“So you do gardening?” That’s usually the response Ashleigh Bancel gets when she tells people she studies landscape architecture. Bancel is a senior in the Landscape Architecture program (LA), a major offered by the Department of Plant Science and Landscape Architecture.
“A lot of people just don’t know what we do,” says Peter Miniutti, associate professor of landscape architecture. “Architecture: oh, they build buildings.” But that isn’t right either. “A lot of people feel that landscape architects are landscape contractors.” Also not quite right.
So if they aren’t gardeners or architects or contractors, then what is a landscape architect and what do they do?
“We design the landscape, everything except climate-controlled structures,” says Miniutti.” Think green roofs, gazebos, urban farms, college and corporate campuses and outdoor shopping malls. Even the new Storrs Center Town Square was designed by LA faculty, students and alumni.
“There’s a continuum from the simplest work we do, which are people’s backyards . . . to the most complex, which is management of ecosystems, millions of acres,” says Miniutti.
The LA program gives its students an opportunity to explore all that and more through science courses, landscape architecture seminars, design studios and a myriad of real-world landscape architecture opportunities.
