Retreat describes the deliberate withdrawal of human intervention from landscapes destabilized by climate change, contamination, or disaster. It contrasts with control-oriented adaptation by acknowledging limits to design and management. Retreat does not signify abandonment but re-situates agency, allowing ecological processes to unfold without constant anthropogenic steering. In landscape discourse, it raises ethical and political questions: who retreats, from where, and at what cost. As a practice, retreat stages humility, marking a shift from mastery to relinquishment.
Landscapes of Retreat, a book by Rosetta S. Elkin, is informed by land-based practice, observation, and paying close attention to the multifaceted changes occurring in landscapes and their impact on communities. The second edition of this award-winning book (originally published in 2022), which gained considerable attention within the landscape architecture community, has been released this […]
During all the media coverage—particularly in the United States—of Hurricanes Harvey (Category 4, 17 August-1 September), Irma (Category 5, 30 August-12 September), Jose (Category 4, 5-22 September) and Maria (Category 5, 16-30 September), the flooding and subsequent trail of destruction in Houston and southeast Texas, South Florida and the Caribbean, there was ceaseless talk of […]
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