42nd annual Aggie Workshop explored urban landscape design

Lucinda Sanders

Texas A&M landscape architecture students teamed with design professionals at the 42nd annual Aggie Workshop, Feb. 3, 2017, a series of lectures, a charrette and a graphics class hosted by the university’s student chapter of the [American Society of Landscape Architects] (https://www.asla.org) .

Event speakers and participants explored Workshop’s theme, “Urbanization: Placemaking within the Urban Matrix,” by considering how landscape architects can create designs to meet the needs of growing urban communities, said Alaina Parker, Workshop chairwoman and senior landscape architecture student.

“As people continue moving into urban environments, it becomes increasingly important that landscape architects create engaging and safe places that connect people to each other and the environment and are adaptable to future needs,” she said.

Design professionals discussed their projects and the field’s latest trends at Workshop’s morning session in the Bethancourt Ballroom of the [Memorial Student Center] (https://www.google.com/maps/place/Memorial+Student+Center/@30.612282,-96.3413758,15z/data=!4m2!3m1!1s0x0:0x90311327f8c2221d) before the event moved to the Langford Architecture Center for an afternoon charrette and graphics design class.

Workshop's morning session was headlined by keynote speaker Lucinda Sanders, CEO and partner of OLIN, a landscape architecture, urban design and planning firm heralded for creating iconic and vibrant landscapes.

Sanders led the design of many OLIN signature projects including [Comcast Center Plaza] (http://www.archdaily.com/158763/comcast-center-plaza-olin) and the Central Delaware Riverfront master plan in Philadelphia, [Gap Headquarters] (http://www.theolinstudio.com/blog/asla-honors-san-francisco-corporate-headquarters/) in San Francisco and Fountain Square in Cincinnati.

An ASLA immediate past president and fellow, Sanders is a member of multiple boards and committees, including the [Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center] (https://www.wildflower.org) advisory board, the [Landscape Journal] (http://lj.uwpress.org) editorial board and the CEO Roundtable of Landscape Architects.

In the afternoon, students and design professionals from several firms worked side by side in a charrette to design a project to be determined.

The afternoon also included a graphics class dedicated to the memory of John Moon ‘92, a former landscape architecture student who died in 2015 after a battle with cancer.

He owned MoonDesign, a site design and architectural illustration firm, and before that was an illustrator and designer at TBG Partners, a landscape architecture, environmental graphic design and planning firm.

posted November 11, 2016