This critique challenges the dominance of object-oriented and static approaches in landscape visualization, advocating instead for representations that engage temporality, perception and ecological complexity. Drawing from philosophical exploration of object-oriented ontology, it contends that conventional 3D modeling workflows-while technologically advanced-reinforce a fragmented, object-based view of landscape that fails to account for relational and temporal processes. The discussion explores alternative visualization strategies rooted in artistic and ecological traditions, including the 'infraordinary', montage and slow aesthetics, which foreground mundane and temporal elements as a mode of critical attention. These approaches are situated within a broader lineage of aesthetic theory, phenomenology and environmental ethics, offering models for visualizing landscapes as events rather than objects. By reframing representation as an interpretive, processual act, this perspective proposes a new visual language for landscape that embraces flux, uncertainty and deep viewer engagement-fostering more situated, ethical and ecologically attuned ways of seeing and designing.
The two decades between the formation of the British Institute of Landscape Architects in 1929 and the establishment of the International Federation of Landscape Architects in 1948 were arguably the most formative in the institute's history. During this period, the organization evolved into a recognized professional body-comparable to the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) and the Town Planning Institute (today's Royal Town Planning Institute RTPI). Through a collective biographical approach, this article examines the significant-yet frequently overlooked-contributions of five women: Madeline Agar, Marjory Allen, Brenda Colvin, Sylvia Crowe and Jaqueline Tyrwhitt. By tracing their influence beyond the sphere of design practice, I argue that their efforts were decisive in shaping a profession capable of advocating for the needs of both people and planet. Their legacy, I contend, offers an instructive model for how the landscape architecture profession might position itself in response to today's climate and biodiversity crises-and in the decades ahead.
National parks such as the Cairngorms National Park in Scotland offer access to expansive and diverse landscapes, yet the climate crisis demands new modes of engagement with these places. The Scottish Gaelic concept of d & ugrave;thchas-describing a reciprocal relationship between people and land- provides a relevant lens through which to rethink this engagement. This research, part of a wider study of ecological conservation volunteer programmes in the park, employs Polaroid photography as an embodied practice in which the camera becomes a medium of encounter. The resulting images register atmospheric conditions in landscapes shaped by active human intervention; the sensitivity of Polaroid film to light and temperature allows the landscape itself to participate in the making of the photograph. By dwelling with the images as they develop, the practice foregrounds the dynamic, more-than-human assemblages that constitute d & ugrave;thchas. It demonstrates how visual methods of inhabiting landscape can bear witness to environments undergoing rapid climatic change and enrich sitebased research in landscape architecture.
Wildfires in Canada are common occurrences, but as climate change drives rising fire activity and intensity, remote wildland-urban interface (WUI) sites are increasingly under threat. This paper uses a single event-the 2023 Qu & eacute;bec wildfires prompting evacuation of Lebel-sur-Qu & eacute;villon (LSQ)-as a methodological pilot project for visualizing dynamic wildfire behaviour and the traces megafires leave behind. The paper utilizes two methods, moving between general fire behaviour principles at a distance and their specific impacts on the ground. First, we developed physical models that draw from fire science experimentation methods to visualize principles of fire behaviour. Second, we completed fieldwork in LSQ a year post-fire; we then identified and mapped three sites of WUI significance: a firebreak, a power substation and a logging clean-up site. Combined, the work makes legible variables that drive volatile dynamic fire spread while revealing the wide range of conditions that fall within the WUI purview.
As climate change-driven wildfire patterns collide with the legacy of a century of fire suppression in Western United States forests, there is growing recognition of the need for forest restoration via fuels reduction treatments such as thinning. But the economics of ecological thinning do not work without changes to the system of demand for small-diameter and unmerchantable timber. A landscape architectural design studio at the University of Pennsylvania researched forest maintenance practices and typologies of wood processing facilities that can help support the economics of forest restoration, such as the wood utilization campus typology. Spatial design opportunities exist in the configuration, sizing and co-location of elements in these facilities. Design can also support increased public literacy of fire ecology and acculturate publics to prescribed burning, while design imaginaries can expand opportunities for increasing Indigenous cultural burning and supporting Tribal-owned forest enterprises. Examples drawn from design research elucidate the interconnections between wildfire risk, forestry, wood products manufacturing, land ownership and labour.
The history of fire suppression is deeply entwined with social and cultural marginalization, particularly in rural landscapes often excluded from dominant urban narratives. Too frequently, these regions are either romanticized or cast in apocalyptic terms, reducing wildfires to mere symptoms of climate breakdown. This framing obscures the deeper socioeconomic forces and landscape transformations that make fire-prone regions-especially in Mediterranean-type climates-so vulnerable. This essay advocates for a new 'pyric' sensibility, one that moves beyond the reductive perception of fire as purely destructive and instead recognizes its ecological and cultural significance. By revitalizing rural landscapes through grassroots initiatives and the integration of traditional fire knowledge, landscape architecture emerges as a critical mediator between ecology, culture and community. This shift challenges conventional commission-driven practices, repositioning the field as one of advocacy and co-creation cultivating partnerships among communities and local governments to protect resources, restore natural capital and sustain long-term resilience.
