Turf Design Studio offers a rare depth in thinking for major development and public domain; weaving together planning, design and ecology into a vibrant tapestry – creating places that are functional, fit for living, and where the hand of the designer remains largely unseen.
We understand the nature of major urban projects and what it takes to deliver them. As Landscape Architects and Urbanists, we are key contributors in the making of cities. Our blended knowledge of urban design, landscape architecture, environment, community and infrastructure makes our profession unique in connecting people and place.
Our creative and accomplished team brings fresh thinking to every project and strives to realise a site’s inherent character through innovative planning and design solutions. The making of meaningful, beautiful places is an endeavour that we take very seriously, as both a creative challenge and project responsibility. What makes a place feel right? How can it surprise, excite or soothe the senses? What purpose must it serve and what stories can it tell?
We create settings for life – to enrich a site’s essential qualities of space and light, how it is sensed and how it is revealed. We create memorable places.
“Turf Design Studio has brought the idea and reality of collaborative practice in landscape architecture to new levels of creativity and effectiveness. In response to complex challenges in urban design and ecological design, the Turf team under the leadership of Mike Horne, has reached out to like-minded but complementary atelier-based practices in Australia and Europe to deliver projects with an energy and élan that has given the term synergy true meaning.
From a new landscape for the central campus of Australia's oldest university to a dense urban quarter, a dramatic waterfront and a system of constructed ecologies for an inner urban park, the collaborative approach has brought talent and skill to the making of the city in pacesetting ways.
The Turf approach, based on the combined power of small offices, has brought design innovation to the fore in all these projects, backed up by deep knowledge on how to build and the city has been the winner.”
- Professor James Weirick, Professor of Landscape Architecture, Director, Urban Development & Design Program, Faculty of Built Environment, UNSW