY OF LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTS. By covering the roof of its building with black-eyed Susans, stonecrop, cactuses, sumacs and dozens of other types of grasses, perennials and succulents, the professional association is helping to reduce heating and cooling costs, and improve community air and water quality."Landscape architects are leading many green roof projects across the U.S. and abroad, so it was only fitting that ASLA provide a demonstration project on this sustainable technology that can cure so many urban ills," says Executive Vice psident Nancy Somerville. "We hope to provide a catalyst for more green roof development in Washington and beyond."

Florida Chapter
Goetz & Stropes Landscape Architects
WCI Communities Inc.
Southwest Florida Business Briefs: August 7
Naples Daily News (Naples, FL)
Two area landscapers won awards at the Florida chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects' annual Design Awards Gala. Goetz & Stropes Landscape Architects, a Naples-based firm, received an award of merit in the pservation and conservation category for restoring Mina Edison's Moonlight Garden in Fort Myers. WCI Communities Inc., a Bonita Springs-based company, won an award of merit in the residential category for its work for the Escada Grand Estates at Tiburon.

Maryland Chapter
County park wins landscape award
Frederick News Post (Frederick, MD)
MOUNT AIRY -- Frederick County's new 156-acre park is getting a lot of use. The park's appealing design may have something to do with it.  Old National Pike District Park is at 12406 Old National Pike along the north side of Md. 144, midway between New Market and Mount Airy. The park has become the first playground in the county to receive the Landscape Site/American Society of Landscape Architects Award of the Maryland Recreation and Parks Association (MPRA), an organization of nearly 1,000 parks and recreation professionals.

Charles Eliot, FASLA
Historic Beaver Brook a respite for visitors since 1893
Boston Globe 
BELMONT, Mass. --Kevin Leahy remembers exploring the woods, catching crawfish in the streams, and cooling off in the wading pool at Beaver Brook Reservation…The area had been used for agricultural and industrial purposes until landscape architect Charles Eliot persuaded the Legislature to create the commission and purchase Beaver Brook, mainly to protect the Waverley Oaks, a stand of 22 massive and ancient white oaks, some estimated to be about 600 years old.  About 100,000 people a year visited in the park's early years to see the trees, one of which had a trunk that measured 17 feet and 3 inches in diameter.

Mark Isaacs, ASLA
Fans flood Redskins Park for autographs
Loudoun Times-Mirror (Loudoun County, VA)
Fans lined up as early as 8 a.m. on Aug. 4, a full two hours before Washington Redskins training camp was to begin and four hours before they would have a chance to get what they had come for…Mark Isaacs used his training as a landscape architect and artist to immortalize Santana Moss' game-winning touchdown against the Dallas Cowboys last year on "Monday Night Football."  "I tried to capture the flavor of the moment," said Isaacs, who toted with him his giant canvas portraying the late-game heroics in impssionistic form. "I won't take any offense if [Santana Moss] doesn't sign it. But if I could link up with him and have him sign it, I will be very pleased."

Kerry White, ASLA
Carol Henry, Affiliate ASLA
Lafayette firm finds niche designing parks like Sandstone Ranch
Longmont Daily Times-Call (Longmont, CO)
LAFAYETTE — What kind of adult spends her days thinking about parks and playgrounds?  A landscape architect, especially one who works for Design Concepts in Lafayette.  “As a landscape architect, they are tons of fun to work on,” said Kerry White, who helped design the Adventure Playground Sandstone Ranch in Longmont.   Sometimes, a Design Concepts client such as the city of Longmont has an idea of what it wants in a project. Then White and Carol Henry have to figure out how those ideas can become reality.  “What does a treehouse look like?” Henry wondered rhetorically. “We started giving ideas shape and form.” Another example is a “web climber” — something Henry said is easy to label but leaves the architects wondering what to build.

Mark Boyer, ASLA
UA professor testing ‘green roofs’ on campus
Northwest Arkansas Times
A group of University of Arkansas students is trying to slow the effects of global warming by helping their professor install the first “green roof” on campus.  “We’re using this as a demonstration project to see if the university likes it,” said Mark Boyer, associate professor of landscape architecture at the UA. “It’s also a test run to see if the plants can survive in such a harsh environment.”  Creating a “ green roof” means covering a roof with plants that will absorb sunlight and rain.  Boyer and his students began the first phase of the project Tuesday by installing a drainage layer, aluminum edging, lightweight soil and pea gravel walkways on two new campus structures — the band storage building and restroom facility, both located in The Gardens on the south side of the UA campus.