Beyond beauty

The role of the landscape architect should be about more than just beautification, say Dastin Hillery and Mona Rizk, senior associates at global design consultancy Aedas. Commercial Outdoor Design finds out more.

One of the most aggravating problems that landscape designers have to contend with is a misunderstanding on the part of the general public as to exactly what their role entails.

The lay person's view is that the landscape architect is some kind of gardening expert or someone brought in at the end of a project to tidy up the space and make it look pretty by adding a few palms and shrubs, but the reality, as anyone in the industry knows, is that the role of landscape architect is far, far more complex.

The role of a landscape architect is about much more than just beautification and has a far reaching impact on the land, says Dastin Hillery, senior associate at the urban design and landscape division of global design consultancy Aedas.

"Every time you attend a meeting with a client, the first question they ask is what kind of species you want to use," he says.

"But landscape architecture is not just beautification; it's about creating a space, creating the ambiance of a development, initiating lifestyle and it's creating a new public realm and at the end of the day it's also about creating a quality built environment. And if you are talking about a quality built environment, you cannot avoid talking about the ecological footprint and the environmental framework."

As a global design consultancy firm, Aedas, which has 40 offices worldwide, is well placed to comment on how perceptions of the landscape architect in this region differ to those in other parts of the world.

Both locally and internationally, there has been a gradual shift in awareness with the landscape architect slowly becoming a more prominent figure in the design and construction process, comments Mona Rizk, also senior associate at Aedas.

"Landscape architecture has gone from one phase to another and today you cannot do any masterplanning project or any kind of building anywhere without a landscape architect to advise on how to go and do things," she says.

"All the spaces that they call the ‘left over', that we consider as being the public realm, that is what adds quality. It's not beautification. How people relate to their environment; that is the most important thing."

Planned landscape

Crucial to understanding the importance of landscape architecture is an understanding of landscape planning, and this is something that to a degree is missing in the Middle East region, notes Hillery.

"The understanding about the landscape planning is still slightly immature," he says. "People are still not interested in discussing the ecological components of the landscape, the impact on the ecological footprint, the human comforts aspect that landscape could offer in this extreme climate condition, or [about] how landscape could reshape the future of a city."

"In Dubai, the landscape role is to beautify and repair the mistakes while others look at landscape as the lead of the development because of the ecological component," he adds.

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