Harvard GSD, MLA Thesis: Landscapes of Repulsion: Hidden in Plain Site

Harvard GSD, Option Studio: The Lincoln Avenue Cookbook

Harvard Graduate School of Design, MLA Thesis

2022

Author: Colleen Sloan Advisor: Sergio Lopez-Pineiro

This thesis interrogates landscape architecture’s participation in the cleaning and concealing of repugnant sites of industry through the creation of a public mountain range in Iowa constructed from the wastes of the industrial hog industry.

The constructed mountains, dubbed the De Soto Range, reveal the repulsions of industry through the collapsing in space of pleasure landscapes and disgust. In doing so, the site becomes a battleground of differing political ideologies, motives, and backgrounds connected by a common reality.

Iterative sketching and test models were at the heart of this thesis in order to create a design that was structurally and techincally sound while also providing unique and at times sublime experiences at the human scale. The tectonics and construction of each tall peak ensures structural stability, material containment, as well as allowing for the traversing of pedestrians and vehicles.

The logic of the mountain’s construction is determined based on the radius of the cranes, construction of circular gabion walls, and access roads used to deliver the waste material onsite. All of these requirements, in the end, lend themselves to a variety of constructed landforms.

The plan of the mountain, depicted here for the year 2075, shows the layering of material over time. The various colors represent time as well as the variations in the color and texture of the material itself.

Vegetation in the low-lying areas includes subtropical Bamboo and Banana Trees supported by the heat production of the site. Plantings become more temperate moving out and up from the center, such as the western peaks planted with Magnolia and Osage Orange trees forming designs such as large spirals of vegetation.