2025 LAF Innovation + Leadership Symposium
This invigorating event showcased the power of bringing a landscape architecture perspective to a range of critical issues and opportunities for change.
Our eighth Innovation + Leadership Symposium was held on June 5, 2025, at Arena Stage at the Mead Center for American Theater in Washington, DC. The formal presentations in the Kogod Theater were followed by a cocktail reception in the Lower Lobby.
Photos from the event have been posted to an album on LAF’s Flickr Photostream. The full event recording and videos of each individual presentation will be available to watch on demand later this month.
Sponsors
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Leadership Programs Sponsor
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Symposium Sponsor
A Culmination and a Launching Pad
The symposium is the culmination of the yearlong LAF Fellowship for Innovation and Leadership, a unique program and $25,000 award that supports mid-career, senior-level, and emerging professionals as they develop and test new ideas that will drive the future of the landscape architecture discipline and bring about impactful change to the environment and humanity.
The six 2024-25 LAF Fellows presented their projects, which address rewilding agriculture, landscapes as learning labs, closing the science-communication gap, illuminating policy, expanding agroforestry, and infrastructure adaptation.
Whether you are a landscape architect, allied professional, or community member, your continued interest and engagement will further their work to drive meaningful change.
Symposium Presentations
The full event recording and videos of each individual presentation from the 2025 LAF Innovation + Leadership Symposium will be available to watch on demand later this month.
Emergent Mutualism: Closing the Interdisciplinary Science-Communication Gap
David Buckley Borden, Senior Advisor of Creative Practice and Innovation, Center for the Future of Forests and Society, Oregon State University; Associate Research Professor, University of Oregon College of Design
Using recent collaborations as case studies, this project seeks to identify, develop, and articulate creative environmental-communication methods, models, and frameworks to answer the question: How can interdisciplinary science-communication be re-imagined as a collaborative design process between landscape architects and ecologists? The case studies serve as a prompt for the development of a series of accessible project-specific, how-to booklets that combine design thinking, communication theory, experiential design, and public-engagement practice into a free publication.
Infrastructure, Rescripted: The Public Realm on a Mass Scale
Anya Domlesky, Director of Research, SWA Group
Transportation space dominates the public realm in the United States. But in a moment of transition, much of our port, river, rail, and road infrastructure is obsolescing or misaligned with needs. Since transportation land is often publicly held, it may be adapted for a broader set of benefits, more reflective of public values. Anya argues for a renewed focus on infrastructure adaptation projects as an urban design strategy to build low carbon, economically vibrant cities.
Toronto Policy Atlas: A Graphic Guide for Living Landscapes
Aaron Hernandez, Associate, Reed Hilderbrand
The Toronto Policy Atlas starts with a question: How did we get here? Cascading environmental crises signal a need for transformative change to laws and policies that govern our relationship with the Earth. Transformative change requires grappling with the past. Using the tools of design visualization and storytelling, this project aims to illuminate how cultural values shape policy, how policy shapes land, and asks: How might the living landscape shape policy for a sustainable future?
Landscapes Are Learning Labs
Brad Howe, Principal, SCAPE
This project explores how landscape architects can collaborate with community partners and educators to develop a curriculum for their projects that provides youth with hands-on learning experiences, unlocking the landscape as a teaching tool. Drawing from successful case studies, Brad identifies key components of a successful partnership and shares strategies for integrating these efforts into practice. This research aims to advance this model of landscape participation that empowers youth to become environmental stewards and advocates in their communities.
Feral Farms: Midwestern Recipes for Land Justice
Forbes Lipschitz, Associate Professor, The Ohio State University
In response to the urgent need for sustainable, biodiverse, and just food systems, Feral Farms centers Indigenous conservation as a guiding force for reimagining agriculture. The project asks: How can we modify our diets and de-domesticate our landscapes in ways that honor cultural sovereignty and mitigate climate change? Weaving together case studies and traditional foodways, this research illustrates how rewilding agriculture can be both a reparative practice and a regional reality—culminating in a collection of recipes rooted in Midwestern tradition.
Toward a National Agroforest
Amy Whitesides, Design Critic, Harvard University Graduate School of Design
Agroforestry is the intentional integration of agriculture and tree crops into a productive system with economic, social, and ecological benefits. These layered interactions between people, plants, animals, and fungi create multi-scalar reciprocities that can support profitability alongside environmental stewardship, soil quality improvements, and reduced carbon emissions in the agriculture industry. This project imagines an expansive future for agroforestry through a field guide to collaborative opportunities with plants, policies, and marginal lands across America.
