Awards

Call for Entries 2024 LCASLA Professional & Student Awards

Hello LCASLA Members!

Please find attached the Call for Entries for the 2024 LCASLA Professional and Student Awards. Please take a moment to look over and review. Darren Green will be returning as our Awards Coordinator this year. Any questions related to your submission should be directed to Darren either via email (Darren.Green@cityofalex.com) or via phone call (318.446.2342). Due to the timing of submissions needing to go to the Iowa Chapter for jurying, there will ne NO EXTENSION of time to the submission deadline this year. You will need to submit your entry form and mail your payments by September 27th, 2024, by 5:00pm. The award submissions are required by October 11, 2024, by 5:00pm.

 

The 2024 LCASLA Awards Banquet will be at the Common House New Orleans (420 Julia Street, New Orleans, LA 70130) on Friday, November 1st, 2024, from 6:00pm to 9:00pm. The registration for the banquet is now live. Registration can be made through the link below:

https://lcasla.wufoo.com/forms/r1mj3uzl06pg4bn/

 Registration will remain open for the Awards Banquet until Friday, October 18th, 2024, at 12:00pm. This is due to having to give final catering counts to the venue. Please note that you will be required to select your menu choice as a part of your registration.

Entry Forms Due by September 27th, 2024, by 5:00pm

Award submissions are required by October 11, 2024, by 5:00pm

2023 Award Winners

The annual awards banquet of the Louisiana Chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects was held Friday, October 6th at the LSU Barnes Ogden Art & Design Complex in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. 11 projects designed by Louisiana firms and two special recognition recipients were honored. Award categories include General Design, Built and Unbuilt; Residential Design, Comprehensive and Limited Scope; Analysis and Planning; Patron of Landscape Architecture, and Service to the Profession.

A special thank you to the Awards Banquet sponsors, GEO Surfaces, GEO Sport Lighting, Victor Stanley, Porter Construction, Coleman Partners, ANOVA, NDS, Hydroscapes, and Mullin.

A Merit Award in the General Design: Built Work category is awarded to Dana Brown & Associates for Bayou Metairie Park in New Orleans, Louisiana.

A Merit Award in the General Design: Built Work category is awarded to SCAPE for Tom Lee Park in Memphis, Tennessee.

A Merit Award in the General Design: Built Work category is awarded to Torre Design Consortium for University Medical Center Campus in New Orleans, Louisiana.

A Merit Award in the General Design: Built Work category and a Sustainability Award in Green Design: Built Work is awarded to CARBO Landscape Architects for Mindful Flood Mitigation on a Corporate Campus in Lafayette, Louisiana

An Honor Award in the General Design: Built Work category is awarded to SCAPE for the Arkansas Museum of Fine Arts in Little Rock, Arkansas.

A Merit Award in the General Design: Unbuilt Work category and a Sustainability Award in Green Design: Unbuilt Work is awarded to Reich Landscape Architecture for Allee du Parc Perdu in Youngsville, Louisiana

An Honor Award in the General Design: Unbuilt Work category is awarded to Reich Landscape Architecture for Spanish Lake Educational Recreation Center (SLERC) in Spanish Lake Basin/East Iberville Parish, Louisiana

A Merit Award in the Residential Design: Limited Scope category is awarded to Reich Landscape Architecture for Rouzan Residence in Baton Rouge, Louisiana

A Merit Award in the Residential Design: Comprehensive Scope category is awarded to CARBO Landscape Architects for Tidal Residence: Ephemeral and Elevated in Lake Charles, Louisiana

A Merit Award in the Analysis & Planning category is awarded to Duplantis Design Group for Willow and Castille Street Improvements in Lafayette, Louisiana

An Honor Award in the Analysis & Planning category is awarded to Torre Design Consortium for Auburn University Southeast Raptor Center Master Plan at Auburn University, Alabama

A Patron of Landscape Architecture Award in the Special Recognition category is awarded to Jennifer Van Vrancken, Councilwoman, Jefferson Parish District 5.

A Dr. Robert S. Reich, FASLA Service to the Profession Award in the Special Recognition category is awarded to Danielle Duhe.

2021 Award Winners

The annual awards banquet of the Louisiana Chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects was held Friday, September 24th at the Audubon Zoo in New Orleans. Ten projects designed by Louisiana firms and one LSU Student project were honored. Award categories include General Design, Built and Unbuilt; Residential Design, Comprehensive and Limited Scope; Analysis and Planning; Research and Historic Preservation Documentation; Communications; and Student Work.

A special thank you to the Awards Banquet sponsors, Landscape Forms, DynaPlay, Rotolo Consultants Inc, Hann Enterprises, and Atelier Vals.

The President’s Award of Excellence designates a superior project with an exceptional contribution to the advancement of the profession. CARBO Landscape Architecture & Suzanne Turner Associates project, Deep Roots | Preserving the Integrity of Avery Island.

Rising above south Louisiana’s flat coastal marshes is a geological phenomenon.  Concealed with lush subtropical plant life and remarkable live oaks, Avery Island occupies roughly 2,200 acres and sits atop a salt dome. The allure of Avery Island is its landscape, which has supported and sustained approximately eight generations of the Avery Families.  Residential development on the Island has occurred for over two centuries, and more is anticipated. 

The Avery Island Residential Development Handbook creates a shared understanding of Avery Island’s special landscape.  Through the inclusion of Design Guidelines, the Handbook identifies practical, common-ground approaches for future residential development.

A Merit Award in the General Design: Built Work category is awarded to CARBO Landscape Architecture for Central Louisiana Technical Community College in Alexandria, Louisiana.

The new downtown campus for Central Louisiana Technical Community College (CLTCC) is a great example of downtown redevelopment, and it showcases the success of an integrated design process. Through collaboration between the landscape architect, architect, and owner, the campus not only provides the necessary educational space, it improves the site’s drainage with green infrastructure interventions and embraces the surrounding community with its large public open space.

It’s location within the heart of downtown Alexandria has turned this campus into a community asset. Sidewalks along the adjacent streets provide access into a large open space, inviting members of the community to enjoy the grand lawn. During heavier rain events, the lawn area serves as a detention zone for stormwater, gradually filling up the terraces. Rain gardens with native plantings surround the new buildings, capturing and storing the majority of the roof water. Rows of deciduous trees along the primary promenades frame the building’s entryways.

A Merit Award in the General Design: Built Work category is awarded to McKnight Landscape Architects for Dr. John Ochsner Discovery Health Sciences Academy in Metairie, Louisiana.

The Dr. John Ochsner Discovery Health Sciences Academy is located within the Greater New Orleans Metropolitan Area in Metairie, Louisiana. Less than a mile north of the Mississippi River and only two miles south of Interstate 10, the development is a greyfield, and replaces an obsolete former middle school.

The landscape architect provided the design vision which is inspired by merging the health and science-based curriculum into one powerful expression: an environmentally sensitive garden courtyard with forms based on the abstraction of planetary orbits and proportions.

An Honor Award in the General Design: Built Work category is awarded to McKnight Landscape Architects for City Farm in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Located on a five-acre linear parcel of infill property which was formerly part of Cedar Lodge Plantation, City Farm is a stormwater management-centered office development project in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The landscape architects persuaded the client to consider something different: a guiding vision that was conceived from the practical challenges of the site. They proposed to create an office development centered around the idea of responsible and creative stormwater management.

The stormwater system was designed to accept and hold the first flush during a rain event. This initial surface runoff contains high proportions of contaminants from rooftops, parking lots, and other impervious surfaces. With a capacity of approximately 2,000 cubic feet of water, the bioswales at City Farm slow the time of concentration and keep pollutants and litter from entering the parish-wide stormwater system.

The landscape architects were not only responsible for the project vision, they also designed and were involved in metal fabrication and installation for all wayfinding features. As part of the firm’s ethos, this hands-on approach allowed the landscape architects to explore creative liberties in design, lighting, and typography.

A Merit Award in the General Design: Unbuilt Work category is awarded to Dana Brown and Associates for DPS01 Drainage & Green Infrastructure Project in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Properties within New Orleans’ Drainage Pump Station 1 (DPS-01) drainage district regularly experience repetitive losses due to frequent flooding events. Nine neighborhoods encompass the project area that is located between the Central Business District and Uptown.

The project incorporates a distributed system of green infrastructure and leverages the increased drainage capacity provided by Southeast Louisiana (SELA) flood control projects.

The Landscape Architect worked with project engineers to plan, model, and design a series of green infrastructure facilities to reduce downstream/downpipe flooding in neighborhoods that lie at some of the lowest elevations of the city. The green infrastructure facilities will detain, filter, and store stormwater runoff where it lands, all while promoting infiltration into the subsurface soils, therefore reducing subsidence.

Green infrastructure facilities in the project area include stormwater detention lots, street basins, pervious paving, urban bioswales, and subsurface storage. Multi-use fields in city-owned parks provide the majority of this subsurface storage capacity. The project is funded by a $45 million FEMA Hazard Mitigation Grant for green and grey infrastructure improvements. The team estimates the completed project will reduce flooding by a total of 29 million gallons and prevent 520,000 gallons of runoff from ever getting to the pump station.

An Honor Award in the General Design: Unbuilt Work category is awarded to CARBO Landscape Architecture for A New Future for Gretna City Park: A Natured-based Approach to Stormwater Management in Gretna, Louisiana.

Gretna City Park is a window in time to Louisiana’s natural history. Huge cypress stumps and still-standing native trees provide a glimpse to the pre-development landscape. Seasonal changes are marked by blackberry and wildflower blooms, and the arrival of migratory birds make the Park their home. Gretna City Park’s physical and functional characteristics are defined by water, and targeted upgrades to its natural water systems highlight this important asset. The proposed design focuses on stormwater management and interaction, passive recreational opportunities, wildlife habitats and water quality. Within the Park, space is allocated for current water storage needs with surplus capacity for future flood-mitigation.

A Merit Award in the Residential Design: Comprehensive Scope category is awarded to CARBO Landscape Architecture for Mid-City Residence in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

This residential commission accomplishes the homeowners’ goals of providing renovated front and rear garden spaces for entertaining and welcoming guests, while offering a daily retreat for the family.

The site is located in a well-established neighborhood in Baton Rouge  that was once a pecan orchard. While remnants of the pecan orchard remain nearby, this particular site had been cleared leaving the backyard empty. This was an opportunity to start fresh and personalize the garden spaces for the homeowners.

Due to extensive clay soils, surface drainage was an issue. To that end, the landscape architect’s strategy involved incorporating a sunken garden to aid in capturing and storing rain water from the roof and yard. A pool that was generous enough to

An Honor Award in the Residential Design: Limited Scope category is awarded to McKnight Landscape Architects for Poirrier Residence in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Located in the trendy historic mid-city neighborhood in Baton Rouge, this residence blends modernist Palm Springs-inspired concepts with the coziness and charm of South Louisiana. The landscape architects worked closely with their clients to envision a completely renovated landscape that would be united with a significant architectural addition. The landscape is inspired by the seamless indoor-outdoor relationships that were popular in many mid-century modern Southern California homes.

The architect of the pier-and-beam house addition borrowed many cues from the Southern California model, but fittingly grounded it in the South Louisiana architectural tradition by creating multiple living ‘pods’ that are interconnected by hallways and covered porches, allowing the landscape to breathe. Similar to the architectural approach, the landscape did not copy the West Coast style, but rather sought to evoke the feeling and emotion that it creates.

A Merit Award in the Analysis and Planning category is awarded to Design Workshop for Wisner Tract Master Plan in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Located in the heart of New Orleans’ iconic City Park, Wisner Tract is a 100-acre former golf course that was completely inundated by Hurricane Katrina. Fifteen years later, with the fairways abandoned and no major improvements made, the site has become a well-loved urban wilderness and de facto passive park for neighbors and regional visitors alike.

Wisner Tract’s location provides an opportunity to equitably expand nature access for a large urban population with few similar options. It also presents a vital opportunity for the park – through green infrastructure and stormwater management – to absorb urban floodwaters and prevent neighborhood flooding at the scale seen after Katrina.

By restoring a mosaic of south Louisiana ecosystems, the Wisner Tract Master Plan will protect the wildness neighbors have come to love while creating a vibrant new educational and experiential landscape for all of New Orleans and the region. Its immersive nature-based design leverages existing ecological assets to promote habitat rehabilitation and ecological education, absorb floodwaters, increase park visitation, and establish a restorative escape from the urgency of urban New Orleans.

A Merit Award in the Analysis and Planning category is awarded to Cadence for Outdoor Educational Center at the YMCA of Northwest Louisiana in Shreveport, Louisiana.

The YMCA Outdoor Education Center sits at the center of the Greater Shreveport and Bossier City area and is adjacent to the Red River. The site is located within a two mile radius of seven neighborhoods, twelve school facilities, and three major medical centers. This 112 acre tract of land is an untapped natural asset ready to serve the community as a physical and mental health benefit. The bottomland forest, freshwater lake, and specimen Sycamore trees will provide the ultimate setting for respite, exploration, and outdoor education.

The landscape architect served as the master planner and completed an eight week visioning session with local stakeholders and YMCA leadership. This important step of site analysis, inventory, and gathering input from community members provided a strong foundation of guiding principles for the future physical design and programming of the outdoor education center.

The Outdoor Education Center master plan provides the community with an inclusive and robust outdoor experience that is accessible for all. Elements designed include ropes courses, an open air chapel in the woods, various accessible at-grade and boardwalk trail experiences, kayak and paddle board facilities, outdoor education outposts and an iconic tower outlook.

An Honor Award in the Analysis and Planning category is awarded to Spackman Mossop Michaels for Caño Martín Peña Restoration Project in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

Across the globe, climate change promises to have the greatest impact on the most vulnerable communities. Many economically disadvantaged communities are in low-lying areas and often settled informally without basic infrastructure or flood protection. This project shows how the design of the landscape can serve as the organizing force behind efforts to improve the infrastructure, health, and well-being of environmentally and economically vulnerable communities.

Buena Vista Santurce is a community in the heart of San Juan, Puerto Rico. Settled informally in the mangrove wetlands of the Caño Martín Peña in the early 1900s, the neighborhood lacks critical infrastructure—sanitary sewer systems, storm drainage systems, flood protection, access to public open spaces, among others. Repetitive flooding by contaminated water has serious health impacts on the residents, especially the children.

As a part of the long-term environmental restoration of the channel, this project proposes a series of interconnected water plazas and green infrastructure interventions to clean the water and reduce flooding, while also creating a framework of civic open spaces to strengthen the social fabric of the community.

A Merit Award in the Communications category is awarded to Duplantis Design Group for The Louisiana Statewide Comprehensive Outdoor Recreation Plan.

Louisiana prepares a Statewide Comprehensive Outdoor Recreation Plan (SCORP) to evaluate its statewide supply and demand of outdoor recreation resources every five years. This plan guides federal funding priorities through the use of the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF). For over fifty-five years, LWCF has been an instrumental piece of federal legislation, empowering communities across America to preserve and develop outdoor recreational facilities and ensuring access to these resources for all. In addition, landscape architects have widely used LWCF funding as they create recreational opportunities within their communities. In Louisiana, LWCF, guided by the SCORP findings, has provided funding to over 230 agencies delivering outdoor recreational opportunities to each of the State's diverse cultural and ecological communities.

The Landscape Architect conducted statewide outreach to develop an understanding of the needs of the people and then summarized their findings into a series of priorities for improving Louisiana Outdoor Recreation.

The Landscape Architect strove to make the report accurate and technical while also making it easy to read, engaging, and valuable for recreation providers and the public. Their professional knowledge informs the manuscript with guidance and attention to Louisiana communities' comprehensive outdoor recreation issues.

An Honor Award in the Research and Historical Preservation category is awarded to Reich Landscape Architecture for the Louisiana State Capitol Historic Restoration Plan in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

The Louisiana State Capitol Gardens are 10-acres of formal planting that spread out like a tapestry in front of the State Capitol building. Its grand formal design was created to be experienced by both the people working in the towering 460-foot Capitol Building as well as pedestrians strolling through the garden’s pathways.

It was built in 1932 simultaneously with the construction of the Capitol building and now, at almost 90 years old, the garden has fallen into disrepair and is in need of renovation. The State’s Office of State Buildings hired a local landscape architecture firm to develop a historical report and plan of restoration through researching the history of the site, what the original design was, documenting the existing conditions, and determining how to bring the garden back to its original design intent. Inventory of the site was gathered through drone footage, the original 1932 plan, on-site investigation, historical photographs, and news articles. After compiling this research, a report was developed to outline the path the State should take to restore the gardens to their original form.

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2020 Award Winners

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The annual awards banquet of the Louisiana Chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects was held Friday, March 6th at the Goodwood Main Library in Baton Rouge. Ten projects from Texas to South Carolina, designed by Louisiana firms, and two LSU Student projects were honored. Award categories include General Design, Built and Unbuilt; Residential Design, Comprehensive and Limited Scope; Analysis and Planning; Research and Historic Preservation Documentation; Communications; and Student Work.

A special thank you to the Awards Banquet sponsor, Victor Stanley!

The President’s Award of Excellence designates a superior project with an exceptional contribution to the advancement of the profession. CARBO Landscape Architecture’s project Finding Utopia: Re-Discovering a 1940’s Hill Country Homestead demonstrates these qualities.

This commission involved the restoration and adaptation of a collection of early 20th century farm residences for a family ranch retreat. The ranch is a 4,500-acre holding in Uvalde County, Texas, near Utopia, Texas. Our client, the owner, aspired to create a resort like retreat for he and his extended family in a way that respected the history, agrarian culture, and spirit of Texas Hill Country. 

The master plan was developed with close collaboration with the architect who was involved in the renovation of the existing structures. We all aspired to use Hill Country precedents and indigenous materials to create a destination with multiple houses that fostered respect and interest in the greater ranch and Hill Country landscape and environment. 

A Merit Award in the General Design: Built Work category is awarded to Joseph Furr Design Studio for Chief Tammand’s Playground in Madisonville, Louisiana.

Located on the “Northshore” of Lake Pontchartrain approximately 30 miles north of New Orleans and just outside the town of Madisonville is Coquille Parks and Recreation’s main community park. Within the park, Chief Tammand’s Playground was inspired by the local history, natural systems, culture and industry of the area. This destination playground interprets the story of St. Tammany Parish from its beginnings through the 21st century through a creative play environment that includes wet and dry play-spaces, family gathering areas, and unique play experiences that are unique and specific to the inspiration. The development of this one-acre interpretive play-space required full collaboration between the landscape architect, the local recreation district, product manufacturers, and contractors, in order to ensure safety and quality of the play environment, while also developing something with an identity of its own. This is "placemaking” in progress, as even though the final phases of the construction for the playground were just recently completed, the word is out and the playground has already become a known destination for families from near and far to take their kids to spend the day.

A Merit Award in the General Design: Built Work category is awarded to Dana Brown & Associates for The Maumus Center in Arabi, Louisiana.

The Landscape Architect collaborated with the project architect on the site plan for the renovation of the Maumus Center in Arabi, LA. This former high school site was heavily damaged during Hurricane Katrina and was being redeveloped as a science center for the students and community of St. Bernard Parish. The Landscape Architect designed a series of green infrastructure facilities that manage stormwater from the parking lot, roof, and open space on site. Managing over 45,000 gallons of water, this was the first publicly-funded green infrastructure installation in St. Bernard Parish. 

A Merit Award in the General Design: Built Work category is awarded to Spackman Mossop Michaels for The Habans Green Schoolyard in New Orleans, Louisiana.

The Habans Green Schoolyard is the first project of the Trust for Public Land’s Green Schoolyard Initiative in New Orleans. The project consists of two complementary work products: a master plan for the entire 5-acre school site and the detailed design for phase 1 of the project. The master plan for the site responds to the needs of both the school and community for spaces for recreation, walking trails, educational enrichment, and stormwater management. The first phase of the master plan to be built consists of an innovative wood playground, rain gardens, a chalkboard wall, benches, and bold-colored painted stripes on the existing basketball court. 

The Habans Green Schoolyard demonstrates how stormwater management can be integrated with active play space and become an educational asset for a campus. Rather than treating drainage infrastructure as simply a means to an end, this project demonstrates an opportunity for students to interact with water in a fundamentally different way. The project simultaneously addresses the need to create opportunities for play and the need to improve the drainage in the school’s yard. 

An Honor Award in the General Design: Built Work category is awarded to Spackman Mossop Michaels for The Rosa F. Keller Library and Community Center in New Orleans, Louisiana.

This New Orleans neighborhood library and community center is comprised of two buildings joined together with the intention that they function as a whole. One building, a historically significant bungalow, was built as a residence in 1917, and the other, built in 1993, was added specifically to function as a library. Both buildings were severely flooded by Hurricane Katrina. The bungalow was salvaged and raised for future flood prevention, but the modern addition was deemed necessary for replacement by FEMA. 

The new 10,000 square foot combined library and community center provides residents with a 21st century library, gathering space, and valuable educational resource. The front of the building features a learning wetland garden which filters and cleans water coming from the roof of the building. The wetland garden contains Louisiana Iris, a plant that thrives in water and produces beautiful flowers. The back “reading room” courtyard features a wood deck around existing trees and decomposed granite courtyards. A visually open connection is maintained between the Historic House and Library Addition in order to create spatial relief as the two buildings touch. 

A Merit Award in the General Design: Unbuilt Work category is awarded to Carbo Landscape Architecture for The Awty International School: Fostering a Culture of Resiliency in Houston, Texas.

The Awty International School is a center for progressive learning and international studies within Houston’s dense urban environment. The existing campus, a former warehouse site, sits adjacent to Interstate 10 and was incrementally developed as the school evolved from a small private school to the largest private school in Houston, and the largest international school in the country. The numerous expansions across the limited site led to a patchwork of small open spaces and buildings that were inadequately sized. The design team was tasked with developing a new Student Center and Classroom building within the current campus restraints to accommodate increasing enrollment, while also expanding outdoor learning programming. 

Additionally, the City of Houston continues to intensify their stormwater detention requirements after Hurricane Harvey, which provided additional challenges on the constrained site. 

Through an integrated master planning process with the owner and architect, the design team was able to increase pedestrian connectivity, create various open space experiences, and demonstrate the philosophy of resilient stormwater design, while also embracing a culture of outdoor learning and biophilic design. 

An Honor Award in the Residential Design: Limited Scope category is awarded to Carbo Landscape Architecture for The Charles Park Residence in Alexandria, Louisiana.

This residential commission consisted of an extensive renovation and addition to a suburban home originally constructed in the late 1960s, in a planned subdivision of approximately ¼ acre sized homesites. The new owners of this home are empty nest professionals, who desired a simple garden retreat. Our challenge was to reconcile an extensive list of client needs with a very limited budget in a creative manner. The outdoor space also had to respond to the needs of an elderly mother-in-law who would reside in the guest house addition that was immediately approximate to the space. Our strategy included using aesthetic precedents from the architectural renovation in a direct and straightforward manner, while exaggerating hardscape proportions and the linear character of the space. We limited paving for cost savings and emphasized landscape within the black and white exterior architectural theme. 

An Honor Award in the Residential Design: Comprehensive Scope category is awarded to Carbo Landscape Architecture for The Starlight Point Residence in Natchitoches, Louisiana.

This commission involved the development and enhancement of a linear, narrow sloping lot for a new residence and for exterior garden destinations with swimming and access to the Cane River. Innovative use of rain water collection systems were designed to define and enhance access to river’s edge. Collaborative processes with our firm, architect, client and contractors facilitated design resolutions and construction of all site and garden elements. Our goal was to integrate these elements requested into usable, functional and beautiful gardens. Magnolia screening along boundaries provided needed privacy and screening of close offsite views. 

An Honor Award in the Analysis & Planning category is awarded to Joseph Furr Design Studio for One STM: A Master Plan for St. Thomas Moore Catholic Church & School in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

A Church, daycare facility, Pre-K thru eighth grade school, and years of incongruence between Church and school administrations produced a fractured relationship between communities and the facilities. Decades of development without long-term vision created disparate relationships between Church and school facilities, created segmented circulation, and produced compromised stormwater management over large parts of the site. The separation of facilities also separated the communities. With and the consolidation of a second Parish into this site, and with new leadership, the Rector and Principal desired a single, blended, Church/School Community.” 

The Vision of “One STM” was adopted as the guiding principle for the new Master Plan – a collaboration between the Communities, Landscape Architects, and Architects, the plan produced eliminates physical division, and centers all communities around a single, unified, greenspace, which becomes THE community space of the campus. Circulation re-ties the site together and field design vastly reduced the perceived need for impervious parking. The landscape becomes the unifying element for “One STM” –The greenspace is now the central focus of the community. It repurposes parts of the original school building into outdoor classrooms, playspace, and gathering areas for all communities and provides the main storm water management solution for the site. 

An Honor Award in the Research & Historic Preservation Documentation category is awarded to Suzanne Turner Associates for Nathaniel Russel House Cultural Landscape Report in Charleston, South Carolina.

This cultural landscape report documents the landscape of the Nathaniel Russell House, a house museum, known as “America’s most important neoclassical dwelling.” Beyond documentation, it recommends treatment for the 1808 property, where original landscapes of labor and leisure have been erased. Over years, the lush collectors’ garden and stark work yard have been replaced. Visitors today experience an uninspired Colonial Revival garden with ornamental elements that have no historic relationship to the site.

This landscape is significant for several reasons—it was the garden of Sarah Hopton Russell, a member of the Hopton family known for its horticultural prowess; its early Federal garden represented the pre-eminence of Charleston as a horticultural epicenter; and the garden was subsequently redesigned by pioneers of American garden preservation, including Loutrel Briggs and Rudy Favretti. 

Future treatment relies on archaeological technology. It proposes recreating and interpreting the work yard where the enslaved who cared for the garden labored, reconstructing the site’s curving garden pathways, and preserving the collectors’ garden heritage distinct to Charleston by showcasing plants collected during the Russell period. It also recommends that the garden include exceptional collectors’ plants of today and experimental plants that stand up to salt-water intrusion. 

The Louisiana Chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects also encourages and recognizes excellence in the preparation to practice landscape architecture at our state’s only accredited landscape architecture program at Louisiana State University. Two student submittals received awards from the 2020 jury, the Georgia Chapter of ASLA.

An Honor Award in the Student Work category is awarded to Elizabeth Peterson for Scaling Subsidence in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Scaling Subsidence is a city-wide network of activated vacant lots that seek to mitigate subsidence across New Orleans, Louisiana in anticipation of a changing climate. Threats from hurricanes in this community are well known, however the role that a depleted water table plays in exacerbating flooding during normal, and ever-increasing rain events, is not widely understood. This system brings ground elevation loss into a legible scale and takes action to redirect water from canals into the water table, slowing subsidence. 

The concept consists of two parts: a rammed earth wall, constructed from soil excavated on site marking elevation loss since 1900, and the subsequent void that stores water that would otherwise be leaving the city in canals. This approach to slowing subsidence is replicable across the city and malleable to fit each site’s needs. A primary goal of the design is to educate the public about elevation loss, and offer an immediate, small-scale design that replenishes the water in New Orleans’ soils, lot by lot. The design builds upon the stormwater lots already active in New Orleans by directly engaging with, and critiquing, the canal system, to spread awareness about the benefits of living with water. 

A Merit Award in the Student Work category is awarded to Sophie Lott for RE-AR-RANGE Ave. in Denham Springs, Louisiana, under RRSLA faculty member, Dr. Brendan Harmon.

Denham Springs, Louisiana, a commuter community nestled on the Amite River 13 miles east of Baton Rouge, has endured years of devastating flooding, most notably in August 2016. Like many commuter cities, the footprint of Denham Springs over time has prioritized vehicular convenience over pedestrian amenities, thereby increasing impervious surfaces and limiting safe pedestrian movement. The small, partially channelized Long Slash Branch Creek in the community inhibits water movement and exacerbates complications during flood events. 

The graduate level Advanced Topics Studio worked collaboratively with engineering students and local residents, to develop strategies to 1) utilize green infrastructure to filter and mitigate stormwater runoff; 2) to improve pedestrian access to the Antiques Village, a commercial center; and 3) to demonstrate how design can enhance community identity, thereby helping the Antiques Village become a destination for increased economic activity. The approach for this project turns the community’s main intersection into a pedestrian-friendly vehicular roundabout which will clean and effectively manage stormwater. The improved streetscape includes raised pedestrian paths, filtration planters, street trees, and details that are inspired by the City’s historic connection to water. 



2019 Award Winners

The 35th annual awards banquet of the Louisiana Chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects was held March 8th at the Goodwood Main Library in Baton Rouge. Fourteen projects located throughout the Gulf Coast states and designed by Louisiana firms and LSU Students were honored. Award categories include General Design, Built and Unbuilt; Residential Design, Comprehensive and Limited Scope; Analysis and Planning; Communications; and Special Recognition, Student Work.

The President’s Award of Excellence was awarded to Design Workshop and Reich Associates in the General Design (Built) Category for The Downtown Greenway in Baton Rouge, LA.

Project Statement: Downtown Baton Rouge is experiencing a renaissance, with new businesses renovating existing buildings, creating many new options for eating and entertainment, as well as new residential developments and growth in the workforce that have all strengthened and evolved the downtown core. The Downtown Greenway is a 2.75 mile phased trail system of bicycle and pedestrian paths connecting historic and inner city neighborhoods to seven existing public parks and attractions of Downtown Baton Rouge. The first section of the Downtown Greenway has extended the historic North Boulevard median as a desirable pedestrian and biking corridor from Interstate 110 overpass to the North Boulevard Town Square. It features separate bicycle and pedestrian paths, median crossings, seating areas, ADA accessible ramps, lighting, workout areas, bike racks and repair stations in a lush garden setting amid the active urban environment.

Reed Hilderbrand and Reich Associates were awarded the General Design (Built) Honor Award for City Hall Plaza in Baton Rouge.

Project Statement: The redesign of City Hall Plaza is the most recently completed component of the downtown Baton Rouge ‘Central Green’, intended to be a unified system of greenspaces connecting downtown civic and cultural attractions. With its central location in the heart of the urban core, City Hall Plaza has successfully linked Galvez Plaza, Repentance Park, the Old State Capitol, North Boulevard Town Square, River Center and City Hall. For years, this shared space adjacent to City Hall and the River Center was a somewhat harsh environment of large paved surfaces with little to no shade and rigid planters that prohibited accessibility and deterred a smooth, intuitive flow through the space. Intense collaboration and communication between Clients, Contractors and members of the Design Team was vital in dealing with challenging and complex existing site conditions and realizing the construction of a successful project. The revitalization of City Hall Plaza has strengthened the growing network of greenspaces in downtown Baton Rouge with more usable and accessible greenspace that provides users with ease of mobility and an inviting destination to attend events or linger and people watch.

Spackman Mossop Michaels Landscape Architects. General Design (Built) Merit Award. Lamar Advertising Headquarters. Baton Rouge, LA.

Reich Associates. General Design (Built) Merit Award and USGBC Excellence Award. Lee Magnet High School. Baton Rouge, LA.

CARBO Landscape Architecture. General Design (Unbuilt) Honor Award and USGBC Sustainability Honorable Mention. The Mirabeau Gardens Phase 1 Master Plan. New Orleans, LA.

CARBO Landscape Architecture. Residential Design (Comprehensive Scope) Honor Award. Hill Country Village Residence. San Antonio, TX.

Project Statement: This residence is located just northwest of downtown San Antonio, Texas, in an unincorporated rural area known as Hill Country Village. Defined predominantly by larger rural residential parcels, Hill Country Village is home to many who work in urban San Antonio, and is an escape to more rural Texas landscapes. Our client purchased this home shortly after its initial construction by previous owners. Our planning and construction efforts occurred over two and a half years. Our planning goal for the residence was to amplify and exaggerate all things natural and native. Preservation zones for wildlife with walking trails, use of mostly natives, and artful subtle interventions, so as to not distract from what is significant in realizing our ambitions for the client – a retreat to the simple pleasures of nature.

Rene Fransen Landscape Architects. Residential Design (Comprehensive Scope) Merit Award. Studer Residence. Pensacola, FL.

CARBO Landscape Architecture. Residential Design (Limited Scope) Honor Award. Cane River Residence, Fern Glade. Natchitoches Parish, LA.

Project Statement: Time and patience created this tranquil and serene garden over the last 20 years. As part of a larger residential garden Master Plan in the early 1990’s, this garden was executed incrementally as resources and desired natural conditions allowed. The powerful use of mass plantings within more detailed garden destinations, that also function as “working” landscapes, make this a memorable place. This garden artfully serves as water retention and detention for the highly developed garden on 8 acres of this residence’s upper terrace. All garden site stormwater is collected here, stored and filtered, before ultimately discharging into the Cane River. Cane River is being suppressed by development along its edges, where sedimentation and fertilizers are creating unhealthy environments for beneficial water quality. Our goal was to create a precedent for others to follow so that development practices in the future might change to ensure a healthy river environment for all.

Joseph Furr Design Studio. Analysis and Planning Honor Award. Electric Depot Adaptive Reuse Master Plan. Baton Rouge, LA.

Project Statement: One site - a Catalyst for Growth turned to Brownfield now a Catalyst for Re-development. Originally constructed in the early 1900’s, the Baton Rouge Electric Company power plant was constructed to expand power production for the latest technology of the time - the electric home. At the time and throughout the early 20th Century this was catalytic in the explosive growth of the City of Baton Rouge as it provided the energy for a growing community. The Plan for Electric Depot provides vision for this site, abandoned for decades, and fosters re-growth potential. Repurposing of this now abandoned Brownfield site, located in an economically challenged neighborhood just a few blocks from downtown Baton Rouge, this adaptive re-use plan combines public, private, economic, environmental, historic, architectural and landscape architectural expertise and collaboration to insure that the project becomes the second catalytic influence on the Cityscape. By adapting existing buildings, repurposing existing on site material, increasing the footprint for greenspace, water management and outdoor uses, the Master Plan provides for three mixed use blocks including entertainment, retail and mixed rate housing and has already started the reclamation of this important downtown neighborhood.

Dana Brown & Associates. Analysis and Planning Merit Award. New Orleans River Front Master Plan. New Orleans, LA.

CARBO Landscape Architecture and Suzanne Turner Associates. Analysis and Planning Merit Award. Bienville Square Park Master Plan. Mobile, AL.

CARBO Landscape Architecture and Suzanne Turner Associates. Communications Honor Award. The Atchafalaya Water Heritage Trail. 14 Parish Atchafalaya National Heritage Area.

Project Statement:Established in 2006, the Atchafalaya National Heritage Area (ANHA) stretches across 14 parishes in south-central Louisiana. It is among the most culturally rich and ecologically varied regions in the U.S. and is home to the widely recognized Cajun culture as well as a diverse population of European, African, Caribbean and Native-American descent. The Water Heritage Trail was established as a self-guided driving trail for the purpose of illustrating how water became and remains a distinctive influence on life and landscapes of the 14-parish ANHA.

Hayden Hammons, Taylor Jacobsen, Nguyet Nguyen, Betsy Peterson, Tanvi Shah, Xi Stich, Andrew Wright; LSU Robert Reich School of Landscape Architecture (MLA.) Faculty Advisor Brendan Harmon, PhD. The Hungry River. Amite River, LA.

Project Statement: The Hungry River brings awareness to the often-overlooked impacts of improper sand and gravel mining practices along waterbodies across the United States, focusing on a section of the Amite River in southeastern Louisiana pockmarked with over 15,000 acres of mines. The timeliness of this project is significant, as influential academic, governmental, and political stakeholders are studying the primary factors that contributed to the severity of the August 2016 floods throughout the Amite watershed. This project reveals how the lack of post-mining reclamation of floodplain sand and gravel mine pits contributed to excessive sedimentation and increased floodplain footprint downstream.

Mai Nguyen, LSU Robert Reich School of Landscape Architecture MLA Student. Faculty Advisor Lake Douglas, PhD, ASLA. Special Recognition, Student Work Merit Award. Reclaiming Common Grounds: Parks for Community Health in New Orleans District B. New Orleans, LA.

2018 Award Winners

The Louisiana Chapter, American Society of Landscape Architects, recently honored projects and patrons at its 34th annual awards banquet, held earlier this month at Hilltop Arboretum, Baton Rouge. Projects located in Louisiana, Arkansas, Alabama, and South Carolina were recognized in the following categories: the Built Environment; Planning; Special Projects; Natural Resource Conservation; Residential; Research; and Student Work. All projects were completed by Louisiana landscape architects (most of whom are graduates of LSU’s Robert Reich School of Landscape Architecture) or students in LSU’s nationally recognized undergraduate and graduate programs.

“We had an unusually vast array of projects this year,” according to Chapter president Justin Lemoine, ASLA, of Baton Rouge, “and we are proud of the many different ways Louisiana’s landscape architects are making an impact in our region.”

Two Patron of the Profession Awards, in special recognition for commitment and engagement with the profession, were given to:

  • Coquille Parks and Recreation, St. Tammany Parish, for its on-going efforts to improve public parks and recreation in St. Tammany Parish; and

  • Genevieve Munson Trimble, New Orleans, for over 45 years of garden stewardship at Afton Villa, St. Francisville.

The President’s Award of Excellence (Research category) was awarded to Suzanne Turner Associates, Baton Rouge, for its Aiken-Rhett House Cultural Landscape Report, Charleston South Carolina.

Projects receiving awards included the following:

Built Environment, Institutional or Cultural:

Honor Award: Audubon Charter School, New Orleans: Mathes Brierre Architects, New Orleans

Merit Award: New Orleans Botanical Garden Arrival Garden, New Orleans: CARBO Landscape Architecture, Baton Rouge

Planning, Recreation Master Planning:

Honor Award: Longleaf Botanical Garden Master Plan, North Central Alabama: CARBO Landscape Architecture, Baton Rouge

Honor Award: Airbase Park Master Plan, Houma, Louisiana: Joseph Furr Design Studio, Baton Rouge

Merit Award: Tamanend, St Tammany Parish: Reich Associates

Merit Award: Iberville Parks & Recreation Framework Guide, Iberville Parish: Duplantis Design Group, Baton Rouge

Merit Award: Healing Springs Park, Siloam Springs, Arkansas: CARBO Landscape Architecture, Baton Rouge

Merit Award: Lafourche Parish Multi-use Path Master Plan and Feasibility Study, Lafourche Parish, Louisiana: Dupantis Design Group, Alta Planning + Design, Baton Rouge

Special Projects, Communications:

Honor Award: Afton Villa – The Birth and Rebirth of a Nineteenth Century Louisiana Plantation by Genevieve Munson Trimble (LSU Press), Lake Douglas, series editor

Natural Resource Conservation, Sustainable Design:

Merit Award: Coquille 2.0 – A Master Plan updated for Green Infrastructure, St. Tammany Parish: Joseph Furr Design Studio, Baton Rouge

Residential:

Rene J. L. Fransen - Laborde Residence_Page_08.jpg

Merit Award: Laborde Residence, New Orleans: René J. L Fransen, FASLA, New Orleans

Student Awards:

Honor Award: Family Friendly Community Design, Baton Rouge: Tianyi Zhang; Faculty Advisor: Professor Lake Douglas, FASLA

Merit Award: Atchafalaya Bear Authority, Calumet, Louisiana: Daniel Hernandez, Delaney McGuinness, and Benton Williams; Faculty Advisor: Assistant Professor Forbes Lipschitz

Merit Award: Elmer’s Island Wildlife Refuge, Elmer’s Island, Louisiana: William (Joey) O’Mahoney and Chenfeng (Austin) Lu; Faculty Advisor: Assistant Professor Brendan Harmon