ESALA AH&T Seminar Series - Luca Csepely-Knorr

Please note this event is hybrid - if you wish to view online, please select an "online viewing" ticket and you will receive zoom link before the event.

A recent study, funded by the Department for Environment highlighted the £25.6bn a year ‘Welfare Value’ of open and green spaces in the UK economy. By using a contextual biographical approach, this talk will analyse the collaborations and networks of landscape architect Brenda Colvin (1897-1981), through which some of the post-war histories and visions of the idea of ‘welfare value’ and landscapes as a tool to achieve the redistribution of social welfare and ‘fair shares for all’ will be discussed. Colvin, the first female president of the Landscape Institute was early to recognise the importance of ecology and conservation, and that we cannot create a sustainable future without comprehensive plans for landscapes across the country, for all who wish to use them. Understanding her legacy in the context of the developing ideas of environmentalism provides not just a more nuanced understanding of the landscape profession in the post-war period, but also valuable lessons to learn in the current climate emergency.

Speaker bio: Dr. Luca Csepely-Knorr is a Reader in Architecture at Manchester Metropolitan University. She is a chartered landscape architect and art historian, researching the histories of landscape architecture, architecture and urban design from the late 19th century to the 1970s. She is leading the AHRC funded ‘Women of the Welfare Landscape’ project, and is Co-Investigator of the project ‘Landscapes of Post-War Infrastructure: Culture, Amenity, Heritage and Industry’.

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Host or Publisher Edinburgh College of Art at the University of Edinburgh