ASLA 2012 Awards Call for Entries Released

Outstanding Juries Named for Professional and Student Awards Programs

The American Society of Landscape Architects has released its 2012 Awards Call for Entries for the 2012 professional and student awards, the premiere awards programs for the profession. Award recipients will receive featured coverage in the September issue of Landscape Architecture Magazine and in many other design and construction industry and general-interest media. Award recipients, their clients, and student advisors also will be honored at the awards presentation ceremony during the ASLA Annual Meeting and EXPO in Phoenix, September 28 – October 1, 2012. The award winning projects will be featured in a video presentation at the ceremony and on the awards website following the event.

The prestige of the ASLA awards programs relies on the high-caliber juries that are convened each year to review submissions. Members of this year’s professional awards jury are:

  • José Almiñana, ASLA, Andropogon Associates, Philadelphia, Jury Chair
  • Stephen T. Ayers, AIA, The Architect of the Capitol, Washington, D.C.
  • Gail Brinkmann, ASLA, City of Phoenix Street Transportation Department, Phoenix
  • Kathryn L. Gleason, FASLA, Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y.
  • Christopher Hawthorne, Architecture Critic, Los Angeles, Times, Los Angeles
  • Mikyoung Kim, ASLA, Mikyoung Kim Design, Boston
  • Tom Leader, ASLA, Tom Leader Studio, Berkeley, Calif.
  • Thomas R. Oslund, FASLA, oslund.and.assoc., Minneapolis
  • Jim Schuessler, ASLA, BNIM, Kansas City, Mo.

Members of the student awards jury are:

  • David Yocca, FASLA, Conservation Design Forum, Elmhurst, Ill., Jury Chair
  • Sheila A. Brady, FASLA, Oehme, van Sweden and Associates, Washington, D.C.
  • Mark A. Focht, FASLA, Fairmount Park Commission, Philadelphia
  • M. Paul Friedberg, FASLA, M. Paul Friedberg & Partners, New York City
  • Paul H. Gobster, FASLA, USDA Forest Service, Evanston, Ill.
  • Debra Guenther, ASLA, Mithun, Seattle
  • Linda Jewell, FASLA, University of California at Berkeley
  • Chris Reed, ASLA, Stoss Landscape Urbanism, Boston
  • Andrew Wilcox, ASLA, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, Calif.

Both the ASLA professional and students awards feature five categories: General Design; Residential Design; Analysis and Planning; Communications; and Research (the Professional Awards are co-sponsored by the Council of Educators in Landscape Architecture). The Professional Awards also include The Landmark Award, while the Student Awards include the Student Community Service Award and Student Collaboration categories.

Entry forms and payment must be received by:

  • Friday, February 3, 2012, for ASLA Professional Awards
  • Friday, April 27, 2012, for ASLA Student Awards

Submission binders must be received by:

  • Friday, February 17, 2012, for ASLA Professional Awards
  • Friday, May 11, 2012, for ASLA Student Awards

In need of inspiration? View the ASLA 2011 professional and student award-winning projects.

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ASLA: Exclusive Interview with 9/11 Memorial Landscape Architect Peter Walker, FASLA

Landscape Architecture Magazine features and in-depth interview with 9/11 Memorial landscape architect Peter Walker, FASLA. Walker candidly explores the collaboration with original designer Michael Arad, the difficulties in working with such an emotionally charged project and the decisions that went into the final design.

You can download a PDF of the feature online here or read the interview online here. Below are some excerpts from the interview.

Accepting to work with Arad’s design:

If one of the other finalists had wanted to bring me in, we probably wouldn’t have done it. I didn’t know that we would offer anything—I mean, to plant it up, who wants to do that?

The working relationship with Arad:

Our relationship was fine at the beginning. We worked well through the point where we won. Again in the same way that Michael wants to explain himself he also wants to elaborate everything. It’s a little like someone who’s designing their first house, they want to do everything they’ve ever thought of.

The visitor experience:

The fountains are not going to be pleasant. This is not a Victorian or baroque exuberance. This is an awesome kind of thing. And then you turn around. And you walk out, and there the trees are again, and they’re alive. And I think the symbolism of that is powerful too.

Achieving the design goal:

I’m hoping. But you never know. We’ve made huge models—eighth-scale models of the whole thing—and we still don’t know.

On the difficulties of such a high profile project:

The problems have all come about details—this detail or that detail. The benches have been redesigned five times. Every new group of people wants to go after the benches. We went around and around with the lights. We went around and around with the security. With every detail. With the drainage. So it’s been a lot of defense of detail.

Walker will present lessons learned from the 9/11 Memorial at the 2011 ASLA Annual Meeting and EXPO. The convention runs from October 29 to November 2 in San Diego.  If interested in a complimentary press pass, please email me at jlapides@asla.org. To learn more about the show, visit www.asla.org/2011meeting.

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Billable Hours Down, Hiring Up in Latest ASLA Business Quarterly Survey

The fourth quarter of 2010 represented a mixed bag for landscape architecture firms, as firm leaders reported fewer billable hours but increased hiring opportunities, according to the American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA) Business Quarterly survey. The findings echo the results from the 4Q 2009 survey, though billable hours, inquiries and hiring all strengthened from this time last year.

Six in 10 respondents reported stable or higher amount of billable hours (59.6 percent) and inquiries for new work (59.4 percent) in the fourth quarter of 2010 – a decline of six and ten points, respectively from the third quarter survey. At this time last year, 45.5 percent reported stable or rising billable hours, and 53.7 percent reported stable or rising inquiries.

Also like last year, the fourth quarter 2010 saw a modest increase in job opportunities for landscape architects. One in five (20.7 percent) respondents plan to hire in the upcoming quarter, up from 14.6 percent last quarter and 16.4 percent a year ago.

“Despite signs of recovery, continued layoffs, lowered fees, and strong competition for few projects made this past year one of the toughest on record for the industry,” said ASLA Executive Vice President and CEO Nancy Somerville, Hon. ASLA. “We’re confident that the worse of the recession is behind us, but improvement will be frustratingly slow.”

The survey also asked about firm work with federally funded projects. Overall, 40 percent of firm leaders indicated that they worked on projects that were partially or fully funded by the government within the past two years. One in ten (9.8 percent) respondents reported working on Green Project Reserve green infrastructure projects under the Stimulus Bill.

View the full survey results online at: http://www.asla.org/NewsReleaseDetails.aspx?id=30562

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