Vertical wall: ‘Green vs Grey’ in urban landscape

The ‘Green vs Grey’ workshop tries to give guidelines in order to transform a historical city center into a network of sustainable urban landscape. The purpose of the workshop  is to find ways of improving the city’s resilience to climate change, enhancing the public realm, and increasing connectivity in the city centre.

This course aims to examine the ways of incorporating more green spaces in cities, by focusing on the historic center of Piacenza, Italy, and the use of vertical green systems. The course will be showing the historical use, the characteristics and benefits of vertical greenery. It will further analyze their use on the city of Piacenza, in order to find methods of using them in other public spaces in historic towns.

The course, through case studies of built works including significant gardens, urban designs, recreational areas, corporate landscapes, restored natural sites, heritage sites, waterfront projects, resorts, et al., will focus on vertical and horizontal forms. It will also explore the conceptual framework that guided the production of those forms in today’s landscape architectural practice.

The course will be structured on the platform of a professional design office with individual and collaborative modes of working. Pin-ups and design critiques will contribute to the process. We will collectively explore different design methodologies and technologies in order to develop flexible design strategies through a series of projects concerning vertical and open spaces design through several examples.

Students are expected to explore, evaluate and practice all forms of design and planning communication: graphic representation, verbal presentation and critique discussions.

The syllabus consists from introductory lectures as well as an intensive studio work in order to comprehend the principles and concepts behind evaluating, analysing, and designing vertical and open spaces. The programme of the studio explores ways of analysis and evaluation methods, focusing on the character of the given landscapes. Using the knowledge gained from the previous studio and courses, as well as from concurrently running courses, students will engage in advanced landscape design processes by: representing the landscape design and the characteristic details from specific works in vertical walls and open spaces and they will explore the contemporary examples including drawings and construction details, three-dimensional actual and computational models, digital media, written descriptions and analyses.

Finally experimental works will be taken part aiming in building a sample of vertical wall.

The course is structured around introductory lectures, individual and group tutorials, private study and design work. Students develop design skills through self-directed learning, and through tutor supervision. Students will be expected to present their work to tutor and other students during mid and final review.

Student Evaluation Assessments will be based upon the completion of each exercise, the formal presentation of projects during reviews and, the quality of graphic work submitted for their project. The work will be graded according to the following criteria:

• Alignment with targeted objectives for design projects.

• Thoroughness and overall quality of research.

• Evidence of comprehension and integration of assigned readings, lecture materials, and tutorials.

• Clarity and quality of graphic and verbal presentation.

   

  GRADING:

• Attendance and Participation in Discussions: 20%

• Project # (Mid Presentation): 30%

• Project # (Final Presentation): 50%

pp 204

pp 160.

899-909

pp 390

154-162.

pp 415-420

pp 216