The 2019 International Festival of Landscape Architecture adopts the typologies of the Square and the Park to explore how we conceive, design, fund, construct and manage urban open space in our contemporary context.

This focus is particularly relevant to a Festival held in Melbourne – a city which at various times has had problematic relationships to the Square and the Park. For example, colonial Melbourne emerged from a speculative grid conceived without a civic square, ringed by a series of colonial parks and gardens that erased significant Kulin nation gathering grounds. More recently, the internationally celebrated Federation Square was scheduled for partial demolition to allow the insertion of an Apple global store, stirring debate over the Square’s continuing role as a public space.

This Festival advocates for a greater ambition for designed parks and squares in all Australian cities, conceived to extend beyond an internal professional discussion to reach the broader community, politicians and other design disciplines.

A partnership with the University of Melbourne to deliver an international ideas competition to find new public parks in Melbourne forms a major part of this strategy. Launched in March 2019, this competition will provoke discussion before, during and after the Festival.

Programmed around a diverse presentation format, the Festival will be engaging and entertaining, offering ideas and inspiration relevant to established professionals, emerging designers and students of landscape architecture. Discussions will continue at a post-Festival academic forum to be held at the University of Melbourne, while a record of key moments, ideas and competition winners will be published in a February 2020 edition of Landscape Architecture Australia.