Lord & Wyllie to offer Advanced Landscape Architecture Studio, Fall 2020

The Graduate Program in Landscape Architecture is honored to welcome James Lord and Roderick Wyllie of Surface Design Inc., San Francisco to the UT School of Architecture for the Fall 2020 semester. James and Roderick will be offering an Advanced Design Studio entitled Planting Justice. The studio is open to all design disciplines and will examine the potential for the landscape to be a tool and forum for activism, remediation, advocacy, and restoration.

Focused on the grassroots organization, Planting Justice, in Oakland, California whose mission it is to empower people impacted by mass incarceration and other social inequities with the skills and resources to cultivate food sovereignty, economic justice, and community healing, students will consider the historical framework that underpins the nation’s system of incarceration. Against the current backdrop of society reckoning with these systemic inequities, the landscape can be a vehicle for healing and empowerment. Students will explore ways of amplifying the mission of the organization through spatial design and materiality. In addition, modes of representation and communication will be expanded to address audiences beyond the academy.

Surface Design, Inc. is a landscape architecture and urban design firm based in San Francisco, California. This award-winning practice focuses on creating dynamic parks, plazas, waterfronts, civic landscapes, and private gardens. James A. Lord, Roderick Wyllie, and Geoff di Girolamo, in collaboration with a multidisciplinary team of landscape architects, urban designers, and architects, provide innovative design solutions for a wide range of projects.