Innholdsfortegnelse for Issue 157 February 2018 i Landscape Architecture Australia

LANDSCAPE AUSTRALIA CONFERENCE, SYDNEY, 5 MAY 2018 The 2018 Landscape Australia Conference will explore Australia’s emerging position in the Asia-Pacific region and reveal insights into Asian landscape design cultures. The conference features an impressive line-up of keynote speakers from New Zealand, India, South Korea, Thailand, Singapore and China. A lively series of panel discussions will complement the presentations, which will help to identify tools and methods for Australian landscape architects and designers, architects, planners and urbanists. Discounted student tickets are available and a fringe program will be announced closer to the event. Stay up to date via the below link. landscapeaustralia.com/conference IFLA WORLD CONGRESS, SINGAPORE, 18–21 JULY 2018 The 55th International Federation of Landscape Architects (IFLA) World Congress will be held in Singapore 18–21 July 2018. The congress will bring…

Reflections on the theme of this issue of Landscape Architecture Australia reveal that my practice as a landscape architect in Australia has paralleled, over a professional lifetime, the development of Australia’s relationship with the Asian region, both culturally and economically. As the introduction to this issue outlines, the 1970s and the Whitlam Government saw a reorientation of national focus – away from the previously dominant relationships with the United Kingdom and Europe and toward our relationship with Asia. This reorientation was to directly impact the practice of landscape architecture from the start, as Australian landscape architects worked as part of multidisciplinary teams to spearhead the way – tasked with delivering a round of bold new Australian embassies in countries where previously, Australian representation had been much more modest. These new…

I’ve come to a hotel forecourt in Seoul’s Itaewon district to meet a landscape architect whose practice holds rockstar status in South Korea’s landscape community. After a patchy phonecall, a black BMW mounts the curb, tinted windows roll down and I’m invited to jump in the back; there’s no time to stop. Jungyoon Kim is a founding director of Parkkim, a landscape architecture practice she runs with her partner Yoonjin Park in the upmarket district of Gangnam, made famous by that song we’d all rather forget. She and one of her senior colleagues have taken time out of their schedule to show me one of the practice’s largest built projects – the Yanghwa Riverfront Park on the bank of Seoul’s Han River. Seoul, the capital of South Korea, is home…

Formal landscape architectural education in Australia only began in the late 1960s and it seemed to adopt a relatively unmediated British approach, with an overlay of Australian environmentalism. Historically, landscape design has a long tradition of chauvinistic nationalism. The Brits were always scathing about the axiality of French-designed landscapes and Aussie landscape architects took on this attitude without question, with the design ethos of the 1960s Sydney Bush School style. The Chicago adaptation of French Beaux-Arts was grudgingly accepted in the designs of Walter Burley Griffin, despite attempts to turn the triangulated pivot points into eighteenth- century English landscape follies, and Marion Mahony Griffin’s drawings were heavily mediated by nationalistic bush icons. We admired the restraint in Japanese gardens and Roberto Burle Marx’s exuberant Brazilian designs and in the late…

While working in northern Laos over a decade ago, I asked a local colleague to generate a simple business card to explain to officials (in the local dialect) that I was an Australian landscape architect with an interest in urban and land design and management. Later that month, when presenting my credentials and project findings to the minister in charge, my counterparts proudly announced that I was an international agricultural science expert! Therein lies one of the great challenges and contradictions of landscape architectural practice in the Asia-Pacific region during an era of such transformative change. Where our identity and role in the region was firstly framed in a context of discrete urban management and environmental conservation, it has quite rapidly shifted to one where we are now instrumental contributors…

In 2017 an almost kilometre-long park constructed on a stretch of redundant highway was opened in the centre of Seoul. Design blogs and media across the world disseminated the Dutch design practice MVRDV’s inspiration for the scheme. Claiming the park as “South Korea’s answer to New York’s High Line,” the design website Dezeen outlined Seoullo 7017’s major design features, including an urban arboretum with plants organized according to the Korean alphabet and set in a vast array of circles, combined with the requisite urban programs.1, 2 MVRDV’s co-founding director Winy Maas describes the garden as “human and friendly and green,” offering approaches typical of European city planning. However, he claims a “science fiction element” as an Asian reference, stating that “in Asia they want to dip their cities in this…

Concrete is a highly versatile construction material that delivers the resilience and durability required for projects in the harsh Australian environment. When used with good design and construction practise, concrete can form beautiful urban landscapes built to last. Concrete can be coloured, textured and moulded to construct an unlimited array of buildings and structures. It is an important contributor to sustainable development and enjoys an outstanding reputation for durability, efficiency and architectural flexibility. Glenorchy Art and Sculpture Park Located by the River Derwent, the Glenorchy Art and Sculpture Park (GASP!) by Room 11 Architects and McGregor Coxall consists of a public walkway, pavilion and courtyard. The architecture responds to the scale of the surrounding landform with blunt forms that frame and command the superlative Tasmanian landscape. The public walkway is…

Across Australian universities, the media and the broader community we have grown accustomed to various attitudes toward Asian students. It is not uncommon to hear claims that these students are here to “buy a degree” to gain easy access to residency. Some academics begrudge the need to internationalize their curriculum, while others (frequently knowing no other language themselves) complain that the students have poor English skills. Formed by particular experiences, these views are often generalized to describe the wide spectrum of “the international (Asian) student.” Rarely do we spend time finding out why these diverse students choose to study in Australia and what they think of our cities, education system and attitudes, so we sat down and spoke with students from Thailand, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong and China who…

It is expected that by 2050 more than 75 percent of the world’s population will live in urban areas. As one of the most urbanized countries in the world, Australia has already surpassed this percentage.1 Like much of the Western world, Australia’s urbanization was firmly established by the early twentieth century, whereas urban growth in the current century is forecast predominantly for Asian and African countries. This transformation from rural to urban is particularly acute in China, where in 1980 it was reported that over 80 percent of Chinese people still lived in rural villages. The Chinese government is currently seeking to “urbanize half of its rural population by 2030 – a staggering 350 million citizens.”2 Understanding and responding to the effect of the Chinese government’s agenda on village communities…

01 CULTURAL AND URBAN LANDSCAPE ASAHIKAWA KITASAITO GARDEN Takano Landscape Planning Location: Asahikawa, Japan 02 CULTURAL AND URBAN LANDSCAPE TIANJIN CULTURE PARK Ramboll Studio Dreiseitl Location: Tianjin, China 03 PARKS AND OPEN SPACE YONG RIVER WATERFRONT PARK AECOM Location: Ningbo, China 04 CULTURAL AND URBAN LANDSCAPE TAMAR GOVERNMENT COMPLEX HOK International (Asia-Pacific) Location: Hong Kong 05 RESIDENTIAL 23° ESTATE Shma Location: Ratchasima, Thailand 06 SKYRISE GREENERY OASIA (DOWNTOWN) HOTEL STX Landscape Architects Location: Singapore 07 PARKS AND OPEN SPACE LIGHTING AND NIGHT EXPERIENCE GARDENS BY THE BAY Grant Associates Location: Singapore 08 INFRASTRUCTURE PARKS AND OPEN SPACE TAUMANU RESERVE Isthmus Location: Auckland, New Zealand 09 INFRASTRUCTURE KOPUPAKA RESERVE Isthmus Location: Auckland, New Zealand 10 PARKS AND OPEN SPACE SYDNEY PARK WATER RE-USE PROJECT Turf Design Studio and Environmental Partnership Location:…

The contemporary cities of East Asia are perhaps best recognized for their sprawling development and glittering skylines. New central business districts were created to attract global capitals but many resulted in banal and ubiquitous development. Large-scale projects have erased traditional urban fabric no longer deemed fit for modern metropolis. Some historic remnants have been kept, but often as window dressings, lacking raw vitality and authenticity. In the midst of such rapid and profound transformations there have also been remarkable landscape design projects. Work by Beijing-based Turenscape presents innovative approaches in mitigating the impacts of rapid urbanization. The Cheonggyecheon stream restoration project in Seoul, despite resulting in displacement of thousands of vendors and businesses, illustrates a remarkable undertaking that favours urban open space over cars, a legacy now reinforced by the…