Today@Dal

Landscape architecture combines various industry requirements
Students passionate about the design of landscapes and the natural and cultural world no longer have to leave the Atlantic provinces to study.

New this year, Dalhousie University Faculty of Agriculture in Bible Hill is offering a landscape architecture program.

Landscape architecture is a profession that focuses on the design of outdoor environments. It combines a number of different aspects including botany, horticulture, architecture, design and earth sciences, to name a few. The multi-disciplinary profession has multiple routes for graduates including entrepreneurship, private firms, different levels of government, public engagement and facilitation and academia. While some graduates prefer to create unique, comfortable and beautiful places for people others are interested in protecting and managing the landscape for the sake of the environment.

Heather Braiden, a new professor at the Faculty of Agriculture, will be teaching landscape architecture this fall.

"Landscape architecture is increasingly important as populations grow and we look for new and often sustainable means to design, plan, manage, and care for the built environment," Braiden said. "From climate change to complex infrastructural networks and food security to aesthetic design, landscape architects are tackling these and many more contemporary topics. The program is the first of its kind in the Atlantic provinces and fills a much needed gap in landscape education east of Montreal."

As only one of two Canadian undergraduate programs offered in English, students at Dal AC will receive theoretical aspects of the growing discipline and benefit from a variety of hands-on experience through "living laboratories."

Students will have the opportunity to design, build, and maintain small projects on campus, developing collaborative and supervisory skills. Landscape architects typically work collaboratively with architects, planners, engineers, ecologists, and other professionals in their daily practice.

Read the full story on the Truro Daily News.