Postgraduate Course: Landscape Design for Health and Wellbeing (ARCH11263)
Course Outline
School | Edinburgh College of Art |
College | College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences |
Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) |
Availability | Available to all students |
SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
Summary | This course introduces you to examples of landscapes that have been designed or redesigned with human health and wellbeing as an aim. It offers you an opportunity to engage with, critique, and make proposals for different salutogenic design solutions and examples. |
Course description |
This course draws on experience from OPENspace research centre, for example in working with the Forestry Commission to develop salutogenic landscapes, and other landscape design interventions to enhance health. You will participate in field trips to a range of sites subject to access availability e.g. at Maggie's Centres, the Royal Infirmary, Edinburgh, and Gartnavel Hospital, Glasgow, and schools and facilities for children in addition to Forestry Commission Scotland projects.
The course addresses a 21st century need to better understand how to design salutogenic environments. Such issues are now being raised by the World Health Organisation, and there is an urgent need to produce better guidance on what design approaches, and associated management requirements, are important for different populations' wellbeing in different contexts. you will be informed of world-leading developments and will engage with, critique, and make proposals for different salutogenic design solutions and examples.
The course will be adapted to your different needs and backgrounds, so it is not necessary to have a design background. The course allows those with design training to engage in design projects, while offering others opportunities to critique existing designs and learn how to brief planners and designers appropriately for new projects. You will learn from group working around issues; site-specific problems and peer-learning will be an important element of the course.
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Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
Pre-requisites |
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Co-requisites | |
Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | None |
Information for Visiting Students
Pre-requisites | None |
High Demand Course? |
Yes |
Course Delivery Information
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Academic year 2023/24, Available to all students (SV1)
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Quota: 50 |
Course Start |
Semester 2 |
Timetable |
Timetable |
Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
200
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Seminar/Tutorial Hours 22,
Supervised Practical/Workshop/Studio Hours 11,
Fieldwork Hours 10,
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 4,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
153 )
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Assessment (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
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Additional Information (Assessment) |
You will be expected to work individually and in groups, as follows:
1. Initial work will focus on critical review of existing landscape designs, informed by field work and studio-based and peer-led discussion. This is part of the homework throughout the semester rather than part of the final assessment.
2. You will work in teams to analyse the site(s), discuss the existing site qualities and the potential for intervention, again informed by field work and peer-led discussion. This work will be presented to the class for formative feedback.
3. You will then individually work up a proposal to address the design problem, e.g. by preparing a brief for commissioning design, and/or by preparing revised design guidance or proposals, using a range of techniques, including precedent studies, for analysis and presentation as appropriate (previous landscape design experience is not necessary).
Summative assessment will be based on the final project submission from each student. 100% of final mark |
Feedback |
Field work and studio-based and peer-led discussion will include elements of formative feedback as a regular part of the learning process and, particularly, at the end of Tasks 1 and 2. The data collected through group work will be presented to the class and used to collect formative feedback.
Formative feedback for Task 3 will be provided via formal and informal critiques in the studio setting. Projects will be orally and visually presented to the class towards the end of the teaching weeks. |
No Exam Information |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- demonstrate a detailed and critical understanding of a range of specialised concepts and principles behind salutogenic landscape design, informed by developments at the forefront of the discipline.
- critically review and assess examples of landscape design practice for health and wellbeing that are at the forefront, consolidating and extending knowledge, skills, and the potential for professional practice in the area.
- develop original and creative responses to problems and issues, based on one or more real-world sites where landscape design for health and wellbeing is needed, making informed decisions in complex situations where data or information may be incomplete.
- communicate effectively on the above to peers and other academic and professional audiences, using oral, written and graphic skills and ICT as appropriate.
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Reading List
Ward Thompson, C. 2013. Activity, exercise and the planning and design of outdoor spaces, Journal of Environmental Psychology 34, pp. 79-96, doi: 10.1016/j.jenvp.2013.01.003
Ward Thompson, C. 2016. Is Landscape Life? in Doherty, G. & Waldheim, C. (eds) Is Landscape? Essays on the Identity of Landscape, Abingdon: Routledge.
Souter-Brown, G. 2015. Landscape and Urban Design for Health and Well-Being: Using Healing, Sensory and Therapeutic Gardens, Abingdon: Routledge
Shackell, A. & Walter, R. 2012. Greenspace design for health and wellbeing. Forestry Commission Practice Guide, Edinburgh: Forestry Commission
Southwell, K., Roe, J.J. and Ward Thompson, C., OPENspace Research Centre. 2013. Enhancing the Woodland User Experience: a toolkit for assessing Woods In and Around Towns. Edinburgh: Forestry Commission Scotland.
Ward Thompson, C. & Silveirinha de Oliveira, E. 2016. Evidence on Health Benefits of Urban Green Spaces, Chapter 2 in WHO, Urban Green Spaces and Health: a review of evidence. Copenhagen: WHO Regional Office for Europe |
Additional Information
Graduate Attributes and Skills |
Knowledge and understanding: ability to reflect critically on the principal approaches and concepts currently used in landscape design for health and wellbeing.
Generic cognitive skills: critical review and judgement on landscape designs at the forefront of salutogenic design.
Practice: applied knowledge and understanding
Generic cognitive skills: creativity in the practical application of specialist skills to a real-life design project and its associated challenges.
Communication skills and autonomy and accountability: working alone and with others to develop and present findings and the demonstration of routine and specialist skills to communicate effectively to different audiences. |
Keywords | landscape,wellbeing,environmental design,health,salutogenic,green space |
Contacts
Course organiser | Dr Simon Bell
Tel: (0131 6)51 5828
Email: |
Course secretary | Ms Ellie Wallace
Tel: (0131 6)50 2309
Email: |
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