Encompassing 59 acres, the soils surrounding the Smithsonian museums in Washington, D.C. uniquely reflect planting soil trends of the last century, creating a patchwork of soil types in a small footprint. Studying these landscapes, we present the impact of various soil types and a resilient soils approach for the future.

In 2015, Denver undertook a complex stormwater project to solve a historic drainage problem and flooding in seven low income and minority-occupied neighborhoods. The unprecedented effort resulted in a new form of infrastructure aimed at equity and putting the community’s needs first to create a celebrated series of open spaces.

Responding to aging infrastructure, the NYC Council and Van Alen Institute launched an international design competition that aims to spark a new public conversation about the much-loved Brooklyn Bridge. The competition's finalists will be joined by representatives from the City and the Institution to share their perspectives on how this unprecedented process has inspired real progress.

Getting projects built well is hard! Diverse owners, project types, complex designs, costs of labor and materials, demanding timelines, “perfect” installations, all converge making project delivery a daunting challenge. This session, by veteran designers, construction managers, and owners, share overlooked fundamentals of designing and building in today's construction environment.

Discover the Joint Benefits Authority, a new mechanism allowing city departments to jointly plan, implement, and finance multi-purpose projects that maximize nature-based solutions to foster urban resilience.

Prospect Park is Brooklyn’s flagship park, welcoming more than 10 million visitors each year. Explore recent renovation projects sensitive to the original Olmsted & Vaux plan that meet the needs of the communities that use and border the park today—particularly communities of color, young people, low-income families, and new immigrants.

Traditional project delivery methods often overlook under resourced communities. Using unconventional project funding sources and partnerships, three landscape architects share how they approach resilient site planning and design in their local communities in the Atlantic Coast, Gulf Coast, and Midwest.

Three practice leaders will share how design research, curious methods and provocative questioning provide a critical foundation for their work. These stories will explore how different scales of practice are challenging the normative environment of professional practice through process-oriented ways of working, engaging, and thinking.

Designing the Green New Deal (GND) is a collaborative national initiative for designers to inform and advance GND policy ideas for decarbonization, justice, and jobs. Panelists use outcomes from the GND Superstudio and LAF Summit to explore the complex intersection of policy and design and how designers can affect change.

The Pulse Memorial and Museum will be a sanctuary of quiet reflection dedicated to honoring the loss of innocent life and remembering the tragic attack at Pulse Nightclub. This session will describe the complex process of mending a community following a tragedy.