The Double Life of Dean Hill, ASLA
LAND Online talks to Dean Hill, ASLA, about his unique career in landscape architecture and television, the public perception of the practice, and sustainability in residential design.

The following is a partial transcript of LAND Online’s interview with Dean Hill, ASLA, from the 2006 ASLA Annual Meeting and EXPO and 43rd IFLA World Congress. Click here to listen to the full audio of the interview.

Dean Hill, ASLA

I’m interested in your career path—you’re a landscape architect and you’ve done a lot of television work. Which came first, your television work or your landscape architecture career?

Actually, it’s a little bit of both. I have an undergraduate degree in telecommunications and graduated from Ball State and went into the television and radio market in Indianapolis. I was in that market for about 12 years. And at that time, in the late 1980s, the FCC deregulated the industry and allowed multiple station ownership in multiple markets. What that did was change the business environment in that industry—it used to be mom-and-pop owners and now became a corporate thing. So that shift wasn’t something I was real crazy about, and after about 12 years I wanted to get out of the radio and television market altogether.

After that, I was looking for something I was interested in, and something that would hopefully sustain me for my midlife career change, which happened at 25. Now, I had inherited an interest in horticulture from my mother—I always liked to be outside, and I was never afraid to get my hands dirty—so I got into landscape contracting, and actually went to work as a laborer—a guy off the street with a strong back who wanted to learn. I worked my way up through landscape contracting, became a foreman and a supervisor, and had the epiphany of me standing out in 90-degree weather when I was 65 years old planting trees for someone else. At that point in time I reflected and said, “If I don’t want to do that, what do I want to do?” And that’s when I went back to get my master’s in landscape architecture.

Then the opportunity for the TV show came back. I mean, when the opportunity to do the TV show came around, I was basically doing design work. I was doing high-end residential work and not doing any contracting or installation or anything like that—I was subbing it all out—and now it’s almost come complete circle, in that I’m working out in the field for the most part on television. It’s not what I would consider your everyday career path, but it’s the one that’s been afforded to me.

Your show—Grounds for Improvement—is one of several that spotlight landscape architecture and landscape design and, I think, raise general awareness that the residential landscape is more than just a lawn. How do you think these shows are good for the profession—and what potential pitfalls do you see in their proliferation?

In my approach to the show, I want to expose people to good design within limitations. Obviously, within the scope of the show we have two days to complete whatever we’re going to do, so we’re not going to do a 20-acre estate in two days. But what I want to expose them to is good design, whether that be through appropriate use of materials or whatever. But more importantly, I want to involve them a little bit in the design process, so they have a good experience with the design process, so now they can say, “Well, I know I need to redo my front foundation next year.” If they have a good experience then they’re not going to hesitate to call a design professional to do that. The problem that I have with shows—and there’s one that’s been around for a very long time, and there’s books, and people have gone on to do Sears commercials and things of that nature—where designers didn’t care about the client, they just did whatever they wanted to do and never took the client’s interests into consideration. To me, that is wiping out that design experience for that person, for anybody that person has as an acquaintance, and quite possibly for anybody that comes into contact with that person in the future. So to me, it’s not necessarily what you’re doing—although you do try to show them the difference between quality and crap—but even more importantly, it’s all about creating a good design experience, because that will lead them on to bigger things.

And I would imagine exposing them to good materials would be important as well—what you were saying, the difference between quality and crap?

The thing that I’ve always tried to do, and it’s been a little bit subliminal, is change the general perception that when people have a need or a problem they go to a big-box retailer to see what’s on the shelves to solve that problem. So if they don’t see it on the shelves of that big-box retailer, they don’t think it exists. What I’ve tried to do is show them that there are other materials out there—and there are different applications for existing materials. I try to point out when people are using green building materials and they just don’t know it—point out the recycling, reuse, natural, and “sustainable” elements of a project. You know, sustainability as a phrase or as jargon hasn’t really trickled down to home owners—it’s really stayed within our profession and batted about for 20 years. But what people do understand is green building materials. They understand that when they take their recycling bin out to the curb and the big truck comes to pick it up, that product is going to be made into something else. Now, if they can see and touch that recycled product and say, “Oh, hey, this used to be aluminum cans, or here’s some composite decking that’s made from those plastic bags,” that’s where I think people are going to start making that correlation that it’s not necessarily sustainability, but it’s more green building materials.

Home owners, or someone not necessarily in the profession, can understand green building materials much easier than they can come up with a definition for sustainability.

I think people in our profession would have a hard time coming up with a definition for sustainability.

Actually, an interesting thing happened on the EXPO floor this morning. An exhibitor came over and said, “Dean, what’s the definition of sustainability?” And I told him it really depends on who you ask. I bet you could ask 15 people on the EXPO floor what that term means and you’ll get 15 different definitions. And that’s why I think If we’re really going to take our message to the masses, it really has to be something they can identify with.

You’ve designed a demonstration project, dubbed “Sustainability with Style,” here in the EXPO hall. Can you explain the concept of this and take us through the process of designing this? I understand you’re using vendor products—how did you set that up?

Basically it was born from the idea that we wanted to do a demonstration area with a residential feel. But more importantly, if we could cross that boundary and go from residential to global and use that sustainable theme that the meeting had already set, then we might be able to cross a couple of different genres. So what I’ve tried to do with the design is incorporate some of those things that people might see on a bigger scale and shrink them down—for example, the recycled rubber surface safety tiles. The client may have seen those at a playground somewhere, or at a school, but you can actually extrapolate those from that setting and build something at your house with those things. They exist, they’re available, you can get them—you don’t need to be a licensed whatever to get them. Permeable paving—you hear about it, you hear about pervious concrete and things of that nature, but I think a lot of the time, people don’t think that those products are available to them. And you can do a driveway out of permeable pavers—it’s something that’s definitely attainable. There’s a lot being done with recycled glass and rubber.

One of the other products we featured is a green roof material that’s a geotextile with sedum plants growing in the textile, and it comes almost like a sod roll. The technology out there is incredible, and there’s a little bit of a groundswell right now from a consumer standpoint, but I think once people get a taste of what that technology is, then it’s going to really trickle down to the consumer market, and consumers will start to ask for it.