October 17, 2023 (Washington, D.C.) – The Cultural Landscape Foundation (“TCLF”) today announced that Beijing-based landscape architect Kongjian Yu is the recipient of the 2023 Cornelia Hahn Oberlander International Landscape Architecture Prize (“Oberlander Prize”). The biennial Oberlander Prize includes a $100,000 award and two years of public engagement activities focused on the laureate’s work and landscape architecture more broadly. Yu is the global champion of the “sponge cities” concept fo...

Designing Sponge Planet

Winner of the 2023 National Design Award for Landscape Architecture, Kongjian Yu is a globally recognized landscape designer, founder of Turenscape, and a founder of Peking University College of Architecture and Landscape Architecture. Several of Yu’s core ideas for nature-based climate adaptations, including the sponge city concept, have been implemented nationwide in China. In this illustrated talk, Yu will discuss his work and how his landscape architecture methods and ideas can help mitigat...

Winner of the 2023 National Design Award for Landscape Architecture, Kongjian Yu is a globally recognized landscape designer, founder of Turenscape, and a founder of Peking University College of Architecture and Landscape Architecture. Several of Yu’s core ideas for nature-based climate adaptations, including the sponge city concept, have been implemented nationwide in China. In this illustrated talk, Yu will discuss his work and how his landscape architecture methods and ideas can help mitigat...

Sponge City: Healing the Planet

Living with Water

The purpose of this page is to introduce non-specialists in landscape design to the work of Kongjian Yu, founder and dean of the Graduate School of Landscape Architecture at Peking University and founder of the planning and design office Turenscape in Beijing. Professor Yu received the Cobb Common Good Award in 2021. His work is immensely important to those of us in the worldwide process community who are committed to the ideals of Ecological Civilization. In designing our cities and working ...

For an industry accustomed to working with timelines that span several years into the future, architecture spent 2020 decidedly rooted in the present, as COVID-19—and its economic fallout—stalled or killed scores of projects. But that didn’t stop many firms from finding ways to put their design skills to work. Some responded specifically to the pandemic, others adapted their skillsets in the face of pressing needs, and yet others pushed relentlessly forward on stellar new projects that show the ...