As a landscape architecture student, I have become acutely aware of the lack of understanding most people have for what a landscape architect actually does.
As a college student, you should expect to have conversations on a regular basis about your studies. The questions could come from someone you met in one of your classes or from an old friend back home.
The conversation usually starts with “So, what are you majoring in?” This is followed by an answer: “chemical engineering,” “general business” or “accounting.” Then the person who asked the question usually nods, and says “cool” or “OK.” The conversations proceed on to other things because most people have a pretty good understanding of what people majoring in those fields will be doing when they get out of school.
This is hardly the case for a landscape architecture student. Peter Summerlin, a senior landscape architecture student, said, “I don’t even tell people what my major is anymore; I just say I’m interested in going to grad school for urban planning.”
Once someone asks you “What are you majoring in?” and you reply, “landscape architecture,” the conversation will usually go one of two ways. The first and most common response is that people will confuse the profession of landscape architecture with some other profession. If they have confused it with gardening, horticulture or landscape contracting (each a separate and distinct profession in its own right), they will say something like, “Well, you should come and practice on my back yard” or “You can come mow my grass.”
The second common response is a look of confusion, followed by the question, “So what is it that you do?” Both responses lead to an impromptu education session on the subject of landscape architecture. The surprising thing is that even after you explain what a landscape architect is to some people, they still don’t know and will leave the conversation just as confused as before.
I will attempt to concisely answer two questions: “What does a landscape architect do?” and “Why don’t more people know about the profession?”
The first thing you should know about landscape architects is they are designers who work at a variety of scales. Begin with a fountain in a city park. The landscape architect could design the fountain; he could also design the layout of the entire park that the fountain is in; he could design the layout of the city grid around the park; or he could even be involved in planning at a regional scale, deciding what areas are suitable for development, what areas should be set aside for wildlife preservation and how traffic should move through those areas.
While a landscape architect is capable of working at any of these scales, it’s simply not feasible or reasonable for one person to expect to design a community to that degree of detail. There are also other professions specifically trained to be better suited to solve some of the complex problems that occur at various scales.
Landscape architects work with these allied professions, including architects, civil engineers, urban planners, wildlife and forestry biologists and policy makers, to execute development in a way that hopefully finds a balance between the built environment (the human habitat) with the natural environment (the non-human habitat).
Landscape architects are uniquely suited to view a project from a variety of angles and should ideally function in a leadership role as a member of a multi-disciplinary team.
So if landscape architects have so much to offer, why don’t more people know about the profession?
There are several reasons why. First, the profession is relatively young; landscape architects have only been around for a little more than a century and a half.
Second, the profession is still relatively small. There are only about 200,000 registered landscape architects worldwide, compared to over 6 million registered architects. Most of the members of this small profession are concentrated in cities. There are over 900 members of the Florida chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects, while Mississippi’s chapter has just more than 90 members.
Another reason why the potential of landscape architects is not widely known is, until recently, landscape architects have not been involved as parts of project development teams from the beginning, which would be ideal. Instead, they are often brought in at the last minute after plans have already been made and asked to “green up” or develop a planting plan for the development.
The need for landscape architects is evident. As you travel, notice places, housing developments, city parks, plazas and campuses that are well-designed. If the project was well-executed, chances are a landscape architect played an active role in the planning process.
Other evidence of the growing need for landscape architects can be found through the U.S. Department of Labor. The department’s annual report said: “Employment of landscape architects is expected to increase faster than the average for all occupations through the year 2014. Employment will grow because the expertise of landscape architects will be highly sought after in the planning and development of new residential, commercial and other types of construction to meet the needs of a growing population.”
Cliff Jones, a senior landscape architecture major, says: “No, as a matter of fact, I don’t want to ‘practice’ on your back yard.”