PETER WALKER AND PARTNERS

INTRODUCTION:
• Location: Berkeley, California
• This firm is formed by Peter Walker in 1983 with around 30-40 well trained
landscape architects.
HISTORY:
• Peter Walker was born in California in 1932.
• He studied in University Of California, Berkeley.
• He got his bachelors of science in landscape architecture in 1955 and he studied
under Stanley White .
• In 1956 he joined Harvard University Graduate School Of Design and received his
masters in landscape architecture in 1957.
 INTRODUCTION:
• Peter Walker and Hideo Sasaki formed Sasaki Walker associates in 1957.
• 2 years later in San Francisco, Walker started its West coast office it is informally
came to be known as SWA in the late 1960’s.
• During early 1970’s recession Walker formed SWA group serving as the chairman
of the board until 1983.
• In order to maximize his personal attention to design he created as new firm.
• Over the succeeding years the firm became famous as
– The Office of Peter Walker Martha Schwartz.
– Peter Walker William Johnson and Partners .
– Peter Walker and Partners.
– PWP landscape architecture (now)
 INTRODUCTION:
ABOUT THE FIRM:
• It has 7 partners and 35 employees.
– Douglass Findlay, FASLA
– Adam Greenspan
– David Walker, FASLA
– Jay Swaintek
– Conard Lindgren
– Michael Dellis
– Sandra Harris
• The firm works on variety of projects of urban design and planning, landscape
design globally.
• In 30 years PWP has received more than 90 regional, national and
international awards including 35 national awards from ASLA.
 INTRODUCTION:
STYLE:
• PWP is known for strong designs that evidence highest concern for quality, lasting
materials and a passion for the craft of landscape architecture.
• PWP’s signature style is one of simple classicism, based on the traditional
architectural order of orchards and fields.
• The firm is frequently associated with the minimalist artists of 1960s and 1970s.
• It understands both conceptual and material processes, mastery of the realities of
project construction, keen attention to craft and detail.
• PWP has designed variety of landscape and planning projects that range in size
from parks and university campuses to corporate headquarters, plazas, museums
and gardens.
• Within this range the office specializes in complex high design open space projects
with layered physical and political conditions.
 INTRODUCTION:
PHILOSOPHY:
• PWP focuses on symbolism /iconic strength
of a site , formal geometry and minimalist
ideas or simplicity.
• Walker believes in emphasising things
through minimalism.

I like minimalism because one of the things you do is

make people see natural process more strongly. For
instance, if you don’t have a bunch of shrubs it’s
much more evident when spring comes, when fall
comes, and when winter% comes. So in a way it
makes the plant material the star; one of our
principles is to try to use plant materials in a way to
show them off.”
- PETER WALKER
CASE STUDY -1 : IBM SOLANA
LOCATION : Westlake and Southlake, Texas.
COMPLETION DATE: 1989
CLIENT: IBM Corporation and Maguire/Thomas Partnership
ARCHITECT : Legorreta Arquitectos; Mitchell/ Giugola Architects;
Leason Pomeroy & Associates; HKS Architect.
CATEGORIES: Campus, office garden
• Site :850-acre portion of former ranch land, thirty miles from
the Dallas / Forth Worth Airport.
AWARDS: A.S.L.A. National Honour Award
Interiors 13th Annual Awards
Gold Medal, Second Biennial of Mexican Architecture
Award for Design Excellence,
Print Casebooks 9
Southern Accents Award
A.S.L.A. Merit Award Solana Arrivals Garden and Village Centre
Eleventh North American Prairie Conference Landscape Design Award
CASE STUDY -1 : IBM SOLANA

Planning:
• PWP analysed human use as well as the topography, geology, hydrology, ecology,
and climate of 850 acres of rolling grassland punctuated with a few forest lots
and bottomland creeks lined with willows and pecans.
• The studies of this degraded  land revealed historic patterns of overgrazing, loss
of top soil, and stress on plant life that included the last remaining stand of
native post oaks in West Central Texas.
• In this predominantly arid, often climatically harsh landscape, trees and
landforms are relatively fragile, and nature is relatively slow to heal itself.
• Thus, existing topographic and forestation patterns helped to determine the
location of roads and building clusters--a practice justified on both
environmental and economic grounds, leading to the preservation of several
hundred acres of open terrain.
 CASE STUDY -1 : IBM SOLANA
• I.B.M. Solana’s sight was designed with the interplay of line of horizons and natural
gateways created by stones, paths and carefully placed trees.
• The careful geometry of the parallel and perpendicular line scheme is repeated
throughout the whole site. Walker and partners use the openings created by stone as
leisure spots, along with complementing the axes that the trees establish.

• Within the sight canals are built to incorporate a

natural irrigation system which flows directly into
a stream.

• The canals lead the building to

become apart of the landscape,
creating a seamless connection
between what is the formal status of
the building and the land itself.
• There is also linear repetition of the
trees following the water.
CASE STUDY -1 : IBM SOLANA
• To enhance the horizontal line of the prairie,
buildings were limited to five stories and located on
relatively low ground.
• To keep several hundred acres of terrain open,
developments were clustered, as in traditional south
western haciendas, and seventy-five percent of all
automobile parking was provided in structures rather
than on grade.

• The parking
structures
were
arranged to
form courts
and gardens.
 CASE STUDY -1 : IBM SOLANA

• As visitors drive through Solana, from the

highway exit ramp, through the great
roofless rooms of the Arrivals Garden, and
into the village and the marketing centre,
they experience the transformation of
ordinary features of the built landscape--
highway exit ramps and parking lots-- into
gardens evoking the rural landscape of
the region.
CASE STUDY -1 : IBM SOLANA

CONCLUSION:
• In the Arrivals Garden, the flattened and tilted
ground planes are planted in rows of Indian
hawthorn, reminiscent of the row patterns of
cultivated fields.
• A pool fed by Tunnels of water recalls irrigation
systems in this arid land.
• At Solana, the designers carefully studied lines of
sight and gateways.
• Portals and allies of trees mark entrances and
axes.
• Canals lead to a meandering stream, thus
connecting the built environment with the
surrounding landscape.
• The banks of this stream are strewn with carefully
placed boulders that invite casual sitting and
contemplation beneath the willows.
• On higher ground, wooden benches are found in
the open, along canals or in the cool, cloistered
courts between office buildings where a more
traditional order prevails.
CASE STUDY – 2: JEWEL CHANGI AIRPORT
LOCATION: Singapore
COMPLETION DATE: 2018
CLIENT: Changi Airport Group and Capital Malls Asia
ARCHITECT: Safdie Architects
CATEGORIES: Gardens, civic landscapes.
Site: Area of  135700.0 m²
PLANNING:
• The design concept of Changi’s airport is to establish a green environment for the
interior space, which is in accordance to the nation’s vision–‘City in a garden’.
• And also to design it with environment concerns,
the impact, reinforcement and also its sustainability.
• Other intention of this design is also to establish
and create an interior environment where
planting is not just for some decorative or accents
but is also for the purpose of architecture.
 CASE STUDY – 2: JEWEL CHANGI AIRPORT
• The publicly accessible 135,700 sqm center includes facilities for landside airport
operations, indoor gardens and leisure attractions, retail offerings, restaurants and
cafes, and hotel facilities, all under one roof.

• Directly connected to Terminal 1 and to Terminals 2 and 3 via pedestrian bridges, Jewel
engages both in-transit passengers as well as the public at large.
•  Each of the cardinal axes—north, south, east, and west—are reinforced by gateway
gardens that orient the visitors and offer visual connections between the internal program
elements of Jewel and the other airport terminals.
• The retail levels of the mall are hidden by a five-level forest under glass, complete with
canyons, a valley and a 40m tall waterfall.
CASE STUDY – 2: JEWEL CHANGI AIRPORT
• At the heart of
Jewel is the 8
acre garden
-Forest Valley, a
terraced indoor
garden that
offers many
spatial and
interactive
experiences
featuring walking
trails, cascading
waterfalls, and
quiet seating
areas.

•  Amid the more than 200 different species of

trees and flora, is the world’s tallest indoor
waterfall - a ‘rain vortex’-showering down
from an oculus in the domed roof to the
Forest Valley garden 7 stories below.
CASE STUDY – 2: JEWEL CHANGI AIRPORT
• The waterfall—at peak conditions flowing at more than 10,000 gallons per minute—aids in
the cooling of the landscape environment and collects significant rainwater to be re-used
in an around the building.
• Surrounding the gardens is a multi-level retail marketplace on five levels that access the
garden via a series of vertical canyons.

• Visitors can experience a light and water show at the center of the building, where
water and captured rain fall from the roof becoming a projection screen.
CASE STUDY – 2: JEWEL CHANGI AIRPORT

• Gardens terrace down nearly 30 meters to a central gathering space with informal
amphitheatre seating.
• Restaurants and cafes as well as an event plaza can all be accessed from within the
garden.
CASE STUDY – 2: JEWEL CHANGI AIRPORT
CASE STUDY – 2: JEWEL CHANGI AIRPORT
CASE STUDY – 2: JEWEL CHANGI AIRPORT

• Fulfilling its mission as a connector between the existing terminals, Jewel combines
two environment an intense marketplace and a paradise garden to create a new
community centric typology as the heart, and soul, of Changi Airport.
• Jewel weaves together an experience of being in nature with culture and leisure
facilities, dramatically asserting the idea of the airport as an uplifting and vibrant
urban centre, and echoing Singapore's reputation as “the City in the Garden.”