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“Neuroscience for Designing Green Spaces: Contemplative Landscapes” – A Revolutionary Book

Experience the power of "Neuroscience for Designing Green Spaces: Contemplative Landscapes" - a revolutionary book by Dr. Agnieszka Olszewska-Guizzo. This comprehensive guide was released on May 30, 2023. It revolutionizes landscape design through an innovative approach rooted in neuroscience.

 

Unveiling Contemplative Landscape Design

Delve into the concept of Contemplative Landscape Design, meticulously crafted over a decade of research. Driven by neuroscience principles, this book serves as a go-to resource for landscape architects and architects seeking to effortlessly integrate mental health and well-being into their practice.

This is the first time where I put together the knowldege acumulated thoughout the years.  This book contains all the nuances about design for mental health and well-being. So that landscape architects and architects can easily access and use for their practice.  Before I published only peer-reviewed articles focused mostly on the mental health implications and the performed neuroscience experinents. But I am a landscape architect first, so I come back to my original field with and I hope it will be a useful tool for anyone interested in designing or benefitting from contact with natural landscapes! - says the author.

Accessing the Book

Discover "Neuroscience for Designing Green Spaces: Contemplative Landscapes" available in paperback, hardcover, and e-book formats. You can easily purchase your copy through the Taylor & Francis website or Amazon, ensuring convenient access to this groundbreaking publication.

The book cover of a new book "Neuroscience for Designing Green Spaces: Contemplative Landscapes" It featues a silhouette of a person looking at the beautiful landscape view with a shape of a city on a horizon. There are tall old trees and sunshine shining through them. There are also chairs and a table behind a person standing on a grassy ground

ABSTRACT

Urban parks and gardens are where people go to reconnect with nature and destress. But do they all provide the same benefits or are some better than others? What specific attributes set some green spaces apart? Can we objectively measure their impact on mental health and well-being? If so, how do we use this evidence to guide the design of mentally healthy cities?

The Contemplative Landscape Model unveils the path to answer these questions. Rooted in landscape architecture and neuroscience, this innovative concept is described for the first time in an extended format, offering a deep dive into contemplative design and the science behind it. In the face of the global mental health crisis, and increasing disconnection from nature, design strategies for creating healthier urban environments are what our cities so sorely need.

This book delves into the neuroscience behind contemplative landscapes, their key spatial characteristics, and practical applications of the Contemplative Landscape Model through case studies from around the world. Landscape architects, urban planners, students, land managers, and anyone interested in unlocking the healing power of landscapes will find inspiration here.

"Neuroscience for Designing Green Spaces: Contemplative Landscapes" - a revolutionary book

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Circular Green Cities at the Floriade Expo 2021

Experts talks were a part of the Sustainability day at the FoodForum and gave a lot of fruit for thought on how we can work towards more #circular cities (Vojtech Vosecky), nature inclusive urban developments such as #pampus #Almere (Paola HuijdingIngrid Zeegers) and on a street-level scale by #RewildingSteppingStones (Gideon Spanjar) and the value for human well-being by Dr Agnieszka Olszewska-Guizzo.

The event was moderated by Xander De Bruine
Special thanks to Mark Spetter Bart Harleman Dina El Filali Debbie Tijsterman

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Neuro-architecture to promote well-being | MAB 2020 Symposium

JULY 1, 2021
16:30 – 18:00 (CEST)

Neuro-architecture transmits knowledge and technologies from the field of neuroscience into the professions of spatial design, aimed to get better-informed design solutions to promote human and non-human well-being in our public spaces. We kick off with the key findings of our 2-year research project Sensing Streetscapes, followed by a roundtable exploration with the global pioneers from Neuro-architecture. What is the state of affairs and what is the potential of this approach to push improved sustainable well-being, especially in the newly built high-density urban settings?

Moderators:

Frank Suurenbroek - Professor of Spatial Urban Transformation at the Faculty of Technology at the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences
Gideon Spanjar - Senior Researcher and projectleader at the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences. Gideon is also a professor of Innovation & Urban Green Spaces at Aeres University of Applied Sciences and an associate fellow at the Centre for Econics and Ecosystem Management.

Invited Guests:

Jordan Lacey -Australian Research Council fellow and senior lecturer across RMIT University’s School of Design and School of Art. He specialises in artistic research and soundscape design

Justin Hollander - PhD, FAICP is a Professor of Urban and Environmental Policy and Planning at Tufts University. Among others, he co-authored the groundbreaking study Cognitive Architecture (2015)

Ann Sussman - trained architect, Boston Architectural College (BAC), co-author of the groundbreaking study Cognitive Architecture (2015) and co-founder of TheHapi.org.

Davide Ruzzon - professor of architecture at the University of Venice (IUAV), co-founder of the master Neuroscience Applied to Architectural Design and member of the Academy of Neuro-Architecture, actively involved in the Architecture Biennale in Venice. Davide also works as an architect at Lombardini22 in Milan.

Stefano Andreani - Lecturer in Architecture and a Research Associate at the Graduate School of Design of Harvard University

Michael A. Arbib - University Professor Emeritus and Professor Emeritus of Computer Science, Biomedical Engineering, Biological Sciences, and Psychology at the University of Southern California.

Elnaz Ghazi -  actively working as professor (Docente a Contratto) at Master of Neuroesthetics in department of Medicine and Surgery ( Medical Systems) at Tor Vergata University of Rome in Italy.

Agnieszka Olszewska-Guizzo - President and founder of NeuroLandscape. She has a Ph.D. in Landscape Architecture and Urban Ecology from the University of Porto (Portugal) and is a researcher at the Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine at the National University of Singapore.

Organizers

Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences
Chair of Spatial Urban Transformation
Research project Sensing Streetscapes

This symposium was a part of  MEDIA ARCHITECTURE BIENNALE 2020

JUNE 24TH · 29TH: WORKSHOPS
JUNE 30TH · JULY 2ND: ONLINE CONFERENCE
# FUTURES IMPLIED

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The New Urban Normal_Dr Diana’s speech at TecNM (Mexico)_VIDEO

24th September 2020.

Tecnológico Nacional de México, campus Costa Grande, hosted an online event addressing the World New Normal in the interdisciplinary lens.

Dr Diana Benjumea gave a speech regarding architecture and urban planning, where she sets a new paradigm of bottom-up, evidence-based urban design. Moreover,  she introduces NeuroLandscape projects and explains the global implications of the emerging shift in thinking and approaching urban space.

The entire speech and Q&A session are available on youtube! English subtitles coming soon!

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April – the World Landscape Architecture Month by ASLA

When I went to my first scientific conference, as a PhD candidate, I was surprised that the main topic of the post-conference discussion was about “what is the landscape architecture?”. For more than 1 hour landscape architects (teachers, academics, and proffessionals) were discussing vividly about what it is that what they do.

I found it funny then… but the more I studied and developed in the area the more I understood that the answer to that question is not so straight forward. To me landscape architecture was the only study discipline, which would join my technical, scientific, artistic and environmental interests. Later it turned out that it can be much more than a job. Today, with my NeuroLandscape NGO I know the landscape architecture can literally change people’s life.

Here’s a little tribute to that beautiful yet neglected discipline. Let’s celebrate the month of Landscape Architecture!

“Landscape Architecture is a profession that is unknown or misunderstood as gardening by many. Its value to society is greater than many can imagine and should be celebrated by the population of every town, city, and country….”

What is landscape architecture?