topos 103 | Trees

TOPICS

Trees shape rural and urban landscapes. They define and lend structure to spaces. For researchers in the era of the Anthropocene, it has become highly relevant to ask what contribution trees, as non-human agents, make to the processes at play in contemporary nature-society relations.

In topos 103 we will look at this change of perspective and examine how it begins to transform approaches to landscape design and construction. For this, we will study concrete projects involving trees that rethink the relation of nature and society and restructure it in very distinct and very different ways.

STORYTELLERS
From weeping cherry tree to Tomb Raider roots: a photographic journey

URBAN TREE AS PRODIGY
A plea for why we need trees in our cities

FROM MELBS' ELM WITH LOVE
How Melbourne’s Urban Forest Strategy brings citizens and trees together

THE TREE CONSTRUCTOR
Ferdinand Ludwig – a portrait of a pioneer

NEXT STOP METRO FOREST
How Bangkok follows the treetop path

LIVING WITH A GIANT
Pando: the single tree that is a forest

TREES: FACTS AND FIGURES

GUARDIANS OF THE LAND
How the people of Guabuliga fight climate change

THE INVISIBLE ENEMY
In Italy a plant pathogen threatens olive trees

SLEEPING SEEDS
The Global Seed Vault in Svalbard: a back-up for the world's biodiversity

"OUR MISSION IS TO SECURE BIODIVERSITY"
An interview with Åsmund Asdal

GREEN SURPRISE DRESSED IN BLACK
Marina One and its rainforest in the heart of Singapore

A WALK IN THE CLOUDS
Tree houses as objects of fascination

THE TREE AS MYTH
Reflections on a historical influencer

TREE PEOPLE FROM DYSTOPIA
People's tendency towards humanizing nature