Australian Institute of Landscape Architects

Karl Langer

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Karl Langer Award Presentation
Australian Institute of Landscape Architects – Queensland Group
March 2009

Talk by Lawrence Smith AM FAILA

Tertiary Education

The name Karl Langer meant nothing to me when I walked into the School of Architecture design studio at the University of Queensland, in February 1963 – 46 years ago! The lecturer was Dr Karl Langer and the subject was ‘landscape architecture’; and the first lecture was on Japanese gardens!!

What relevance did this have to a budding new architect who only wanted to design the world’s tallest building? But there and then I began to be exposed to and willingly converted by Dr Karl into someone who might more appropriately understand and bridge the gap between the natural and built environments.

I completed the six year degree course in architecture in 1968 so as to be able to commence the three year post graduate course in landscape architecture at the QIT. During the six years at UQ Karl effectively became my mentor and until his death in 1969 I was privileged to observe at close quarters how this distinguished architect, landscape architect and town planner made a difference to community lifestyle.

One surprising memory relates to the time when Karl took the UQ architecture students to his home in Swan Road, Lucia. Here we closely inspected the application of his subtropical climatic design principles in the house as well as in the innovative surrounding garden. Karl experimented with the relationship between the Japanese garden style and the plants of a Queensland rainforest.

Amazingly (for the time) he had introduced earthworms to do all of the work to successfully aerate and fertilize the shaly soils resulting in luxuriant growth. That’s what I wanted! A great garden with no effort! Karl had certainly won me over!

Karl Langer Remembered (1903 – 1969)

Not many people know or remember that Karl fled from his beloved Austria in 1939 to escape the Nazi invasion. He brought to the big country town that was Brisbane of the time, the urbane and sophisticated European culture for which he and wife Gertrude were renowned.

Karl Langer was a visionary – he introduced the concept of urban design and modernist architecture to many Australian cities and towns. Most notably:

In Sydney in 1948 he first suggested Bennelong Point as a site for an Opera House.

In Canberra in 1959, participating in the controversial site selection debate, he championed Griffins vision for Capital Hill as the site for the new Federal Parliament House.

For Brisbane he suggested a dramatic pedestrian open space corridor extending from Central Railway Station, through Anzac Square, surrounding the General Post Office in Queen Street, incorporating St Stephens Cathedral and then continuing on to merge with the river - it was a sophisticated vision that he compared to a similar open space through Berne in Switzerland.

This was just one of many of his innovative planning and landscape proposals that would have distinguished Brisbane at that time. Although some of these ideas have been partially adopted since, most have been long forgotten along with appropriate recognition for their designer.

Of all of his architecture he was most proud of the Chapel at St Peters Lutheran College, Indooroopilly which is inspired by the lessons of classical Greece. Carmel and I have the singular honour that we were able to arrange that our wedding was the first to be celebrated in his chapel.

AILA early days

Karl was one of a small group of landscape architects who met regularly in the ‘Old Vienna Coffee Inn” downstairs in the Brisbane Arcade. These meetings resulted in the establishment of the AILA in 1966. I joined AILA as a student in 1969 and was elected as state secretary 1975 – 78, vice president 1978 & 1983 and then president 1985 – 1987.

I was extremely honoured that in 1973 the Institute selected me to be the first recipient of the award commemorating Dr Karl Langer – as he obviously had been so instrumental in influencing my career path, in consequence I now had a great deal to live up to. However all of the early members of the profession freely shared their experience and expertise with young new members at institute meetings and other gatherings. I vividly recall many in depth discussions with Harry Oakman, Barbara van den Broek, George Williams, Malcolm Bunzli, Janet Conrad, Beth Wilson, Bernie Ryan, Frank Thompson, Arne Fink and others. Sometimes I feel remiss in that in recent years it seems I have not followed the example of these early members in being more available to today’s younger professionals.

Landscape Odyssey

So let’s take a leisurely walk through my professional landscape world spanning the past four decades.   My philosophy has always pivoted around the phrase ‘design with nature’ combined with a strong personal belief in two major areas:

the unique quality and value of the Australian environment,

the provision of quality community open space facilities.

Early employment

Comemncing in 1966 with a rather uninspiring period of several years alternating during uni vacations between the Queensland Housing Commission and the State Works Department before I joined the locally distinguished architectural firm of Bligh Jessup Bretnall and Partners in 1970 to work with Bernie Ryan in the landscape office. Later this morphed into Urban Design Planning Associates UDPA, possibly Australia’s first planning and landscape consultancy with offices in Brisbane, Sydney, Auckland and Kuala Lumpur.

During the heady days of the Whitlam era, as landscape director I provided the input to highway alignment and corridor planning for the Tuggeranong Parkway in Canberra, an integrated freeway and linear open space which was my first exposure to some very basic CAD.

Selecting the site for Yulara Village at Ayers Rock now Uluru almost cut short my life and career after a rather thoughtless ‘city slicker’ desert experience in a Holden Kingswood!!

Tuggeranong Freeway – 1972

Yulara Village – 1974

The difficult national political and economic situation of the early 1970’s provided the opportunity to start out on my own as a consultant. Landplan was formed in 1974, initially working from home at Whiteside then progressively expanding to offices in Newmarket then Spring Hill until completing the circuit back home in2004 ostensibly to enjoy semi retirement.

LANDPLAN STUDIO

North Pine Country Park – 1978

Toowoomba International Gardens – 1989

Regional Botanic Gardens

Regional Botanic Gardens

Selecting the site for Tondoon Botanic Gardens as one of the principal components of the Gladstone Open Space Strategy, planning for the massive industrialisation and expansion for the city, commenced my continuing association with botanic gardens. Landplan was commissioned for the master planning followed by staged detail design, this association continued from 1979 for the next fifteen years.

It is obvious to me that regional botanic gardens are fundamentally important to research, develop and promote the value for amenity horticulture of locally endemic flora for use in the streets, parks, home gardens and industrial areas of towns. The rigorous promotion of this strongly held belief has resulted in consultancies for the master planning of many existing and new botanic gardens throughout the tropics and subtropics, including chronologically - Tondoon Gladstone, Bundaberg, Darwin, Mt Isa, Longreach, Gold Coast, Barcaldine, Toowoomba, Townsville, Maroochy, Tweed, Hervey Bay, Dubbo, Mackay, Redcliffe, Cairns, Innisfail, Whitsunday Coast and also the expansion of Singapore BG.

Plant Knowledge – landscape horticulture

The role of plants as the basic material of landscape design is obviously fundamental to optimum professional practice, particularly in this time of climate change and the need for optimum sustainability. This is why my preoccupation with regional botanic gardens is considered so important for today and for the future.

I encourage all new landscape architects take every opportunity to get to know and use locally endemic species by regularly visiting local botanic gardens before embarking on design in a regional area.

NRBG

Gladstone Tondoon Botanic Gardens – 1979

Bundaberg Botanic Gardens – 1984

Australian National Tropical Botanic Gardens – 1989

Darwin Botanic Gardens – 1990

Gold Coast Botanic Gardens – 1991

Longreach Botanic Gardens - 1991

Barcaldine Aridland Botanic Park – 1992

Tweed Valley Botanic Gardens – 1994

Townsville Botanic Gardens – Queens Gardens - 1995

Townsville Botanic Gardens Palmetum – 1995

Townsville Botanic Gardens Anderson Gardens- 1995

Hervey Bay Botanic Gardens – 1996

Maroochy Botanic Gardens – 1998

Mackay Botanic Gardens – 1999

Redcliffe Botanic Gardens – 2001

Cairns Flecker Botanic Gardens – 2003

Singapore Botanic Gardens - 2004

Expositions & International Garden Festivals

World Expo 88 - 1988

Without doubt the most distinctive and memorable project of my career was World Expo 88; it took five years to create and I like to think that it was a hybrid between an IGF and Expo. Certainly it was the ‘greenest Expo ever’ to fulfil the brief provided by Sir LLew Edwards. This was obviously endorsed by the fond memories of the eighteen million visits made by the community who simply did not want it to end.

Expo’s and Garden Festivals

As many of you know some consider me to be an ‘Expo and Garden Festival junkie’! Ever since visiting the Vienna International Garden Festival 1974 (note the link with Karl Langer) I have become obsessed with Australia staging an International Garden Festival.   Originating after the war in Germany primarily as a catalyst for urban renewal in damaged and depressed city areas, these events showcase, on the world stage, the latest and best examples of landscape design and horticulture; millions visit the festivals over the six month duration.

Liverpool International Garden Festival – 1984
International Garden and Greenery Expo 90

I was commissioned to design the Australian and Queensland gardens for the Liverpool International Garden Festival in 1984 and later the Australian garden at the International Gardens and Greenery Exposition Expo 90 in Osaka. In each case planning, design and organisation for export of more than 10,000 Australian native plants, then the construction and establishment phase in the host country required more than two years of intense but very rewarding effort.

Andrew Green will probably never forgive me for leaving him out in Osaka’s cold and rain to complete the planting as well as install lights and speakers in the garden just before opening day, while I stayed warm and dry inside the garden visitor centre unpacking sculptures and signage.

Chelsea Flower Show – 1994

Australia’s International Garden Festivals

A small group of consultants have made continuing efforts to stage AIGF in Brisbane 1996, 2000 & 2009, Melbourne 2000, Sydney 2000 as well as Canberra and Hobart. Unfortunately the powers that be seem to be blind to the massive opportunities that a garden festival (effectively a great six month party) can provide.

It seems that each time at the eleventh hour, the event is derailed by some political situation despite the fact that on three occasions the event has been endorsed by the sanctioning body AIPH, and placed on the international calendar.

Never the less I am undeterred and we have our sights firmly planted on staging the AIGF in Brisbane during 2014 – but we need some new vigorous landscape architects who can take up the challenge of the significant opportunity presented.

Other Projects

Outback Townscape Strategies – 1994 to 1997

Hyatt Regency Coolum – 1985 to 2004

Perak Ecotourism Study, Malaysia – 1997 / 98

Roma Street Parkland – 1998 continuing

Expo 88 was a ‘temporary’ landscape project that thrived for six months and only remained in many memories - Roma Street Parkland required a similar five year time frame to plan and develop but (apart from the occasional tornado!) will always be the grand central park of Brisbane. As part of the PARC consortium formed for the project, Mark Fuller and I once again put our complimentary professional skills together just as we had done for the various AIGF projects. The resultant parkland, celebrating the world of the subtropical horticulture, is a fitting component of Brisbane’s inner city open space network that in the planning phase we termed the ‘string of pearls’.

Time marches on!
In 2007 Carmel and I decided it was time to retreat from the hurly burly of full time practice to the quiet of our riverfront rainforest setting on the North Pine River at Whiteside - where my landscape odyssey began more than 40 years ago.

So now in order to continue my grand obsession with Australia’s native plants and the development of botanic gardens still accepting selected consultancies in what I have termed ‘landscape horticulture’.

One day soon I’ll commence to write an account of the many interesting tall tales and true that have resulted from a remarkable professional career the scope of which I certainly never envisaged when first influenced by Karl Langer so many years ago.

Views on the future . . . . .

Unlike the past four decades when life was much slower, and when local and regional issues basically dominated our professional lives, we are now very obviously deep in an expanding era of globalisation. Sometimes it seems that local issues pale into insignificance against the might of China and the Middle East.

It is certainly impressive to see the remarkable work being done by fellow professionals in all spheres of landscape architecture throughout Australia and in many parts of the world.

As never before, the rigors of climate change and variable economic impacts require that much more comprehensive research, planning and design needs to be undertaken to ensure optimum sustainability, social inclusion and cultural expression.

I suggest that this situation augers well for our profession as, like no other discipline, we are integrally concerned with all aspects of the environment and lifestyle.

For many years now it has been obvious that we are living in what might be called the ‘age of the specialist’ for as landscape architects we cannot possibly know everything about everything with which we are involved. That is why for my specific area of interest and expertise, I have coined the term ‘landscape horticulture’. Obviously landscape architecture has a range of increasingly specialist areas which can benefit from concentrated detail knowledge and expertise by individual consultants.

I worry about the trend in amalgamation of smaller offices into large ‘landscape supermarkets’ where the personal one to one relationships and resultant respect between client and landscape architect, that I found was so effective, is today severely diluted.

I know that to maintain this valued status I consciously kept Landplan small and manageable over the decades despite the many opportunities to expand nationally or even internationally. I believe it is important that this personal interaction with clients is maintained and for me this has followed into retirement still making it very difficult to say no to long time clients.

It is apparent that the huge corporate conglomerate clients and international agencies we deal with today do not seem to have the same needs for such personal relationships with consultants that were typical of the past.

Although it is difficult to see too far into the future one thing is certain - it is fundamentally important to maintain respect for and understanding of human needs and relationships in order to ensure the creation of natural and built environments that are functional, attractive and can be used and enjoyed across all sections of the community.

Thankyou for the honour to allow me to reminisce about Karl Langer and his influence on my career.

Lawrence Smith AM
Landscape Architect
LANDPLAN

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