The American Society of Landscape Architects, New York (ASLA- NY), the New York City chapter of the national professional organization representing landscape architects, today announced the recipients of the Chapter's 2023 Design Awards.

Organized by the ASLA-NY Chapter Awards Committee, the Design Awards bolster local visibility, acknowledge and promote the work of the Chapter's membership, and publicly recognize excellence in the practice of landscape architecture. This year's winning submissions clearly reflect the dedication of landscape architects to creating equitable, creative and impactful community spaces and resilient, ecologically sensitive connections between nature and people.

Juried by an interdisciplinary team of professionals from the ASLA Colorado Chapter, this year's winning entries were selected based on quality of design and execution, innovation, and impact on community and the profession. The jury selected six (6) Honor and fourteen (14) Merit award winners and the ASLA-NY Executive Board selected one (1) entry to receive the Board Choice Award. All awards will be presented at our Design Awards Ceremony on April 19 to be held at the Center for Architecture, 536 LaGuardia Place in Manhattan.

Winning an honor award in the General Design - Small Firm category, Ferry Point Park East Waterfront designed by Quennell Rothschild & Partners demonstrates how landscape architects are leading the way on coastal resiliency and natural solutions to transform urban edges. Focused on habitat creation, the primary goal was restoring wetlands and native maritime grasslands to this brownfield site, previously a garbage dump. The site provides sweeping vistas of the waterfront, the city, and the Whitestone and Throggs Neck bridges. The project not only improves waterfront resiliency but provides an educational and health amenity to a low-income neighborhood that had suffered decades of pollution from illegal dumping. Landscape Architectural design services were contracted by the New York City Parks Department through their Design Excellence Program.
In the Unbuilt category, the Ford Dearborn Campus Transformation Master Plan, designed by Snohetta supports holistic human and environmental wellbeing, enriches the greater Dearborn community, anticipates change, and honors the Ford legacy. The Master Plan realizes these ambitions in each of the three fundamental components of the Ford ecosystem-mobility, site, and architecture-at global, regional, campus, and elemental scales. Together, they create a campus that serves as a living laboratory and community amenity with vibrant, versatile, multimodal streets; restored, dynamic open space; and daylit, versatile, interconnected workspaces. It preserves and protects existing forests and wetlands on site.

The Community Impact Honor Award is given to the Johnny Hartman Plaza Playful Art Installation designed and built by the collaborative team at MRC Recreation. To celebrate the Lego Group's 90th anniversary, the immersive play installation in the heart of West Harlem was inspired by the imagination of neighborhood children through multi-day participatory play workshops to design and explain their wildest playful landscape concepts, with hope that they would become a reality right on
their street. Through the collaborative design process, the project developed into a playful art walkway that transformed a low-income city plaza into an immersive playful environment. Children who live within a mostly disadvantaged and underserved area were able to take ownership of their colorful and exciting plaza space that allowed individuals of all ages to experience play, together.

In the Large-scale Residential category, House on the Bluff in Montauk, designed by LaGuardia Design Group, was selected for an honor award. Bordered by a nature preserve, this narrow, topographically challenging site presented many initial constraints that became the impetus for the design. Sensitive interventions such as elevated walkways and the use of native vegetation, provide amenities to the site while preserving the bluff. The use of plants native to the Montauk bluffs, stitch the site into the larger ecological context of the East End. The native landscape pulls you through the property to an elevated deck that hovers over the bluff, capitalizing on the breathtaking view over the Atlantic Ocean.

 
Winning an honor award in the Analysis, Planning, Research and Communications category, Reimagine Middle Branch is a community-driven initiative to reconnect South Baltimore with a system of world-class parks, trails, programs, and economic development plans along the 11-mile shoreline of the Middle Branch of the Patapsco River. Designed by James Corner Field Operations, the plan is fundamentally about equity and justice, resilience, and health-a transformation of place supported by new jobs, wealth generation, and quality of life amenities that extend beyond the built environment. The Plan will protect the shoreline by restoring the thick, green, and resilient edge that once defined the Middle Branch. A living shoreline reintroduces natural systems while fostering interaction between people, their environment, and one another, and the Plan aims to restore the wetlands and expand intertidal habitat.

The Financial District and Seaport Climate Resilience Master Plan designed by SCAPE was selected for an honor award in the Analysis, Planning, Research and Communications category. Developed with two city agencies and a large, multidisciplinary team, the vision proposed in FiDi-Seaport Climate Resilience Master Plan seamlessly integrates flood risk reduction infrastructure into a publicly accessible, multi-level waterfront. Synthesizing feedback from two years of virtual and in-person engagement, the plan balances the aspirations and needs of an extraordinarily diverse group of residents and stakeholders. Ecological enhancements for aquatic habitats are incorporated throughout, including protected coves, wave screens, and textured surfaces to support aquatic species. Layering benefits-risk reduction benefits with restored ecosystems, resilient maritime assets, and new public amenities-the plan envisions a more vibrant and active 21st century waterfront while preparing it for a climate-changed future.
List of award winners as follows:

2023 ASLA-NY Honor Award Recipients:
Ferry Point Park East Waterfront - Quennell Rothschild & Partners
Ford Campus Master Plan - Snohetta
House on the Bluff - LaGuardia Design Group
Johnny Hartman Plaza Playful Art Installation - MRC Recreation, Inc. Reimagine Middle Branch Plan - James Corner Field Operations
The Financial District and Seaport Climate Resilience Master Plan - SCAPE
2023 ASLA-NY Merit Award Recipients: 550 Madison Avenue Garden - Snohetta Al Fresco Botanical Garden - Terrain Work Alafia - SCAPE
Baychester Houses - Terrain-NYC
Bayfront Parks Master Plan - SWA/Balsley
Bronx Point - Marvel
Camden Highline - James Corner Field Operations
Circle Bar Ranch Comprehensive Landscape Plan - Nelson Byrd Woltz Landscape Architects Fountain of the Fairs Mist Garden - Quennell Rothschild & Partners, LLP
Georgia Institute of Technology EcoCommons - Nelson Byrd Woltz Landscape Architects Scissortail Park - Hargreave Jones
Town Branch Commons - SCAPE
Whimsy Farm - Hollander Design Landscape Architects
Workday Campus + Innovation Plaza - HOK
2023 ASLA-NY Board Choice Award Recipient: Yolanda Garcia Park - Stantec
2023 Design Awards Jury from ASLA Colorado:
Sara Bonacquist - Design Workshop - Associate, Landscape Architect
Gretchen Wilson - Dig Studio - Founding Principal, Landscape Architect
Andrew Dawson - WRT Planning & Design - Senior Associate, Landscape Architect, Planner, Geographer Shuying Wu - Sasaki - Landscape Designer
Stacy Passmore - Superbloom - Principal/CoFounder, Certified Planner, Landscape Designer
Shelby Batalla - Denver Planning, Design & Construction - Parks Project Manager
Scott Streeb - Michale Van Valkenburgh Associates - Principal, Denver Office Director
The winning submissions will be on view at the Center for Architecture, 536 LaGuardia Place in Manhattan through the month of April, in celebration of World Landscape Architecture month, and afterwards online at aslany.org.