Michael R. Van Valkenburgh

A landscape architect who designs a broad range of projects including public parks, civic landscapes, institutional landscapes, and private residences. Over the course of more than thirty years in practice, notable works include Tear Drop Park in Battery Park City, New York, Harvard Yard Restoration at Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, Alumnae Valley, Wellesley College, Wellesley, Massachusetts and Brooklyn Bridge Park in Brooklyn, New York. Through landscape architecture practice, teaching, public lectures, and publications, advocates for the central role of the urban landscape in defining the daily life of cities. Built work integrates sensitivity to user experience, history, and urban connectivity with innovative approaches to sustainable design, soil science, and ecology. Collaborates frequently with artists, architects, and engineers. Recipient of numerous awards from the American Society of Landscape Architects, including the 2009 Design Honor Award for Teardrop Park, 2009 Planning and Analysis Honor Award for the Brooklyn Bridge Park Master Plan, 2008 Planning and Analysis Honor Award for the Lower Don Lands Project in Toronto, and the 2006 Design Excellence Award for Alumnae Valley at Wellesley College. Awarded the 2003 National Design Award in Environmental Design from the Smithsonian Institution's Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, the 2010 Arnold W. Brunner Award in Architecture from the Academy of Arts and Letters for contributions to architecture as an art, and the 2011 Brendan Gill Prize from the Municipal Arts Society in New York City for thr design of the Brooklyn Nridge Park.