A Response to 'The New Landscape Declaration'

 

Our lecturer provided us with reading material from the book ‘The New Landscape Declaration’, including both the original and new declarations, as well as extracts from individual landscape architects. I was, at first, tentative about reading it, as the thought of putting myself in the position of questioning the profession, and how I would fit into it, was quite daunting. However, I have thoroughly enjoyed the read and it has made me really question my intentions and passions as a landscape architect, and I am more excited than ever to get into practice.

 

1966 Declaration of Concern

The 1966 Landscape Declaration was built on foundations of concern for the quality of the environment, stating ‘what is merely offensive or disturbing today threatens life itself tomorrow. We are concerned over misuse of the environment and development, which has lost all contact with the basic processes of nature. Most urban Americans are being separated from visual and physical contact with nature in any form’. Decades ago, even before the climate and biodiversity emergency was a commonly spoken phrase, these authors understood the gravity of the situation we were in, able to deeply understand the need for respect and connection between people and their environment, in order to maintain sustainability. They identified that there would be no single solution for this issue, but ‘groups of solutions carefully related one to another, of which landscape architecture has the potential to play a key role as ‘a profession dealing with the interdependence of environmental processes’. They identified the need for those who understood natural resources and processes, who could understand the landscape capabilities and interpret it to plan and design the environment.

 

The New Landscape Declaration

50 years after the original declaration, over 700 landscape architects, inspired by the original words and concerned for the future, met to create a new vision of what it was to be a landscape architect. Within their declaration, they highlighted the connection between humanity and the landscape, stressing ‘Food, water, oxygen – everything that sustains us comes from and returns to the landscape. What we do to our landscapes we ultimately do to ourselves’. They, unlike the 1966 declaration, specifically cite climate change, explaining how centuries of exploitation of nature is now directly affecting us, whilst also mentioning how the poor are disproportionately impacted. Like the first declaration, however, they also raise landscape architecture as a solution, stating ‘The urgent challenge before us is to redesign our communities in the context of their bioregional landscapes, enabling them to adapt to climate change and mitigate its root causes. As designers versed in both environmental and cultural systems, landscape architects are uniquely positioned to bring related professions together into new alliances to address complex social and ecological problems. Landscape architects bring different and often competing interests together so as to give artistic physical form and integrated function to the ideals of equity, sustainability, resiliency and democracy’. The multidimensional capabilities of landscape architecture are what allows it to form these positive connections between people and nature, as I truly believe the only sustainable way forward is to work as one, sharing respect and knowledge with one another for a greater purpose.

I could quite easily write reams and reams on the individual extracts I have read, but for the sake of everyones time (and not creating a several thousand word blog post) I have chosen to focus on Richard Weller’s discussion on the position of landscape architecture within the new Anthropocene era. However, perhaps at a later date I will post my thoughts on Dirk Sijmon’s ideas of the adventures ahead for landscape architecture, or Nina Chase’s experimental landscapes, or Sarah Primeau’s ambition for constructed landscapes – all equally interesting and thought-provoking.

 

Our Time? – Richard Weller

As the fiftieth anniversary of the 1966 Declaration of Concern approach, it was decided that it required a renewal, leading to ‘The New Landscape Declaration: A Summit on Landscape Architecture and the Future’, a summit that provided the platform for 32 declarations, which served to inform the final wording of the New Landscape Declaration. In his chapter, Weller discusses the three key themes that have emerged: climate change, urbanisation, and the profession’s identity in the twenty-first century. He identifies that the progression of climate change since the original declaration only goes to strengthen the original message, and, with that in mind, what does climate change really mean for landscape architecture? Anthropogenic climate change is a new type of  change - Weller recognises that we have ‘altered natural history on a planetary scale’. This impacts the way in which landscape architects can design, as nature in the Anthropocene is manifested by climate change and not yet well known. Therefore, as he entails, it is now what we make it, a direct result of how we conceptualise it. This, Weller suggests, is the purpose of landscape architecture – giving form to certain conceptualisations of nature. Within these conceptualisations is the idea of the city – urbanisation is occurring at a huge rate, as both informal and planned development, requiring a new approach. Weller suggests it is imperative for people to begin looking at cities as new kind of nature, rather than something opposed to nature. This is where landscape architects are vital, he states that ‘our propensity for holistic thinking and interdisciplinary collaboration, and our grasp of the systemic, relational, and temporal nature of things, along with the increasing sophistication of available data, mean landscape architects are well suited to participate in, if not lead, this urban transformation’. The problem, however, is the professional identity of landscape architecture. As Weller identifies, many of the modern issues are well outside of the territory of landscape architecture, into frontiers of extinction, extraction and waste. To tackle the associated issues with the Anthropocene era necessitates the ‘significant expansion of landscape architecture’s professional and educational capacity’ – this is where the New Landscape Declaration comes in. The declaration ‘calls upon students, practitioners, and academics to work to diversify and expand the profession through inclusive leadership, advocacy and activism. It asks us to reflect on how we can reach towards ideals of equity, sustainability, resiliency, and democracy. It asks us how we can help create places that serve the higher purpose of social and ecological justice for all people and all species. It asks how our designs nourish our deepest needs for communion with the nature world and with one another. It asks how they serve the health and well-being of all communities’. I agree with Weller, who stresses the pressure this declaration places on landscape architects, but, as he says, ideals are beacons, not ends. The declaration is less about the profession as a whole, but more an encouragement for personal reflection on what it means to be a landscape architect and how we can individually make a contribution. It reminds me of a quote by Anne Marie Bonneau – ‘We don’t need a handful of people doing zero waste perfectly. We need millions of people doing it imperfectly’. 

 

Reading these extracts has very much made me question my own intentions as a landscape architect – I hope, like many others I can imagine, to leave a lasting, positive impact on our environment. I hope to tackle the issues mentioned of climate change and urbanisation and I hope to be part of a new generation of landscape architects who create a diverse, strong identity for the profession. This discussion has encouraged and reminded me to keep my greater purpose for choosing this profession at the forefront of every design, conceptualising harmony and connection between people and the landscape.