BE A LANDSCAPE ARCHITECT..? INTERACTIVE BOOKLET FOR CHILDREN

If you were a landscape architect..?

 

In 2011, I worked on design proposals for soon-to-be unused sites in Ballymun with UCD students as well as local Ballymun children. The sites where the tower block were being pulled down were going to stay unused- as the economic crash had put on halt plans for building on the sites.

The resulting booklet is designed for school children, animating them to look at their environment in a creative manner and learning to develop and express their expectations towards their environment. Aim is to enhance civic pride and appropriation of environment. To empower them to "think change"

The interactive booklet was produced collaboratively with local children from the Aisling project and UCD students. The booklet was then distributed to local schools and UCD students ran workshops in local Ballymun schools, encouraging the children to develop design proposals for the sites where the tower block were being pulled down. The project was financed by Ballymun Regeneration. And exhibition of the work was held in Ballymun Civic Plaza. It was opened by the Lord Maire and reviewed by Frank McDonald for the irish Times:

KIDS IN Ballymun, on the northside of Dublin, are being asked what they would do with leftover spaces in the area -- some of which could remain vacant for years -- if they were to play the role of a landscape architect.

 Sophie von Maltzan, lecturer in landscape architecture at UCD, took her first-year students to view three disused sites in Ballymun, where tower blocks had been demolished and see what “pop-up” solutions they might devise.

 Working with kids from the local Aisling Teen Transition Programme, they came up with all sorts of ideas, including skateparks, half-size football pitches, “portable gardens” and even playgrounds featuring burnt-out cars.

 A colourful booklet and exhibition of the work done so far, >If you were a landscape architect...?<ITALS, was launched yesterdayWED in the atrium of Ballymun Civic Centre by deputy lord mayor Cllr Andrew Montague (Labour).

 The interactive booklet is to be distributed to 12 schools in the area by Ballymun Regeneration Ltd, which is in charge of its redevelopment, and UCD landscape architecture students are volunteering to help the kids with their projects.

 As Ms von Maltzan explained, the aims are to show children what landscape architecture can do as well as develop their own ideas, use their imagination in reshaping the local environment and engender a sense of civic pride.

 “Because all the drawings in the exhibition are by first-year students at UCD, they have a certain naiveté, which makes them easier for people to ‘read’. Hopefully, we’ll even inspire the kids to think about going to university.”

 Peter Hamilton (13), whose plan for a small park with a bike circuit, learning-to-cycle centre, playground and café is in the exhibition, was jumping up and down with excitement. “It’s very rare that you can get to do anything like this,” he said.

 Dorothea Burger, landscape architect with Ballymun Regeneration, sais she was “looking forward to making their dreams come true” -- although she couldn’t pledge that the money would be made available to implement any of the plans.

 Sheena McCambley, senior planner with Ballymun Regeneration, said there was some funding to “tame the spaces that will be development sites in the future”. But local communities would need to “take ownership” of the projects.

 Cllr Montague said open space and its use was a key issue in the regeneration of Ballymun, where there had been “huge swathes of prairies” that were used for dumping, motorbike scrambling and other anti-social activities.

 Calling the collaboration between UCD’s landscape architecture department and local schools a “terrific idea”, he said some of the sites could remain vacant for up to 20 years “so it’s important they don’t go back to being prairies”.

 

“ If you were a Landscape Architect”

Exhibition opening and book launch in the Atrium of the Civic Centre Ballymun by deputy lord maire Cllr Andrew Montague, 3^rd of March 2011

 During the academic year 2009/ 10 Sophie von Maltzan, lecturer in landscape architecture at UCD, took her first-year students to view three disused sites in Ballymun. The students spend 8 weeks researching Ballymun’s history, analysing the site and the communities requirements in order to develop temporary low- budget design proposals.

With the financial aid and logistical support from Ballymun Regeneration Limited, the students design proposals were made into a colourful interactive booklet titled: “If you were a Landscape Architect…? ”

The booklet was developed by Sophie in consultation with the kids from the local Ballymun Aisling Teen Transition Programme and will now be distributed to schools in the area of Ballymun, UCD landscape architecture students are volunteering to help the schoolkids and their teachers with working through the booklet.

The aim is to show children what landscape architects can do as well as develop their own ideas, use their own imagination in reshaping their environment as well as strengthen a sense of civic pride and appropriation. And perhaps even inspire them to study landscape architecture.

Cllr Montague said open space and its use was a key issue in the regeneration of Ballymun, where there had been spaces that were used for dumping and other anti-social activities.

 Calling the collaboration between UCD’s landscape architecture department and local schools a “terrific idea”, he said some of the sites could remain vacant for up to 20 years