I was thinking about the places I would like to design a project in the world if I had the chance. The places would not be anywhere I had designed a project before and limiting it to 5 places makes it harder to choose. I thought about it for a while and came up with the following.
Indonesia – the plant and colour palette of the South East Asia Tropics along with the culture allows the imagination to think of amazing designs removing some of the constraints that we experience when designing in colder climates. Also the country is urbanising and growing at such a fast rate that the challenge would also to be find design solutions for various new problems.
Netherlands – to me the home of contemporary landscape architecture and home to some of the best landscape architecture firms in the world. To undertake an urban design or a public realm in a city such as Utrecht, Apeldoorn, Rotterdam or Amsterdam would be fantastic.
New York – one of my favorite cities in the world that has a similar energy and buzz to Shanghai. I would love to design a small pop-up installation or a local park. New York with its different boroughs and so many residents and tourists along with mashup of cultural influences would require a different approach. Also with space being at such a premium the challenge would be to design and utilise the space by giving the best experience possible for the local and transient(tourist) community.
Tanzania – Africa to me is an amazing continent not that I have visited but just thinking about countries such as Kenya, South Africa and Tanzania with their vast array of flora and fauna. I would be inspired to design a landscape using the local flora but in a contemporary way. An ideal project would be a Wildlife Park Visitors Centre or a new city space in Dar es Salaam . It would also mean I would get to collaborate with my architect friend Adam Kanza who is now living back in Tanzania.
Brasilia – Designing a landscape within one of the most interesting and well-known modern cities would challenge any designer to think, search and finally make a decision as to whether you honor the design language and intent of Costa, Niemeyer and Burle Marx or do you design something in juxtaposition to their designs creating a different energy, conversation, design language?
Hopefully I will get the chance to design in at least one of these places in my career. For now I am happy designing in China. Where would you like to design a project?