This studio aims to reexamine and reevaluate the value of Kyoto’s environmental culture as shaped by its long history, seeking to update the city’s landscape culture for a sustainable and resilient future that moves beyond its tradition and style. Kyoto, renowned for the Kyoto Protocol and its legacy of environmental stewardship, serves as an ideal site for this inquiry. Its natural wealth derives from distinctive topography and abundant water resources, nurtured by a culture that has managed these resources responsibly and in such elaborate forms for centuries.

Kyoto’s exceptional water resources, known collectively as the “Kyoto Water Basin,” are unmatched elsewhere in Japan, if not in the world. This richness, both in quality and quantity, has enabled the creation of numerous historic gardens in varied styles, earning Kyoto the nickname “Sansui City”–the city of “Mountain and Water.” The city’s plentiful, pure water has not only supported scenic landscapes but also traditional crafts and industries, greatly enriching its cultural fabric. Today, these assets continue to attract millions of tourists and bolster the local economy.

However, the strong presence of historic gardens and landscapes can at times hinder the development of new spatial expressions that reflect contemporary urban life. Many current designs remain formal and isolated, rarely engaging with Kyoto’s evolving context or environmental challenges. As a result, opportunities for innovative, practical responses to global issues and local demands for public pleasure through landscape design are limited.

Furthermore, as in many cities worldwide, Kyoto’s sophisticated hydraulic infrastructures are mostly invisible and thus have not fully contributed to citizens’ experience of public spaces. The city is increasingly affected by the impacts of climate change–hotter summers, torrential rainfall, increased risks of flooding and landslides, and shifting mountain vegetation. Although local action alone cannot resolve these issues, new adaptive strategies rooted in local resources and knowledge are urgently needed.

This studio invites students to engage with Kyoto’s unique historical, cultural, and natural resources, seeking sustainable and resilient design scenarios that transcend traditional styles. By harnessing Kyoto’s water and landscape resources at multiple scales, participants will be challenged to reveal and enhance the presence of water–long invisible–to offer holistic approaches to sustainability and resilience. These strategies will reconsider water both as operational infrastructure and as a defining element of public space.

The studio will travel to Kyoto to perform field research and acquire local knowledge. Thoughts and ideas will be tested and developed through various lectures and workshops during the semester, including the topics of Japanese urban landscape, traditional and contemporary Japanese landscape language, environmental engineering, and model making. The students enrolled in this studio are strongly recommended to take the project-based seminar, “Designers of Mountain and Water: Alternative Landscapes for a Changing Climate (PRO-7453),” to gain a more fundamental understanding of the landscapes we are living in as a result of the reactions of landscape architects to their given environment.