Rob Kuper, PLA, Temple, Architecture and Environmental Design
Scaling up: Climate in All Classrooms at Temple
LARC 2143, Landscape Architecture Design Studio I
LA Design Studio I is the first of six 6-credit design studios offered in the undergraduate Bachelor of Landscape Architecture (BSLA) degree program at Temple University. In this course in fall 2023, students will complete hands-on and place-based explorations that focus on a semester-long design project in the center of the Temple University Ambler campus and Ambler Arboretum.
Coursework addresses one or more of four learning outcomes: 1) communicate a design proposal with words and conventional orthographic projections; 2) integrate fundamental elements of and concepts from landscape architecture and other fields into a site design proposal; 3) understand a site by demonstrating an ability to conduct a unique site inventory and analysis; and 4) express a sense of awe, wonder, and patience for; humbleness and gratefulness toward Nature, and willingness to reciprocate Nature’s gifts.
All outcomes account for content gleaned from the Valley and Ridge Workshop in summer 2023. In 1, communicating a design proposal, students will hand letter five brief excerpts from various texts, such as Braiding Sweetgrass, A Sand County Almanac, and a synopsis of global emissions quantities across space and time. In 2, design, students will create a landscape (proposal) that implements the functions and features of a design program for a specific site given various course texts, content from a site inventory and analysis, at least one case study, United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, and the 2022 American Society of Landscape Architects Climate Action Plan. Additionally, students must account for the embodied emissions of proposed materials and inherent emissions from construction machinery. In 3, understanding a site, individual or small groups of students will identify and document social and natural variables for a specific location (i.e., site) that will inform the design proposal at varied times (i.e., near- and long-term) and scales. Students will engage in place-based learning and content related to resilience by visiting the site, performing “field recordings” (think assemblages like Duchamp or Rauschenberg), and removing invasive plants and planting native trees. Thereafter, students will articulate how the documented information will inform specific aspects of the proposed project. Finally, in 4, wonder, students will articulate their role and the role of landscape architecture in the world given excerpts from Colors of Nature (Deming & Savoy, 2011), Ecological Design (Rottle & Yocum, 2010), assigned videos, and weekly firsthand experiences and observations in Nature (e.g., a “blue” moon, the autumnal equinox, watching an insect).