SWA Group

05/07/2026

This weekend, Halperin Park—Dallas’ newest cap park, spanning I-35E adjacent to the Dallas Zoo—opens to the public after nearly a decade of planning, engagement, and advocacy.

Deeply specific to Oak Cliff in every aspect of its design, Halperin Park is also part of a larger national shift as cities across the U.S. reexamine the legacy of mid-century highway construction and reinvest in public spaces that restore neighborhood connections. In Oak Cliff, this work began with a Community First Plan shaped by the voices and aspirations of over 500 residents, businesses, educators, nonprofits, and community leaders.

Designed by SWA and HKS, the park translates Oak Cliff’s cultural and environmental history into built form, with sculptural landforms recalling the limestone and shale geology beneath the neighborhood, shaping subtle grade changes that guide movement and frame views toward the downtown skyline.

Across the deck, a sequence of public spaces include a walkable promenade and Oak Cliff walk of fame along the original path of 12th Street, mass-timber bandshell and multipurpose pavilion, flexible great lawn, treehouse-inspired playground, perennial gardens, shaded seating, and two water features that extend comfort through North Texas summers.

“Above all, this is a moment to celebrate the people who make up Oak Cliff and Southern Dallas,” said Todd Strawn, Managing Principal of SWA’s Dallas studio. “Halperin Park shows it’s possible to right a past wrong, stitch a neighborhood back together, and center that community’s culture and history throughout the process.”

The park opens to the public on May 9 following a community parade and ribbon-tying ceremony celebrating the historic reconnection of Oak Cliff.

🔗 Read the full story:
https://www.swagroup.com/stories/halperin-park-opens-in-dallas

05/01/2026

The first week of June, landscape architects from across the U.S. descend on Detroit for ’s Future Now Summit, a three-day event focused on landscape-driven solutions to the climate and biodiversity crisis as well as an array of social and economic pressures shaping our cities and communities.

SWA is leading a number of talks and workshops exploring low-carbon design, extreme heat, Climate Action Plans, and more. Attendees can earn up to 14.75 PDH (LA CES/HSW) over the full summit, including a pick of 30 lightning talks, 24 workshops, and an optional day of field sessions throughout Detroit.

Get tickets and check out the full lineup:
🔗 lafoundation.org/summit

Where to find us:

Lightning Talk – “Reading the Low-Carbon Landscape”
Jonah Susskind, Director of Climate Strategy
Thursday, June 4, 12:14 pm

Workshop – “Shade for All: Design for Equity in the Urban Heat Era”
Qiaoqi Dai & Han Fu, Associates, SWA LA
Friday, June 5, 11:00 am

Workshop – “Landscape Architecture as Climate Translator”
Mohammad Arabmazar & Claudia Wu, Landscape Designers, SWA Sausalito
Friday, June 5, 1:30 pm

Workshop – “Time to Act: Draft Your Action Plan Now”
Jana Wehby, Principal, SWA LA & Willa DeBoom, Climate & Sustainability Specialist
Friday, June 5, 1:30 pm

04/24/2026

For over 40 years, SWA has been a key part of how Dallas builds its public realm through signature projects like the Katy Trail, Pacific Plaza, and now Halperin Park.

Todd Strawn, named today as Managing Principal of the Dallas studio, has spent over 18 years with the firm helping realize those projects and countless others across hospitality, mixed-use, healthcare, planning contexts, and more—playing a major role in building the studio's reputation for design rigor, technical ex*****on, and long-standing client relationships.

Join us in congratulating Todd, including at the May 9th opening of Halperin Park, a landmark new cap park spanning I-35E in Southern Dallas, many years in the making.

🔗 Read more: https://www.swagroup.com/stories/todd-strawn-managing-principal-swa-dallas/

04/24/2026

For centuries, Belgrade’s Sava River has been an economic lifeline for the city, located at the convergence of three trade routes between Europe and the Balkans—but for much of its modern history, the river has been cut off from public access.

Since opening in 2015, the Sava Promenade has begun to reverse that. Spanning 1.8 kilometers between Branko's Bridge and a railway overpass, the waterfront is punctuated by social hubs every 50 meters: cantilevered paths, river get-downs, restaurants, museums, and retail. A key feature is the 44-story Kula Belgrade, home to the SOM-designed St. Regis Hotel. For its entry plaza, SWA designed paving inspired by the river movement and shoals, forming a geometric sequence that radiates from the tower.

The promenade fits within a larger million-square-meter waterfront development, the single-largest urban regeneration project in Serbia's history. Reconnecting the city with its riverfront, the promenade also improves flood resilience through demarcations along the entire path to provide a temporary flood protection barrier.

04/22/2026

One of the more thrilling aspects of landscape is its capacity to connect people and natural systems at a scale few disciplines can match.

What other profession can stitch together communities across hundreds of miles? Bring nature into cities, transforming infrastructure into space for public life? What landscape lacks in singular, meme-able structures it makes up for in complexity and sensitivity to context. So often, our brief is less about how to superimpose a single, recognizable “move” across vastly different sites than it is about slowing down, studying the network of social and environmental systems at play, and tailoring design to make that place richer in experience and function.

Earth Day is now in its 56th year. Conceived in response to a wave of overlapping ecological crises (perhaps most vividly the Cuyahoga River catching fire in 1969), it marked a shift in public perception of the environment as a shared responsibility. More than half a century on, the terms have escalated. The climate crisis is warming and acidifying our oceans, intensifying wildfires, and accelerating biodiversity loss, each setting off cascading chain reactions that impact the lives of future generations more each passing day.

For landscape architects, the interconnectedness of these systems is a baseline understanding. Many of the adaptive solutions at our fingertips—natural infrastructure, carbon sequestration, floodplain restoration, urban canopy expansion—are basic building blocks of our profession. The challenge now is not so much inventing new techniques as it is aligning the actors needed to implement them at scale, embedding a climate-conscious ethos into projects of all scales and contexts.

Through SWA’s Climate Action Plan, we’ve committed to a 50% reduction in emissions in our built portfolio by 2030, a goal we’ll continue to report on through our series, “The Low-Carbon Landscape.” A larger, more necessary shift is cultural as well as technical, moving from isolated best practices to collective action.

Read the latest story:
https://www.swagroup.com/stories/what-does-the-low-carbon-landscape-look-like/

04/21/2026

In this weekend’s The New York Times, Sam Lubell writes about how museum security has become a design question, particularly after the high-profile jewelry heist of the Louvre last year.

Covering Architectural Resources Group and SWA’s work on Pasadena’s Norton Simon Museum, the piece illustrates how perimeter design, planting, lighting, and structural upgrades can better secure institutions without hardening the visitor experience. For SWA, this work also entailed revisiting an historic landscape by Nancy Goslee Power modeled after the gardens at Giverny—carefully resurfaced, realigned, and replanted to improve circulation while enhancing overall structure.

🔗 Read the full piece: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/18/arts/design/museums-security.html

📷 Philip Cheung for The New York Times

04/16/2026

TWO WEEKS LEFT to register and earn up to 4.5 FREE CEUs for the richly edited videos of the dynamic presentations at Soak It Up. This recent daylong conference organized by TCLF focused on how landscape architects are at the forefront of addressing climate change-accelerated urban flooding and water management.

The conference videos will be available for THIS MONTH ONLY on PlayCore’s CORE Professional Development Hub and offer opportunities to receive IACET CEUs, AIA CEs, and LA CES credits. Register now at the link below and use code “PARTNER" to register.

https://www.tclf.org/watch-soak-it-los-angeles

📸 Soak it Up Conference, USC Bovard Auditorium, Los Angeles, CA - Photo by Nord Wennerstrom, 2025

04/15/2026

"Biodiversity planning begins below ground," explains Principal Ji hyun Yoo to the South China Morning Post. "Our studio does not see human use and ecological performance as opposing goals. Instead, we design for coexistence ... where social life and ecological systems are not separated, but thoughtfully interwoven."

For the World Trade Center Seoul, Yoo is currently leading a team to reimagine a key hub in South Korea's most prominent business district as a lush, forested campus—weaving 423 canopy trees across a complex site to help reduce urban heat island effect and create a sheltered, immersive natural space for visitors.

Read the full piece in SCMP:

Urban greening is evolving: Asian cities are embracing biodiverse urban forests, moving beyond mere decoration to create ecological, human-centric spaces.

04/14/2026

With over a third of its population above the age of 65, Japan has the oldest population of any country in the world. To meet the growing needs of seniors, innovative companies across the country have created elder-focused developments and programs that center core values of dignified, social, and active aging—including Park Wellstate, the senior division of housing firm Mitsui Fudosan, which has completed four major properties across Tokyo and Chiba since its 2017 launch.

Enveloped in 2,200 square meters of private gardens, Park Wellstate’s flagship residence in Tokyo's Nishi-Azabu district threads biophilic design from the ground plane through a 36-floor, 421-unit tower overlooking Minato City. Developed through careful study of solar exposure, the building’s massing was shifted to carve out a central courtyard sheltered from urban activity—a respite for residents and a stopover spot for migratory birds.

Learn more in Senior Housing News, recognized by the outlet as a best international project of 2025: https://seniorhousingnews.com/2026/04/10/best-international-project-of-2025-park-wellstate-nishiazabu-brings-nature-to-urban-tokyo/

04/09/2026

Today, the role of design in shaping academic and research institutions extends beyond aesthetics—increasingly, campuses are serving as outdoor classrooms, infrastructure to manage stormwater and heat, and civic anchors for the communities that surround them. At the same time, access to green space has been shown to reduce students’ stress, support mental health, and improve concentration in a world defined by constant digital stimulation.

Last week, we explored a few of SWA’s long-term collaborations with colleges and universities. This week, a few individual projects vary widely in scale and context: the Centro Roberto Garza Sada at Universidad de Monterrey in Mexico, the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco, and a new central quad at Medgar Evers College in Brooklyn.

🔗 Read the full story: https://www.swagroup.com/stories/higher-education-50-years-of-university-planning/

04/06/2026

This month only: earn 4.5 FREE CEUs! Register now to view the richly edited videos of the dynamic presentations at Soak It Up, the recent daylong conference organized by TCLF that focused on how landscape architects are at the forefront of addressing climate change-accelerated urban flooding and water management. It was inspired by the work of the late landscape architect and Oberlander Prize winner Kongjian Yu, the global champion of the “sponge cities” concept, and featured exciting and provocative speakers discussing fascinating issues, among them the most recent Oberlander Prize winner, Mario Schjetnan from Mexico City.

The conference videos will be available for THIS MONTH ONLY on PlayCore’s CORE Professional Development Hub and offers opportunities to receive IACET CEUs, AIA CEs, and LA CES credits. Register now at the link below and use code “PARTNER" to register.

https://www.tclf.org/watch-soak-it-los-angeles

📸 Soak it Up Conference, USC Bovard Auditorium, Los Angeles, CA - Photo by David Lloyd, 2025