Camila Medina Novoa is a landscape historian and researcher, whose work sits at the intersection of history of landscape architecture, environmental history, history of science, and the emerging field of Plant Humanities — which places plant species at the centre of historical and cultural inquiry, allowing scientific and More
19 February – 7 May 2026 | ETH Zürich. This doctoral seminar has a twofold aim: (1) to develop an in-depth understanding of walking practices and critical walking methodologies across diverse contexts and geographies through theory sessions; and (2) to practise critical walking in walking seminars as a More
This article examines the intersection of wildfire, drought and extractivism through the case study of the Jardín del Siglo XXI (JSXXI, the Garden of the Twenty-first Century), a garden-based research project in Huertos Familiares, a community in Tiltil, Chile, increasingly affected by fire.
A single species can tell us much about taste, power, and the cultural choices behind how we shape landscapes. Connected to the doctoral project Making Ornamental Trees, this article reflects on the Araucaria araucana, a conifer, and the stories carried by its long journey from the Andes in More
The environmental crisis has created a demand for practices that build awareness about the interconnections of diverse forms of life, allowing humans to understand complex earthly relationships and reconnect with the land they inhabit. This paper contributes to this debate by investigating bird watching activities and their relevance More
Die Oberrheinische Tiefebene ist geprägt von Jahrhunderten des Wandels: vom amphibischen Lebensraum zum regulierten Fluss. Heute, im Zeichen von Klima- und Biodiversitätskrisen, eröffnet die Perspektive des «lebendigen Milieus» neue Wege, Landschaften jenseits von Fortschritts- oder Verlustnarrativen zu verstehen und zu gestalten.
This article examines the socioecological metabolism of soils in New York City, tracing their production, circulation, and transformation within the dynamics of extended urbanisation. It explores how soil, as both a biophysical and socio-political entity, alternates between being treated as lively or inert in response to the demands More
In February 2025, over 40 practitioners, researchers, and educators came together at ETH Zürich for this colloquium, to discuss the evolving relationship between the design and maintenance of living systems. In response to accelerating climate uncertainty, shrinking municipal budgets, and precarious labour conditions, the colloquium posed a simple More
New Orleans is a landscape paradox – a city largely below sea level, which continues to sink as the sea rises outside the levee walls that protect it. Despite its capacity to produce a tremendous amount of biomass and ecological diversity, the city’s urban forest has been in More
The Institute of Landscape and Urban Studies is young and evolving. While it builds on a rich research history across various chairs, its identity still continues to take shape through its doctoral community, lecture series, and biannual research colloquia. In this context, it is particularly noteworthy that the More
Applications until 30 April for autumn 2025. The Master‘s degree programme in Landscape Architecture is aimed at students with a Bachelor‘s degree in architecture or landscape architecture from a university or Swiss University of Applied Sciences with at least 180 ECTS or equivalent.
The NSL Colloquium will take place February 26-28 2025 at ETH Zürich and publishes an open call for submissions until November 8, 2024. The colloquium will investigate the relationship between the design and maintenance of living systems, seeking to cultivate practices, terminology, and theoretical insights into approaches that More
The Schelling Architecture Foundation awards the Schelling Architecture Prize biannually. In 2024, under the guiding principle of “Deep Transformations – Earth, Landscape, Architecture” the board of trustees has nominated three offices that leave classic professional profiles behind: Bureau Bas Smets from Brussels, LOLA Landscape Architects from Rotterdam and More
Landscape systems are intricate and challenging to illustrate effectively. The BeingAliveLanguage, a groundbreaking software integrated into Rhino/Grasshopper, revolutionizes the visualization of soil-centric information. Developed by ETH Zurich’s “Chair of Being Alive,” this tool empowers designers and planners to create expressive, automated illustrations that support decision-making processes.
The pilot issue of DELUS was launched at ONA DiD Lab in the autumn of 2023. It offers a range of diverse insights into landscape and urban questions. It introduces new methods to unpack multiple worlds and narrate manifold stories. The contributions range from unravelling histories of land-body More
The garden located in Huertos Familiares, Tiltil, Chile, investigates how soil modification through changes in land-management practices can establish an ecological and social capacity in the community, and create opportunities for the emergence of a new type of public garden in the com¬munity of Tiltil. Tiltil, which already More
The garden is located in the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans, a neighbourhood which suffered from extensive damage in 2005 during the city’s most severe weather-related disaster, Hurricane Katrina. The garden is a collection of five interconnected 10mx40m housing lots, which had homes on them prior to More
The garden of the XXI century in Zurich is located at the north-facing edge of Campus Hönggerberg, directly next to the HIT building. It is enclosed by roads on three sides and a day-care centre on the fourth side. With a size of roughly 1,000 m2 and a rectangular More
As part of the Garden of the XXI Century research, the project in Senan, Spain, investigates how a simple practice of modifying the soil through the carefully managed grazing of horses can build ecological and social capacities in a rural area with limited resources. Based on the regenerative More
On June 15, 2022, a fire burned 2,683 hectares of forest and agricultural land around the villages of La Clua de Maià and Alos de Balaguer in the municipality of Baldomà, a region of La Noguera north of Catalunya, Spain. Concerned about the intensity of the fire and More
Teresa Galí-Izard is professor of the Chair of Being Alive and director of the Master of Landscape Architecture at ETH. She is a principal of Arquitectura Agronomia, a landscape architecture firm based in Barcelona. Teresa is the author of “The Same Landscapes. Ideas and Interpretations” and trained as an agronomist at the Polytechnic University of Catalonia.
Applications until 30 April for autumn 2024. The Master‘s degree programme in Landscape Architecture is aimed at students with a Bachelor‘s degree in architecture or landscape architecture from a university or Swiss University of Applied Sciences with at least 180 ECTS or equivalent.
Application deadline: 10 February 2024 | Working sessions: 7 March, June, September, December 2024. The Institute of Landscape and Urban Studies (LUS) at ETH Zurich is delighted to announce the Community-led Landscape Restoration 2024 working group, a transdisciplinary series open to citizen groups, activists, academic researchers, and policy More
Video now online! (click here or directly on the keynote titles) The colloquium investigated the relationship between the design and maintenance of living systems, seeking to cultivate practices, terminology, and theoretical insights into approaches that attempt to maintain otherwise.
The landscapes dominated by chestnut trees in the southern alpine valleys are among the traditional agroforestry systems of Switzerland and have long been the main source of food for the local population. These complex socio-ecological systems provide a great learning space for landscape architects and planners, as chestnut More