Editorial Board Message

Hello there! It’s me, your faithful Ground editor. I’m writing you here because our Editorial Board Chair Nadja Pausch has stepped down from the role, after putting an incredible amount of work into the magazine we all love, and helping steer us through the brutal pandemic and years of important social awakenings, making the switch to online meetings, writing articles, moderating and facilitating round tables, and generally ensuring the magazine survived and adapted, no matter what was happening in the world at the moment.

I would like to personally thank Nadja for the time she dedicated to the Chair’s role, and I know the Editorial Board would loudly and happily lend their assent.

This issue is all about neighbours, and I think we all have different associations with the word. It can evoke a Mr. Rogers-esque image of the friend next door who’s ready to lend a hand, an ear, or a kind word. You may think of community initiatives or groups who animate the places we live in, who inspire us, provide support, and act as stewards for the things that make a place special. On the flip side, you may think of tensions, or prickly controversies, large and small, that can sometimes be difficult (however necessary) to navigate. As landscape architects, you may see friends, allies, clients, or stakeholders.

This issue, I believe, covers all of that and more. In our round table discussion, we explore the challenge for practitioners to ensure they are working with a neighbourhood and enhancing what makes it special, rather than imposing “improvements” upon it, without understanding the people they are for. In “Depave Paradise,” we see multiple communities across Ontario coming together to transform underused, paved landscapes into beautiful, climate-resilient green spaces. In “Every Design is a Habitat,” we discuss what landscape architects can do for our floral and faunal neighbours. We even dive into the history of a Hamilton landscape that was an important part of the labour community and the city’s history in our Artifact section.

I hope you enjoy these pages, and, on behalf of the entire Ground team, happy new year!

Glyn Bowerman
Editor
[email protected]