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In McHarg’s wake, it’s hard not to read much of landscape architectural labor as either an endorsement or a critique of his ideology and methods. Many of his acolytes still carry his torch, exemplified by works such as OLIN’s Los Angeles River Master Plan, which directly employs land suitability methods across a 51-mile stretch of one of the nation’s most highly engineered waterways. Still, practitioners like Anne Whiston Spirn and James Corner Field Operations have challenged McHarg’s methods, arguing in various ways against the rationality of his plannerly approach and for more ethnographic and hermeneutic engagements with people and land. Spirn’s West Philadelphia Landscape Project is a career-long endeavor devoted to building community literacy and power around green infrastructure in West Philadelphia, while Field Operations’ Freshkills Park, a 2,200-acre greenbelt capping a Staten Island landfill, has been similarly slow to gestate and isn’t expected to open to the public until 2036.

The last 50 years of landscape architecture and environmental planning belong to Ian McHarg. In theory and practice, no designer has done more to stoke the public imagination or reshape the professions around the environment. And nothing captures the scope and scale of his legacy better than his landmark book, Design With Nature, published in the spring of 1969.

Fifty years after Ian McHarg’s landmark book Design With Nature (1969), Design With Nature Now comprises three parallel exhibitions, an anthology, and a major international conference featuring leading design thinkers and practitioners from around the world.

Naomi Klein, Kate Aronoff, Kate Orff, David Roberts, Rhiana Gunn-Wright, Jane McAlevey, and many other leading voices in climate policy, organizing, and design will join us on Friday, September 13th for this landmark event. We fully expect this event to be at capacity. Reserve your seat today and make plans to join us!