Curious Methods: Contextual Design with Dynamic Landscape Systems

Through the work of two landscape educators, this talk will explore the role of curiosity, experimentation, and temporality in their work. It will use written, instructed, and built projects to make a case for a research and design practice that is more open to and inclusive of the spatial and temporal dynamics that make landscapes such delightful collaborators.

Karen Lutsky is an Assistant Professor of Landscape Architecture at Cornell University and Director/Founder of the Great Lakes Design Labs. She was previously an Associate Professor of Landscape Architecture and Director of Undergraduate Studies at the University of Minnesota. Karen’s work and research focus on how landscape architects and designers might better design ‘with' changing landscapes. Over the years, this work has included the development of the design approach, 'Curious Methods,' and a particular emphasis on the ‘quick’ littoral landscapes of the Great Lakes Basin and ‘slow’ growth and cycles of trees and vegetation. She recently co-authored the University of Pittsburgh Press book Five Bay Landscapes: Curious Explorations of the Great Lakes Basin and has also written articles and book chapters for publications such as Places Journal, The Third Coast Atlas, Conceptual Landscapes, 30 Trees, and Scenario Journal. She received an undergraduate degree in ‘Environment and Society’ from Brandeis University and a master’s degree in landscape architecture from the University of Pennsylvania.

Sean Burkholder is an Associate Professor of Landscape Architecture at the University of Pennsylvania’s Weitzman School of Design, where, in addition to teaching, he co-directs the McHarg Center’s Environmental Modelling Lab. Sean is a member of the Dredge Research Collaborative and a founder of Proof Projects, a small research and design practice that works primarily on coastal landscapes that merge infrastructural, ecological, and cultural agendas. His current book project is titled “Lakemaker: Surveys, Stories, and Speculations on held water” and will be published by AR+D in 2027. Sean received his bachelor's degree in architecture from Miami University in Ohio and his master's degree in landscape architecture at the Harvard Graduate School of Design.

Both Karen and Sean are the current Gilmore D. Clarke and Michael Rapuano | Kate Lancaster Brewster Rome Prize Fellows at the American Academy in Rome, where they are exploring the rich histories of Lake Bracciano and its relationship to Rome.

This talk is part of the Edinburgh School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture (ESALA) 2026 Landscape Events, a series of public events focusing on ways of practising and thinking with landscapes.

Image credit: Karen Lutsky and Sean Burkholder, Open to Interpretation.

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Host or Publisher Edinburgh College of Art