Innholdsfortegnelse for Issue 181 February 2024 i Landscape Architecture Australia

The Rough&Ready Range is characterised by its FSC® hardwood beams, which measure 7 x 15 cm. In addition to benches the range includes Green Benches, Tree Planters, Bicycle Racks & Bollards which makes for a consistent appearance across the product range. All items in this range have a minimal character. Streetlife is a design-driven company with a passion for creating innovative design elements for public spaces. We create products that are natural in style and use the landscape as our starting point. The overall Collection has a timeless, natural quality and is of a high standard, both aesthetically and technically. We not only strive to reduce the amount of maintenance required by selecting the right design and materials but also aim to extend the lifespan of our products. We use simple…

Landscape architects must play a leading role in realizing a strong and sustainable regional Australia. To address the unique challenges faced by regional areas, we place people at the centre of the decision-making process while bringing the expertise to shape sustainable, resilient and beautiful places. The Australian government’s Regional Investment Framework introduces a new approach. It positions regional Australia to capitalize on global transitions, valuing local voices, places, services and economies. The framework aims to support First Nations people, promote a net-zero economy and progress gender equality. The framework is designed to influence budgetary decision-making and foster inter-governmental collaboration. It emphasizes data-driven outcomes and local community involvement. The Australian Institute of Landscape Architects (AILA) recognizes the strong connection between the aspirations of the Australian government set out in the framework…

People are at the heart of any revolution, digital or otherwise. Working in a large, multidisciplinary company like Arup has provided me with a global perspective on current design practices and what is needed for landscape architecture to keep pace with rapid industry and technological changes. In my work, I am surrounded by highly skilled, driven and like-minded people who initiate change and consider how, as designers, we can best take advantage of new and emerging technologies. Innovation is not just about jazzy new tools, but also about the processes implemented. My journey over the past 20 years in the UK and Australia has highlighted the importance of people and organizations in driving innovation in the landscape architecture profession. From the beginning of my university training as a landscape architect,…

As urban areas densify and housing lots become smaller, low-growing ground cover systems can offer impactful and time-saving alternatives to lawns. Conceived as a green carpet tile, Plant Tiles helps homeowners to achieve instant garden makeover results and to enjoy the benefits of being surrounded by nature. Plant Tiles are propagated and delivered in custom-designed trays. Each individual tile covers the same area as ten 100 mm pots of ground cover plants. The trays are filled with media and seeded with selected low-growing aromatic herbs or creeping perennials. As the ground cover plants grow, the roots bind the media together so that the Plant Tiles can be removed from the tray and laid on the prepared area. Being air-pruned, the roots very quickly take to the prepared garden bed. For…

The University of Melbourne Student Precinct, Parkville, Victoria Built on the land of the Wurundjeri Woi-wurrung people Aspect Studios and Glas Urban It is on Wurundjeri Woi-wurrung land that I meet James Wilson of Lyons and Mark Gillingham of GLAS for a tour of the long-awaited, recently completed and now multi-award-winning University of Melbourne Student Precinct. Members of the university community are setting up for the Mid-Autumn Moon Festival, with stalls, food trucks and performances planned to occupy the central amphitheatre, lawns, courtyards, and terraces. Prior to arriving, I had received a briefing from Kirsten Bauer of Aspect Studios, whom alongside Wilson and Gillingham, cited the collaboration model between Lyons Architecture, Koning Eizenberg Architecture, Aspect Studios, NMBW Architecture Studio, Greenaway Architects and Greenshoot Consulting, Glas Urban and Architects EAT as…

The boundaries of the discipline of landscape architecture are a rich space for research experimentation, innovation and change. It is out of this space that Landskip Lab was formed in 2014. Combining academic and professional research, the practice emphasizes site exploration over design. Through the development of extra-visual sensing, surveying and analysis methods borrowed from the adjacent science disciplines, the “permanent laboratory” now works closely with community, local government, industry and academic institutions to develop highly specific landscape analysis outcomes. Within its collection of research projects, two fundamental principles of adaptation and accessibility have significantly influenced its approach to landscape architectural practice, research and knowledge transfer. Adaptation and efficiency In the landscape architecture office and the field, a broad and constantly evolving series of technologies are often inspired or generated…

Michael G. White Michael G. White is completing his PhD at UNSW Sydney, investigating computational tools for planting design. He is an associate at Hassell in Sydney. Darren Hickmott Darren Hickmott is global landscape digital leader at Arup. He develops tools and workflows to enhance the digital capabilities of landscape architects. Ella Gauci-Seddon Ella Gauci-Seddon is a senior landscape architect and gender equity lead at City of Melbourne. She is passionate about promoting equity through place design. Philip Belesky Philip Belesky is a computational designer in McGregor Coxall’s Biourbanism Lab. His research considers how to design tools for designing landscapes. Claire Martin Claire Martin is a landscape architect and associate director of Oculus. She is a fellow and past president of the Australian Institute of Landscape Architects. Chris Madigan Chris…

Innovation describes a process of adjusting existing practices to meet changing conditions and improve performance. Economist Joseph Schumpeter first conceived of the idea of innovation as “creative destruction” in the 1940s, in reference to capitalism’s continual evolution. Since then, however, the term has come to encompass the technical and social dimensions of change across many disciplines and professions. This edition of Landscape Architecture Australia explores how innovation is understood and how it is transforming landscape architecture practices in contemporary Australia. It examines how the boundaries of the profession are being pushed by prevailing forces of change. These forces range from the industry and the market, the emergence of digital technologies and the impetus for climate-positive action, to the social dynamics of reconciling the relationship with First Nations people in Australia.…

With some exceptions, landscape architecture and architecture have had a limited engagement with the medium of video games as a form of culture and design expression. While practitioners from the built environment work within video game development, they often do so directly after graduation. It is uncharted territory in Australia for an established practice to attempt to broaden its portfolio from the constructed realm into the digital space of games. Our small interdisciplinary architectural visualization studio, Lucernal, is attempting to bridge this industrial gap by developing our first video game title, Little Ruin. Doing so has necessitated a twofold innovative shift within our practice: first, in terms of generative approaches to design; and second, at the level of business development. I co-founded Lucernal with my partner, Mark Fenollar. The studio’s…

Leadership at the organizational level is an infinitely intriguing dimension of innovation. It’s about the people who make change happen through decisions, actions, and role-modelling behaviour; they set the tone of the invisible layers of culture. Based on my recent PhD research about innovation in Australian landscape architecture practice (2022),1 leadership is one of the key factors in innovation at the organizational level. Leadership encompasses a range of roles – champion. changemaker, opinion-shaper, gatekeeper – and can be assumed by one or several individuals. To explore the topic further, I spoke with four women in leading positions in organizations undergoing transformation. Together, they represent a cross-section of the profession from organizations of different sizes and types. Agnes Orvos-Nagy is a senior designer at Arup, leading the studio’s landscape digital team…

A practice’s digital toolkit is typically populated with the offerings of software giants, such as Autodesk, Adobe and Nemetschek. While some practices might engage specialists to build new tools to fill in the gaps, these efforts typically remain proprietary. But what if landscape architects’ design software was made by other landscape architects? Philip Belesky spoke to two practising landscape architects who make software and release their tools into the wild: Thomas Chapman, computational design lead at McGregor Coxall, and Niki Schwabe, a director of both landscape architecture practice Bush Projects and Doco Lab, a sibling company to Bush that was created to develop and sell software for landscape architects. Philip Belesky – Niki, Doco Lab is preparing to release a mix of paid and free software. Thomas, you released LandArchTools…

“Deep Earth,” “Raw Earth,” “Fertile Earth” and “Subterranean Earth” were the themes that shaped the 2023 Festival of Landscape Architecture, Un/Earth, held in Tarntanya/Adelaide on the lands of the Kaurna people. Curated by Lyndon Slavin, Tanya Court, Scott Hawken and Gemma Kleinig in collaboration with cultural advisors Uncle Jeffrey Newchurch and Aunty Merle Simpson, the event aimed to draw attention to “the worlds beneath us, through exploration of the physical and metaphoric soil horizons upon which landscape architecture practice is founded.” I have attended most of the AILA festivals over the past nine years, including last year’s edition, Country. This year’s edition struck me with four key learnings. 1. Building relationships, listening and good process In pursuit of progress and the delivery of outcomes, designers often neglect the communities who…

This first issue of Landscape Architecture Australia for 2024 focuses on innovation in the landscape architecture industry. Our guest editors, Jela Ivankovic-Waters and Darren Hickmott, have collated a series of articles that explore what innovation might mean within the landscape architecture profession and highlight the methods individuals and studios are using to expand how landscape architects work. By applying design skills and knowledge in new ways, the landscape architecture profession can generate fresh ways of approaching design, which can, in turn, influence thinking in other disciplines. Jela’s interest in this topic stems from her PhD research at the University of Melbourne on how Building Information Modelling (BIM) is being adopted by Australian landscape architecture practices. Darren, on the other hand, has overseen processes of change in multiple contexts and scales,…

I usually ride my bike to work, but in the last few weeks before parental leave, I have been catching the tram. If you look around you on the tram on a morning commute, you’ll find it difficult to see anyone without a digital extension of themselves in their hands – head down, peripheral vision almost shut off, swiping away in the digital realm. As we depend on our digital appendages more and more, we are at risk of becoming increasingly disconnected from the specifics of place, from the natural world and from the contextual inputs that stimulate our senses. One of the risks of designing in digital is the ability to produce at ever-increasing speeds. Although, as landscape architects, efficiency is important for our viability in practice, it can…

Sydney Modern, Sydney, New South Wales Built on the land of the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation McGregor CoxallS Sydney has a new art gallery, the Sydney Modern. By calling the new wing of the Art Gallery of New South Wales (AGNSW) “modern,” the AGNSW is distinguishing the new from the old, drawing on art historical terms. Reviewing a project that calls itself “modern” in an issue dedicated to “innovation” begs inquiry into the two words, which pivot around time. When treating them as adjectives, the Oxford English Dictionary defines “modern” as “relating to the present or recent times as opposed to the remote past” and “innovative” as “featuring new methods [or] advanced and original.” Modern architecture and landscape architecture in the twentieth century defined itself both ideologically, on…