ASLA UTAH OCTOBER NEWSLETTER
ASLA UTAH OCTOBER 2023 NEWSLETTER
UPCOMING EVENTS
LuckyDog Recreation Lunch & Learn Monday, November 13th, 12:00pm. (Virtual Option) ASLA UT Office 270 S 400 W, SLC REGISTER HERE
GreenBlue Urban. LACES Virtual Seminar Wednesday, November 15th, 12:00pm REGISTER HERE
***SAVE THE DATE!!!
2024 ASLA Utah Annual Conference & Expo. Cultivating the Profession of Landscape Architecture Wednesday March 27th. Logan, Utah. **More details coming soon!
Leadership Express
Jake Powell, ASLA Utah President
One of the questions I have pondered during my time as the Utah ASLA chapter president is “what does the American Society of Landscape Architecture (ASLA) do for me (and by extension each of you)?” I suppose the underpinnings of this question point to our desire to weigh the comparative cost of our annual dues with the value it creates. I want to delve into that important question and share how my understanding of the answer(s) have evolved through my service in the ASLA. I hope that it will provide you with some answers to that question if you have ever asked it yourself.
Advocacy:
ASLA is actively protecting and advancing the profession of landscape architecture at a national and local level in ways that I have come to appreciate and admire over the past few years. While your great individual work certainly elevates the profession, there is so much critical work happening behind the scenes at a legislative and policy level. Much of the legislative and legal structure our profession currently operates within has been fought for by ASLA since its inception. We owe so much to the ASLA of the past for what we have now!
Currently, ASLA is advocating in the halls of Congress for legislation that protects the profession and that opens up funding streams to support projects that in turn create work opportunities for landscape architects to engage in major national initiatives. This kind of work is happening locally in Utah as well.
The ASLA state chapter leaders have received incredible support from ASLA national in our efforts to protect and advocate for the profession of landscape architecture in Utah. This collaborative effort helped us effectively engage with our local elected leaders, and strategize on the next steps to similarly create more spaces where the skills of landscape architects are recognized and even required in our state.
These processes take time to bear fruit, but I assure you that ASLA is proactively and passionately engaged in the invisible efforts to sustain and grow the profession you depend to support yourself and your family. While likely none of us have the time and expertise to advocate for the profession even part-time, I am grateful that at a national and state level someone is. Your dues and participation in ASLA make that advocacy possible.
Training:
Landscape architecture is a profession that needs to be aware of and often on the cutting edge of so many different things: sustainability, technology, products, and policies to name just a few. ASLA brings that training to your doorstep through online learning, conferences, and local lunch-and-learn training events that expose you to ideas, concepts, products, and processes that you wouldn’t likely discover on your own. ASLA supports the lifelong learning of professionals and makes it accessible for you to acquire it. ASLA supports the formal professional development opportunities as well as the informal learning that happens among colleagues and friends. When else would you pause your work to learn something new? Your participation in ASLA creates new opportunities to expand your knowledge and hone your craft.
Connections:
One of my favorite things about the profession of landscape architecture is the tight-knit community I feel a part of. It happens in the studios as a student, transfers to the office, and is supported by the ASLA. The social events ASLA plans and hosts support the critical interpersonal networking that has created new partnerships, linked future employers to employees, inspired friendships and reconnected old friends and colleagues. Where else can you find a room full of people who 1- actually know what you do for work, 2- are interested in having a stimulating discussion about the complexities of street tree planting best practices, 3- actually care about your opinions regarding the quality of AutoCAD’s new release, and 4- are some of the most down to earth, best people you can spend time with? I would propose there isn’t such a room outside of an ASLA-sponsored event. Your participation in ASLA facilitates the connections that make landscape architecture feel like a big family. A family I am proud to claim allegiance to.
Your membership and support are meaningful, and the value of your dues is multiplied and comes back in likely more ways than I was able to explain above. I challenge you to look for how your membership in ASLA has impacted you, your company, your work, and the larger profession. I also challenge you to reach out to those who are sharing in the benefits ASLA brings to the profession, but are not fully engaged in supporting the efforts that create those benefits and invite them to join and support ASLA.
Our profession is stronger together, and it is only through bringing many voices to the table that we can continue to advocate for the profession.
I want to thank each of you for supporting and participating in ASLA, it continues to be an honor to serve you in this great work of advancing the profession of landscape architecture.
ASLA Utah 2023 Awards Event
Tyler Smithson, VP of Membership
On October 6, 2023 ASLA Utah celebrated the Annual Awards Event at the very hip location, The Shop. Guests feasted on a variety of yummy crepes to the sounds of DJ Moody spinning tunes that kept the evening lively. Award winners and their colleagues and guests were able to meet, mingle network and socialize with a wide variety of landscape architects, state employees and supportive vendors. This event is always so much fun and has become an annual tradition - plan on attending next year! Huge Thanks to Berliner for sponsoring the Awards Event this year
ASLA MEMBER SPOTLIGHT
Tyler Smithson, VP of Membership
NATHAN CLARKE
Q: Where did you grow up? Where did you go to College? I grew up in the small town of Evanston, Wyoming. I think this helped smart my creativity as a kid as we tried to find new and fun things to do. I enjoyed the small town feel and got my B.S. degree from Utah State University in Logan, UT.
Q: Tell us about your family and interests (work and non-work related). I currently live in Spanish Fork with my beautiful wife (also from Evanston) and four children. One boy and Three girls ranging in age from one to nine years old. When I'm not spending time with my family, I enjoy working on projects at my home and in my yard or spending time in the mountains hunting. I’ve always been interested in the environmental side of Landscape Architecture.
Q: Tell us about your family and interests (work and non-work related). I currently live in Spanish Fork with my beautiful wife (also from Evanston) and four children. One boy and Three girls ranging in age from one to nine years old. When I'm not spending time with my family, I enjoy working on projects at my home and in my yard or spending time in the mountains hunting. I’ve always been interested in the environmental side of Landscape Architecture.
Q: What is something that makes you unique? When I was 9 years old, I got into a four-wheeler crash with my cousin while in the mountains in Wyoming and had to get 50 stitches in my leg. I’m also allergic to cashews and several different types of fruit, and I don’t like peanut butter.
Q: Describe an LA project that you have recently accomplished recently that you are proud of. I was a part of the team for a recently completed project along US-89 between Farmington and Layton. As part of the project, we developed an Aesthetics Plan for the corridor that included the colors, textures and design for the new walls and bridge structures. We also completed a landscape plan for the area and developed wetland and stream mitigation sites for the project.
Q: What would you like to get out of the ASLA? I hope to grow relationships with likeminded individuals in the industry to help move our profession forward and provide a valuable service to our community.
Q: What interests you in Landscape Architecture? My interest with landscape architecture has always been the breadth and variety or work we can do. And whether you're designing small residential yard, master planning a large community, designing a park, visitors center, or stream mitigation; you're creating spaces to connect people.
Q: What is your favorite part of your practice? I enjoy that every day is different. With my current position, I work a lot in the environmental portion of projects. For that, I’m able to spend a lot of time out of the office visiting project sites to delineate waters and wetlands. Other days, I'm able to create 3D renderings to help communities visual proposed projects, write reports, create figures, or work on park designs for local communities.
Q: What is your favorite hobby? My favorite hobby would be hunting. I’m particularly interested in the challenge of archery hunting.
Q: What do you find inspiring? I find people inspiring that commit their time to a cause. They see a need, and they do something about it. I’m also a sucker for sports movies based on true events.
USU STUDENT HIGHLIGHT - TANNER WYATT
Hi, my name is Tanner Wyatt, and I am this year's Secretary of our ASLA Student Chapter here at Utah State. I am originally from Lehi, UT, and moved to Logan about 3 years ago to study Landscape Architecture. I am committed to bringing excitement and development to the landscape architecture students of USU’s LAEP program, and connecting them with opportunities outside of the studio.
In the studio experience, our students gain many skills that benefit them in their professional experience. As an ASLA Presidency, we like to provide them with new opportunities for networking, character building, and community involvement. On October 14th, we gathered students to help representatives from the Logan and Ogden Ranger Stations in a Canyon Clean-Up event. As a group, we logged over 55 hours of service clearing trash, picking up spent bullet casings, and replacing a damaged fence in a public-access shooting area in Providence Canyon. As a side benefit, we even witnessed the solar eclipse as it took place during our project.
As the end of October draws near, we look forward to sending several students to the National ASLA Conference in Minneapolis! We are very excited to meet and learn and gain experience to ‘Scale Up’ our ability to succeed in this field!
Special Thanks to ASLA Utah 2023 Sponsors & Corporate Partners for their Support!
Click here to become a 2024 ASLA Utah Sponsor or Partner!
Platinum Sponsors
BioGrass | Great Western Recreation l Pikus | Rain Bird | Victor Stanley
Gold Sponsors
Belgard | Hunter/FX Luminaire | Live Earth Products
Silver Sponsors Anova | Chanshare Farms | Holcim | Landscape Forms | LuckyDog Recreation | MADRAX/Thomas Steele | Omega II Fence System | OPTConnect | ORE | PlaySpace Designs | Progressive Plants | Vortex Aquatic Structures Intl.
Bronze Sponsors
Amiad | Bermad | CES&R | Calsense | Confluence | GCP | GPH Irrigation | Garrett & Company | Granite Seed | Grasshopper Climbing | GreenBlue Urban | Hanover Architectural Products | Inman Interwest | IRONSMITH | Miller Companies | Mountainland Supply | Musco | Netafim | NOVA Color | Sonntag Recreation | Stonecover | TORO
Corporate Partners
MHTN | Io LandArch | SGLA Technical Training