tHE WILD IS A RESEARCH LAB EXAMINING THE PERIURBAN TERRITORIES OF THE BUILT ENVIRONMENT
As a 510(c)(3) non-profit, we seek to initiate dialogue around the effects of the Climate Crisis on the built environment. Through intense research, education, and design speculation we engage communities and the general public in the hope that this work will serve as a catalyst for changes in policy and a deeper understanding of the interrelationship between all species in this world, and the territories within which they co-reside.
GREG KOCHANOWSKI
Greg is a licensed architect, landscape architect (anticipated soon!), and educator in the State of California. He is a Partner and Design Principal at GGA+ in Pasadena, CA, Co-President of the LA Forum for Architecture & Urban Design, and has been practicing and teaching for over 25 years with projects spanning a wide array of scales, typologies, complexities and disciplinary orientations. His work and research seeks to holistically combine the techniques and strategies of architecture, landscape architecture, and urbanism to create unique, sustainable, forward thinking, equitable environments that build upon and enhance the specific qualities of a place. His work explores new initiatives and thinking around transdisciplinary design, with current research focusing on resilient environments that create synergies between natural systems, culture, infrastructure, and development.
Greg’s work has been recognized and published nationally and internationally within all three disciplines – architecture, landscape, and urban design, and exhibited in both the Venice and Rotterdam Biennales, as well as other venues, and has received recognition from prominent organizations including the Young Architects Forum Award from the Architectural League of New York, AIA, ASLA, and AIACC. He has led education sessions at both the ASLA and AIA National Conventions focusing on the Wildland Urban Interface, and the fire, flood, debris flow weather cycles experienced in Southern California on a recurring basis. This research seeks to engage these unique challenges of climate change within the West & Southwest United States, Australia, Central and South America, and globally. Most recently, he has published a book on the subject entitled "The Wild", through a grant from LA County Dept. of Arts and Culture and the LA Forum for Architecture and Urban Design.
The book is available for purchase here
Additional areas of research involve alternative housing planning strategies and typologies, particularly those focused on issues of equity, affordability and innovative ownership models. Specific lines of inquiry are: community land trusts, land cooperatives, co-generational & co-cultural living, transitional housing, and homeless student housing.
INTERVIEW WITH ENTRE ARCHITECT
Greg sat down with Entre Architect to discuss his work and research on wildfires, the climate crisis, holistic design, and the values of compassion, community and collaboration in practice.
You can listen to the full conversation HERE.
LECTURE: “WILDLANDS IN THE EXPANDED FIELD”
You can watch the video HERE
University of Santiago, Chile School of Architecture
18 November 2021
CAL POLY POMONA / ASLA CLIMATE ACTION COMMITTEE LECTURE SERIES
“WILDFIRE: A Conversation with Greg Kochanowski & Max Moritz”
05 November, 2021
WATCH THE VIDEO HERE
The Department of Landscape Architecture is hosting “Landscape Architecture and the Science of Climate Change,” a series of talks pairing the research of scientists with the implementation of landscape architects on climate change topics.
The second installment of the 2021-22 public event program “WILDFIRE” presents talks by Max Moritz, Adjunct Professor at the Bren School of Environmental Science and Management and statewide wildfire specialist within UC Cooperative Extension; and Greg Kochanowski, AIA, ASLA, Partner and Design Principal at GGA+, and founder of The Wild, a nonprofit research lab focusing on the impacts of the climate crisis in urban environments.
“Landscape Architecture and the Science of Climate Change” talks are scheduled on the first Friday of each month, 12-1 p.m. PT. (Except April 8, 2022). The 2021-22 program is organized with Ronnie Siegel, chair of the Climate Action Committee of the Southern California chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects (SoCal ASLA) and Carlos Flores, SoCal ASLA Climate Action Committee Member and Lecturer at Cal Poly Pomona. Each talk is moderated by a faculty member of the Department of Landscape Architecture at Cal Poly Pomona.
SAN GABRIEL VALLEY COUNCIL OF GOVERNMENTS WILDFIRE SUMMIT
04 November, 2021
As California faces serious effects of climate change with increased temperatures and longer droughts, many communities have also witnessed the increased frequency and intensity of wildfires. In partnership with the Southern California American Society of Landscape Architects, the SGVCOG held this Summit to invite experts, fire scientists, and landscape architects to discuss fire resilience strategies and provide recommendations for local jurisdictions to protect residents and communities from wildfires.
Speakers include CA Senator Anthony Portantino, SGVCOG President Becky Shevlin, San Gabriel Mountains District Ranger Matthew Bokach, Chris Danch, Executive Director of the Ojai Fire Safe Council, and Greg Kochanowski.
Lecture at UC Berkeley 22 September, 2021
Los Angeles, Wildfires and Adaptive Design:
Greg Kochanowski on Creating New Futures
Interview with Arch Daily
Great design is rooted in responsive and adaptive approaches. For architect and landscape architect Greg Kochanowski, equitable design solutions should address critical issues, such as climate and housing. Greg is an active researcher focusing on resilient environments that create synergies between natural systems, culture, infrastructure, and development.
In the following interview with ArchDaily, Greg explores his early inspirations and design ideas, as well as his thoughts on major issues shaping the future. With a background across urban design, landscape, and architecture, his work has been instrumental in a variety of projects reshaping the cultural and environmental fabric of Los Angeles.
Article by Eric Baldwin
02 September 2021 - Los Angeles landscape architect Greg Kochanowski was studying the impact of wildfires on landscape management in the West even before his own house burned in 2018. His suggestions and conclusions, detailed in his book “The Wild,” offer a vision of a new kind of community response to living in fire-adapted landscapes. In this conversation, Greg discusses this with Growing Greener and the part that individual homeowners and gardeners can play. Growing Greener Podcast Website
03 June 2021 - Climate change-fueled disasters are destructive, scary, and rapidly increasing in both frequency and impact all over the world. At this point, half of the global population has been affected by at least one climate change-fueled disaster (and the other half isn’t far behind). And California has been a microcosm of the global climate emergency.
For the past decade, communities across the state have faced severe challenges on multiple fronts — from extreme fires and flooding to earthquakes and the COVID-19 pandemic. But how have they responded and what community resilience strategies have proved most successful?
In this episode of The Response, we explore some of the answers to these questions with two guest speakers
Lisa Beyer is an Urban Water Infrastructure Manager at World Resources Institute. As part of that role, she is responsible for developing and scaling financially innovative, environmentally sustainable municipal water management solutions in cities across the country.
Learn more about Lisa Beyer, World Resources Institute, and the Joint Benefits Authority (JBA) by visiting wri.org.
Greg Kochanowski is a licensed architect, an aspiring landscape architect, and educator in the State of California. His new book, The Wild, explores the urban periphery of Los Angeles, where the city meets the mountains, a landscape inherently vulnerable to wildfire, and its secondary and tertiary effects, including flash floods and debris flows.
2020 ASLA National Conference Education Session with Molly Peterson and Richard Mullane
Interview with The Landscape Architecture Podcast
‘The Wild’ Book Release and Panel Discussion
Lecture and Discussion at XLab
Collective Impact, Los Angeles
ASLA National Conference Education Panel 2018
with Helen Kongsgaard and Jeremy Lancaster
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Interview with Landscape Architecture Magazine
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Interview with the LA Forum for Architecture + Urban Design
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Podcast: What Can Emergencies Tell Us About Design?
Design for a Changing Climate
Fire and Community Resilience
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