The Masters by Project programme is a lab for landscape and architectural graduates to ask searching question about their own practice and the ways that practice can connect to the world.

The programme encompasses a range of graduates who bring their own unique perspectives to research work. Their research often crosses disciplinary lines. The result is a constellation of ideas that resolve around concerns rather than specific disciplinary problems. This work is developed in presentation and discussion at four workshops held through out the year. Important practitioners and academics in their field and associated professionals, developers, iwi, and local government, not only critique the work but help to engender a larger conversation about the impact of the research for the bigger community.

What is the shape of the wananga of the future and how will this affect the form of the marae? How can the social problematic of suburbia be addressed? What is the social ecology of the industrial park? These are just a few of the critical questions that the graduates are engaged with.

New research work in the programme is becoming more focused on specific problems to do with Auckland’s predicted growth; where can development occur in a way that will not affect Auckland’s unique landscape and lifestyle? This work is being carried out in collaboration with practice and industry.

mbradbury@unitec.ac.nz

Wednesday, 4 December 2013

Jennifers Exam











Jennifer Parlane completed a successful MLA examination on the 8th of November graduating with distinction . Jennifer, working with supervisors Peter Connolly and Peter Griffiths, explores how leftover spaces in industrial zones could be connected to the existing life of the upper Manukau harbour. Through a series of rigorous and evocative mappings and careful site investigation, Jennifer proposed a sequence of careful small-scale interventions that help to activate the social and environmental potentials of the site. The two enfant terribles of the Auckland landscape profession, Claire O’Shaughnessy and Garry Marshall examined Jennifer. The examiners were unanimous in their appreciation of the rigour of the research process that Jennifer had undertaken. They felt that the design work addressed the concerns that the research question raised in a clear and confident manner. The overall conclusion of the examiners was that the thesis was an important investigation into an area of landscape practice that has been explored overseas has as yet to be been thoroughly investigated in New Zealand. 
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