A Landscape Manifesto
WE MUST PUT THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY CITY IN NATURE RATHER THAN PUT NATURE IN THE CITY. TO PUT A CITY IN NATURE WILL MEAN USING ENGINEERED SYSTEMS THAT FUNCTION AS THOSE IN NATURE AND DERIVING FORM FROM THEM. By 2050, the UN estimates that 70% of the world’s population will live in large municipal centers. Cities are the place to work in and on for the 21st Century the population of the world is all moving to cities. And we need to intervene in it to make it more sustainable and livable using a variety of new tools one of them being landscape. The different projects described will show different ways of working in cities in the contemporary world. . Diana Balmori, FASLA the founding principal of Balmori Associates, is recognized internationally for her creative interplay between landscape and architecture. She established Balmori Associates in 1990. In 2006, she created balmoriLABS within the firm to undertake and join the search for form in landscape and the intersection with architecture, art or engineering: Green Roofs, Floating Islands, Temporary Landscapes, Forms of Representation, and Zero Waste City are some of the labs.
Diana Balmori has been featured in publications and programs including Dwell, The Architects Newspaper, Monocle, El Pais, PBS, WNYC, Design Observer, Inhabitat, and Utne Reader, which named her 1 of 50 "Visionaries Who Are Changing Your World" in 2009.
In addition to teaching at Yale University in both the School of Architecture and the School of Forestry and Environmental studies, she has lectured and published extensively. Her most recent book is Groundwork: Between Landscape and Architecture, written with Joel Sanders (Random House, September 2011). A Landscape Manifesto was published by Yale University Press (2010). She is the co-author of many books, such as Saarinen Garden: A Total Work of Art; Redesigning the American Lawn: A Search for Environmental Harmony; Transitory Gardens, Uprooted Lives; The Land and Natural Development (LAND) Code: Guidelines for Environmentally Sustainable Land Development; Beatrix Farrand, American Landscapes; Garden and Campus Designs.