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Making Practice: Studio Balcones
Studio Balcones, an Austin, Texas based landscape architecture and urbanism office founded by Ilse Frank and Jennifer Orr, has been in existance for just over one year. As the country fought its way out of a recession these two designers successfully nagivated the first year in the life of a new business to establish an office that focuses on transformative design and sustainability. Topophilia sat down with Ilse Frank and Jennifer Orr to learn more about the office and how they've made it work.
Can you give us a brief overview your backgrounds- what you’ve studied, interests, etc.?
Urban Transformations: Identity, Streetscapes And Regional Rail In Taipei, Taiwan
Submitted by Sarah Kathleen Peck, ASLA, LEED-AP
In less than 30 years, Taipei, Taiwan has undergone significant 
transformation in its cultural identity, its urban design, and its regional transportation systems. Taipei, the largest city of Taiwan, lies on the Danshui River 25 kilometers across the Taiwan Strait from China. Taipei City has approximately 2.6 million residents, and the metropolitan region has just shy of 7 million people. While Taipei is not the largest city in the world by any stretch of the imagination, the city is one of the most densely packed, due to the natural hilly topography and limited areas upon which to build city structures.
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Printmaking at MacDowell
Submitted by Kira Appelhans
My relationship with printmaking began in graduate school when I took a theory class that included 5 weeks of printmaking. The class, taught by Anu Mathur , focused on the exploration of landscape strategies through analog processes of casting, photography and printmaking. This unconventional introduction to printmaking was as much a study of the potential in processes as the production of images. Those five weeks created what has become a life long addiction to printmaking and the opportunity to explore design through an alternative medium. This spring it lead me to the MacDowell colony in New Hampshire where I spent six week developing a body of work.
Trees Not Trash: An Interview with Kate Gilliam, Founder and Director
Trees Not Trash is an organization dedicated to improving the quality of open space in Brooklyn's Bushwick neighborhood. Kaarin Patterson caught up with Kate Gilliam to discuss some of the group's challenges and successes and their goals for the future.
Q and A with Liat Margolis,co-author of Living Systems
Published in 2007 as a compendium of green design techniques and resources Living Systems: Innovative Materials and Technologies for Landscape Architecture has become part of the new intellectual capital that is emerging from the landscape architecture/landscape urbanism field.
In 2008, Danielle Choi, one of our regular contributors was able to sit down with author, Liat Margolis and speak with her about the origins of this book, these new inroads for the discipline of landscape architecture and landscape urbanism as well as upcoming future projects for Liat.