3rd City Conference 2017
3rd City Conference 2017
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Looking back at the 2017 3rd City AILA Festival

As the Principal Corporate Partner of the Australian Institute of Landscape Architects, WE-EF looks back at the key events of the 2017 International Festival of Landscape Architecture.

2017 International Landscape Architecture Conference, 13 – 14 October

The 2017 The 3rd City AILA Conference focused  on environmental issues – on how future cities will meet the challenges of changing ecological and climate conditions. This means facing the need to grow and expand, while at the same time, trying to preserve as much of the natural environment and wildlife as possible. The 3rd City is the future city – a speculation, an idea to be postulated and explored. Read more and view the Conference image gallery here

WE-EF asked Julie Lee, landscape architect and director at Tract Consultants, for her impressions from the festival

WE-EF: What was your biggest impression from the festival and the conference?

Julia Lee: Inspiration. The festival brought together a broad spectrum of speakers and topics, from the theoretical to the real. Together they reinforced the expansive range of our collective interests. This has led to post festival reflection, which is an important benefit of attending.

WE-EF: What was your personal highlight from the festival?

JL: The festival demonstrated the maturity of our profession, in curating a highly successful event through the dedication of members and our national AILA team. I have to also mention Jan van der Grift, for his whimsical presentation. I won’t forget him, or Dutch rivers for a while!

WE-EF: What are you looking forward to at the next year’s festival?

JL: The opportunity to catch up with friends and colleagues from across Australia, in conjunction with a visit to the rapidly developing Gold Coast region.

Future Street, 12 – 15 October 2017

The Future Street project took over Alfred Street in Sydney for four days over the AILA 2017 Festival.

Set up as a conceptual visualisation of how our streets of the future may look, the Future Street installation included ‘Complete Street’, ‘Green Street’ and ‘Today Street’, demonstrating different approaches to the street, whether the balance shifts towards people, cycling and public transport or towards cars. The Smart Street with the Internet of Things (IoT) Lounge was the nerve centre and data hub of the Future Street Project.

During Future Street WE-EF interviewed visitors on their opinions and feedback. The results of these interviews will be presented in a video report early next year.

Read more about The Future Street here.

2017 WE-EF AFTER DARK National Competition, 13 October 2017

In a first of its kind, WE-EF partnered with AILA to recognise Australia’s best lit landscape architecture projects, across a national competition entitled WE-EF AFTER DARK: Australia’s best lit landscapes. The competition will engage the broader community to think about the value of quality designed lighting spaces and will celebrate best practice examples. The launch of the competition took place on board an exclusively charted cruise boat on the Sydney Harbour, with 160 landscape architecture design professionals and friends from all over Australia and the world.

The competition entries will be opened February to June 2018, with the winners to be announced at the 2018 AILA Festival.

North to Sydney City Industry Tour, 12 October

North to Sydney City Industry Tour took 30 landscape architecture professionals to have a look at recently completed projects, which included Coal Loader Waverton (North Sydney Council), Barangaroo Headlands (PWP and JPW), Darling Harbour Live (Hassell) and Goods Line (ASPECT Studios), which features WE-EF exterior luminaires.

View the Tour image gallery here

For more information contact:

Alena Leonardi:  a.leonardi@we-ef.com

Ina Parakhina: i.parakhina@we-ef.com