HONG KONG — A team from The University of Hong Kong (HKU) received an Outstanding Award from the annual World Landscape Architecture (WLA) Awards.

Recognized in the Student Awards – University Studio category, the accolade honors the team from the Department of Architecture’s Division of Landscape Architecture for its innovative, field-based approach to design teaching and experiential learning.

The WLA Awards are among the discipline’s most respected international honors, showcasing excellence in practice, research, and education. The University Studio Award recognizes outstanding teaching, visionary student work, and transformative design studio methods in landscape architecture programs worldwide.

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HKU’s award-winning postgraduate studio, “Dynamics and Encounters: Fieldwork as Placemaking,” is taught by William Shivers, assistant professor of landscape architecture; Francisco Cevallos Barragan, lecturer of landscape architecture; and Ivan Valin, a former scholar in the division.

The studio stood out to an international jury for its rigorous fieldwork, ecological sensitivity, and bold, speculative design strategies.

Developed in 2017 to address pressing spatial, environmental, and urbanization challenges facing Hong Kong, the studio challenges students to connect issues across scales.

Through hands-on fieldwork in Shap Long on Lantau Island, critical diagramming and mapping of changing natural features, and close engagement with site-specific conditions, students develop nuanced, forward-looking landscape interventions.

“It’s an honor to have our studio program awarded at such a level,” said Shivers. “This award reflects not only the dedication of our team in developing progressive, site-responsive teaching over the past eight years, but also the exceptional talent and hard work of our students.”