Celebrating World Landscape Architecture Month
With contributions by:
-
Ashley Scott /
Global Practice Principal, Planning + Landscape -
Lance Walker /
Managing Principal, Landscape -
Eric Carbonnier /
Director of Sustainability -
Dan Hinch /
Managing Principal, Planning + Landscape -
Sean Harry /
Managing Principal, Digital + Data + AI -
Chris Dunn /
Studio Director, Planning & Landscape
At a glance
Celebrating World Landscape Architecture Month marks World Landscape Architecture Month 2026, themed “Beyond Boundaries,” written across the firm’s Planning and Landscape studio. The article addresses four practice areas: ecological restoration through native planting, climate-resilient water management, sustainable use of locally sourced materials, and culturally grounded placemaking. Contributors include Ashley Scott, Global Practice Principal; Lance Walker, Managing Principal; Eric Carbonnier, Director of Sustainability; Chris Dunn, Studio Director; and Dan Hinch, Managing Principal.
April marks World Landscape Architecture Month (WLAM) and this year’s theme, Landscape Architecture in Action, highlights how Landscape Architects create places that support health, resilience, and everyday life. From resort renovation and urban developments to national park conservation and wellness-led destinations, Landscape Architecture is integral to the experience of a place, and has a measurable impact on ecosystems, communities, businesses, and guests.
“We aim to create spaces that not only captivate the eye but also resonate deeply with the cultural and environmental contexts in which they exist. Every project is an opportunity to transcend expectations and create meaningful experiences that stand the test of time.” – Ashley Scott, Global Practice Principal, Planning + Landscape.
Landscape Architecture is integral to the experience of a place, and carries measurable consequences for ecosystems, communities, businesses, and guests.
Landscape in Action
At Sharaan National Park in AlUla, Saudi Arabia, WATG was selected as master planner to lead a consortium of specialists ensuring that this 1,543 km² site is protected, its environment restored, and its wonders conserved. The master plan was developed in collaboration with international experts to restore the natural landscape of this fragile ecosystem and re-establish the rich diversity of plant and animal life, including the Nubian ibex, three species of gazelles, and the critically endangered Arabian leopard, which may be reintroduced to the area by 2030. The project lead, along with WATG’s senior landscape architect and conservation planner, were based in AlUla for six months, visiting the site frequently and working directly with RCU rangers, some of whom were born within the Reserve’s boundaries. As a result of this commitment to research, site investigation, and cultural immersion, Sharaan National Park was admitted to the International Union for Conservation of Nature Green List
At the other end of the scale, Limelight Boulder is a hotel built on a former brownfield site, once a gas station and parking lot, at the gateway to the University of Colorado. The courtyard fountain draws on the geometry of Colorado’s mountain rivers, translated through a series of waterfalls and cascading pools, while a trail of locally sourced flagstone and integrated boulders creates a pedestrian experience rooted in the Front Range landscape. The courtyard wall, articulated with vertical steel fins, creates a protective edge from the busy street while allowing glimpses inward to an urban sanctuary.
[0:14]
Designer — Limelight Boulder
Limelight Boulder is situated in a very unique and prominent location as the gateway to CU, and also as a strong connection on the northwest portion of the campus to Pearl Street and to Boulder Creek. Design inspiration came from a number of sources — the first being the Flatirons and the natural environment around us. We also drew inspiration from the site’s history in terms of the railroad and the industrial context, and then from the vibrant community of Boulder itself and the campus at CU.
[0:44]
Distinctive design features for this property include the portal trellis, which is designed to reflect the industrial character of the railroad. Built in steel and wood, it has beacon lights on top that serve as an icon for arrival at the hotel. We also have the Flatiron Fountain — a water feature that emulates the natural environment, translated in a contemporary way through a series of waterfalls and cascading pools.
The courtyard lawn is designed as a flexible event space with seating all around it in several different configurations, so that guests, families, students, and faculty can come together and connect in different social ways. The amphitheater seating acts as a terrace and can work with the lawn space itself or tie back to the bar.
[1:30]
The design of the site responds to a diverse group of guests. Weddings are a key element, as is tailgating. Running clubs meet here, so it really is the backyard for the community. The space is designed to flex from one experience during the day to another at night, and from season to season — flexibility, adaptability, and diverse programming are core features.
Another key feature is the rooftop pool, which creates a unique outdoor experience with cabanas and seating areas. It has commanding views towards the Flatirons and all the amenities you would expect — heaters, an outdoor fireplace, and snowmelt throughout the pool deck so that guests can use the pool all year round.
[2:23]
Sustainability is central to the design of Limelight Boulder. Several strategies were implemented across the site, including the use of native plants in a diverse arrangement, reduced water use, and a series of shade trees that provide heat island cooling. We’ve also connected the site through multi-modal transportation links — it’s walkable, with bike connections and public transportation access.
[2:50]
Community, adventure, and sustainability are key pillars of the Limelight brand, and we thought through those design principles as we worked through every aspect of the project. What we hope guests take away is a strong connection and authenticity to the place that is Boulder — a connection to the art experience, to the outdoor adventure that this property serves as a jumping-off point for, and to the great events and experiences that guests, families, and students will have here.
The design and material selection for Limelight Boulder draws on context from the university and from Pearl Street, but retranslates it in a more contemporary way — giving it a fresh look that is consistent with a vision for the future of Boulder.
Working with The Environment
At Taj The Trees in Mumbai, indigenous vegetation was selected to integrate the hotel into its surroundings, creating a seamless flow between public and private spaces, and allowing the resort to sit within, rather than against, its environment. The result was a place which promotes connectivity and sense of place, and well as creating a sense of calm.
At Thanh Xuan Valley in Vietnam, the entire development is conceived as an eco-sensitive and wellness-focused retreat which positions landscape regeneration as the core value proposition. The design approach is shaped by the site’s dense pine tree forest and diverse system of water bodies, focusing on preserving the site’s natural terrain, fostering a strong sense of community, seamlessly integrating architecture with the landscape, and enhancing connectivity through walkability and outdoor living.
W Hollywood
“The W Hollywood renovation moves beyond typical planting to showcase a profound client passion for botanical artistry. The integrated design uses experiential and temporal design to transform outdoor spaces into dynamic destinations achieved through two distinct narratives: the sun-drenched Rooftop Pool ‘Day Garden’ and the intimate Shaded Courtyard ‘Night Garden.’” – Lance Walker, Managing Principal
Working with Chiva-Som on their global brand standards for master planning and landscape architecture gave us the opportunity to embed these principles across multiple future sites. The process began at Chiva-Som Hua Hin in Thailand, their flagship, where we could develop an understanding of the brand’s history, evolution, and the core elements of its DNA. The result is a framework that embeds wellness across the guest journey: biodiversity-driven spaces, meditation gardens screened by lush local planting, outdoor viewing points, and aromatic or chromatic garden themes that draw on the culture of each new location.
The Mitsis Faliraki project brought a different ecological and cultural context – the Greek coast, where WATG’s integrated teams have worked on the renovation of multiple properties in the portfolio. Each site demanded close attention to Mediterranean climate conditions, water scarcity, and the use of materials that respect the regional landscape. A series of underutilized spaces were transformed into vibrant, dynamic hubs which decentralise activity, enrich guest choice, and create a multifaceted destination alive with energy, play, and serenity.
“We embrace solutions that regenerate the environment, engage communities, promote circular economies, and build resilience. ”
Learning from Place
Before embarking on a project in Bodrum, our London landscape architecture team took an intensive six-day journey along Türkiye’s southern and western coast, exploring local nurseries, studying the region’s flora, growth patterns, and site conditions. Working alongside local experts, they examined how native plants have evolved to thrive in a constantly changing climate, and how that resilience could inform the design. Read more about their journey here.
At Zayed National Museum, our landscape team worked in close collaboration with the client to bring their vision to life, blending the local scenery with the striking architecture. This includes the creation of the Al Masar Garden, the external gallery of the museum, intended as a journey through the natural heritage of the UAE. Walking through the three zones – desert, oasis and urban – evokes the country’s ecological and cultural evolution.
“It has been a real privilege to help shape the landscape of the Zayed National Museum. This project holds profound cultural significance, and we approached it with great care and admiration for the legacy of Sheikh Zayed. Now that the museum is open, we are thrilled to see people experiencing the gardens as they were intended – as a living reflection of the UAE’s beauty and heritage.” – Dan Hinch, Managing Principal for Planning + Landscape EMEA
Nobu Hotel Los Cabos holds its character because the design respects the rugged Pacific coastline rather than softening it. That sense of dialogue between the built and the natural, and the hotel and its context, is what we’re working toward on every project, from a national park masterplan in Saudi Arabia to a hotel courtyard in Colorado.
Wellness
There is an increasing amount of research which connects landscape design to health and wellbeing benefits. Toby Kyle, Associate Principal of Landscape Architecture at our Singapore office, recently published and article titled The Feel-Good Effect which explores the positive economic, environmental, and human effects of design. Each of four brain chemicals; endorphins (physical activity), dopamine (novelty/experience), oxytocin (social interaction), and serotonin (sunlight/nature) can be associated with particular design factors or characteristics: movement, new experience/enjoyment, socializing, and sunlight/nature.
Before, during and since the pandemic wellness-based commercial property development has been one of the fastest growing sectors. Both consumers and developers within the construction industry recognize how much our outside environment impacts both our physical and mental health. Projects like Umana Bali, LXR and Rissai Valley, a Ritz-Carlton Reserve put these ideas into practice at different scales and in different cultural contexts. From foraging experiences embedded in the forest landscape at Rissai Valley, to the contemplative outdoor pavilions at Umana designed for what the Balinese call bale bengong, blank thinking, or doing nothing.
[0:27] — Introductions
Dan Hinch, Managing Director, Planning & Landscape — WATG
I started here in 2006 as a young designer, very excited about hospitality and hotels — that’s really what brought me to the company. I’ve been here ever since, and now I’m moving into the technology realm. I was always interested in using the most advanced technology on projects, and now I’m overseeing firm-wide technology and looking at how we can embrace it across all our disciplines.
Sean Harry, Head of Digital Practice — WATG
I joined the firm ten years ago — this is my tenth anniversary. I rose up through the ranks. I love design in general, planning and landscape in particular — two hats you’ve always got to be swapping. It’s been a journey from coming in as an associate to now holding a very senior position as Managing Director of the planning and landscape team. A lot of responsibility, not only for the team itself but for the projects we’re doing.
[1:23] — AI in the Workplace
Dan Hinch, Managing Director, Planning & Landscape
The advent of artificial intelligence is such a hot topic right now — it’s everywhere and accelerating, coming into our workplace even faster than we could have imagined. Do you find the team is ready to embrace it in their workflows?
Sean Harry, Head of Digital Practice
Some feel tentative and apprehensive, but some are ready to adopt it immediately. As a purist landscape architect, there’s still something to be said about being on site and experiencing a place directly. But our clients are now sending us RFPs with AI-generated images and saying, what about this? That has never happened before — we have never had such direct steering towards a concept at that early stage. It’s easier for clients to focus in on architecture and forget about landscape and planning, but we’ll see that change as they become more savvy with these tools.
The team — and it’s not about age, it’s about enthusiasm — love the fact that instead of spending hours on a Google search to find a reference image, they can take the vision in their mind and generate the image that supports it directly. The time saved in that one small piece of work is phenomenal. And it frees up the designer to look at other components of the design that we normally wouldn’t have had the opportunity to study in depth.
[3:22] — Mining WATG’s Data
Dab Hinch, Managing Director, Planning & Landscape
We want to be able to harness the intelligence of our accumulated data and use AI to mine it, categorize it, and produce results and outcomes from it. What new areas of design do you see opening up in planning and landscape that we may not be doing today?
Sean Harry, Head of Digital Practice
A major new focus coming from clients, from the environment, and increasingly from guests who stay in our projects is green credentials — and it’s very real. People are now using Booking.com and Expedia to search not just for the cheapest rates but for what the green credentials of a hotel are. What are they doing to make a difference, either locally for the community or in terms of their built practice and sustainability commitments? We can no longer rely on 78 years of history and just keep designing what we’ve always designed. The guest of today is so much more aware.
We are finding more and more that it’s not just resort planning anymore — it’s conservation planning. What are we doing to the land to enhance it for the biodiversity that’s there, the flora and fauna? We are going in and changing the landscape, so how do we leave it better?
[5:01] — Rewilding and Ecosystem Restoration
Dan Hinch, Managing Director, Planning & Landscape
I was recently watching a documentary about scientists who removed specific species from ecosystems to understand their impact — a starfish from a tide pool, a sea otter from a kelp forest — and found that removing one species could completely wreck the entire ecosystem. How much does that kind of thinking come up in what you’re doing on the ground?
Sean Harry, Head of Digital Practice
Constantly. We worked on a project in Mauritius where the island is almost completely covered in sugarcane — a total monoculture — and they need to import around 70% of their goods to survive, so the island is unsustainable as it currently stands. What we were doing with the client was removing the traveler palm — an invasive, non-endemic species — that essentially crowds out everything local. By removing it, you allow the natural habitat to return. Rather than designing traditional golf courses, we said, why don’t we try to bring back the natural habitat that was there and see if we can leverage that natural parkland to increase the value of residential development around it? That client now has planning permission for it and is already selling residential off plan. It’s a real thing.
And I think what’s interesting is that our role is changing. We are becoming educators. Clients are coming to us not just for our design skills across architecture, landscape, planning, and interior design, but to help them understand where best practice is, how to stay ahead, and what technology from other parts of the world could apply to them.
[8:11] — Open Source Data and Bravery
Dan Hinch, Managing Director, Planning & Landscape
At the board and executive level, when we join our summits, there’s always a conversation about new opportunities. One of the things we’ve discussed is the data we capture on projects as potentially being released as open source information. Better for us, better for the planet, better for everyone.
Sean Harry, Head of Digital Practice
And it will depend on how brave the company wants to be. Do we want to open up all of our history and share it? We’ve been doing this so long, we are very good at what we do — and we could improve every other hospitality project in the world by releasing that information. We’ve been speaking with consultants including Volker Buscher and Nathan Miller from The Proving Ground about exactly that kind of bravery — being on the bleeding edge, but not so far out that you lose the plot. And for us, it’s great that we have a board, a CEO, and an executive committee willing to take these steps and say this is important to our organisation.
Being here since 2006 and understanding the history of this company since 1945, and having had the opportunity to work alongside a couple of the founders before they passed away — you really understand how far out there they were as pioneers. That bravery is something passed along through the firm.
[11:55] — Conservation Accreditation and IUCN
Sean Harry, Head of Digital Practice
The big thing that’s enhanced the way we work is a real drive on conservation. We’ve managed to work alongside the IUCN and UNESCO on certain projects and received accreditation. We’re slowly taking the importance of that to the next level — building a reputation for projects that are not just amazing hospitality projects, but real initiatives that are going to make a dramatic difference to the land and the ecosystems around them.
[17:00] — AI on Site and Real-Time Design
Dan Hinch, Managing Director, Planning & Landscape
When you think about AI on site specifically — being out there on a virgin landscape with a client — the idea of showing them the potential of a project without building anything yet is remarkable. You could start to explore composition, massing, and design in real time on site, looking through an iPad or similar device.
Sean Harry, Head of Digital Practice
And someday we might be able to do that in front of the client in real time at a design charette — sketching on a Wacom tablet and having the AI output appear immediately. Imagine a presentation where we can make changes and refinements right in front of the client. In design terms, it means a client can see a real image, say that’s the wrong direction, try something else, and you haven’t wasted weeks of design time, research, and precedent hunting. You’ve just explored something rapidly and moved on.
[20:48] — AI and the Human Touch
Dan Hinch, Managing Director, Planning & Landscape
Some of our colleagues have said AI scares them — is it going to take our jobs? From a digital practice standpoint, we’re focused on the positives. It may cut down time in some areas and eliminate some of the more mundane tasks, but that creates space to add in other components. Creating more time only means we get a better product at the end. Ten years ago we didn’t have that space and time. You can already feel the release of pressure that AI is enabling.
For me this raises the deeper question of what it means to be human — and what we do as designers, the experiences and places we create, so much of which is about the human touch. I wonder about the overlays of AI — wearable technology, AR, VR, mixed reality — and how they relate to the human experience of design. Could AI enhance the experience when someone’s out on site, walking through the landscapes of a resort? Could it enhance smell, or sight, or sound? The notion of these holodeck-like spaces — where you walk into a room and fully immerse yourself in a place — is something a science fiction fan like me finds very exciting. If AI can enhance what guests sense as they move through a landscape, that’s a profound new dimension.
Sean Harry, Head of Digital Practice
And if we can use it in a way that makes people want to go and explore — that links perfectly to the pioneering nature of this company from the beginning. It was always about seeing the world, embracing it, and being part of it. If we can keep relating that to our projects and make sure they are explored and experienced deeply, all the better. After all, that is one of the things humans will forever do — want to explore and experience new and different things. That’s personally what a lot of my life has been about. And that’s probably why we’re at the same company.
AI and Data
Sean Harry and Dan Hinch‘s conversation on the intersection of digital practice and landscape architecture explores how cutting-edge design technologies are reshaping both individual projects and the firm’s broader capabilities, with Dan’s dual expertise in planning and landscape architecture informing how these tools are applied to sustainability and environmental sensitivity.
The practical applications are already visible in how we approach site analysis, planting schedules, ecological modelling, and growth-cycle planning. Technology extends the range of questions a landscape architect can ask before committing to a design decision. The creative and ecological judgment that interprets that data still rests with the designer.
“By working across disciplines, and with communities, we create places that are not only visually striking but also deeply functional and meaningful. ”
World Landscape Architecture Month 2026
The theme for World Landscape Architecture Month 2026, Landscape Architecture in Action, sits comfortably alongside how we think at WATG. It’s about combining art and science to create healthy, connected, respectful and beautiful places that perform and endure. That description sits comfortably alongside how we think at WATG. We’d add that resilience requires honesty about the long-term conditions landscapes will face – climate, hydrology, ecological pressure, and the changing needs of the communities around it.
“It’s about creating spaces that nourish the human spirit and foster our connection with nature. We must design with empathy, listening to the needs of people, their communities, and the environment. Some of the most powerful landscapes are those that invite people in and make them feel they truly belong, while also enhancing the existing habitat.” – Dan Hinch, Managing Principal, Planning + Landscape
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