BSLA Fieldbook BSLA 2014 Fall Fieldbook | Page 105

Merit Award /BSLA

Resi dent i a l a n d Ga rden Desi gn
Matthew Cunningham Landscape Design
project name.
location.

Longwood Garden
Brookline, Massachusetts

A stunning new home and landscape reinvent a dated ranchstyle developer property for outdoor-focused, contemporary
living in urban Brookline, near the Emerald Necklace and
Fenway Park. The active family requested a landscape fusing
“California-style outdoor living” with New England.
Beautifully textured board-form concrete retaining walls elevate
the new front garden with a fantastic porch and steel vine
structure overlooking the busy streetscape. Boldly contrasting
native plants provide foliage displays that soften hard edges with
texture and movement. Terraces in the rear are positioned for
enjoyment of both sun and shade. Multiple creative stormwater
management strategies resolve sensitive drainage problems
throughout the landscape.
The work illustrates simple concepts that can be replicated at
any scale and budget—a model of easy living in an intense urban
place vexed by extreme weather and limited plant options. This
project brings calm and order to a previously neglected space and
draws the family outdoors.

Boston Society of Landscape Architects Fieldbook

103