Nature, Design, and Health
Explorations of a Landscape Architect
David Kamp, FASLA
Library of American Landscape History
Nature, Design, and Health
Explorations of a Landscape Architect
The renowned landscape architect David Kamp, FASLA, traces the first stirrings of his interest in landscape to his childhood in rural North Carolina. Kamp maintained his passion for nature through his architectural studies at the University of Virginia, and these in turn helped prepare him for his first design project, a landscape for Australia’s new Parliament House in Canberra.
In the mid-1990s, Kamp volunteered to design one of the first gardens created specifically for individuals with HIV/AIDS, the Joel Schnaper Memorial Garden at the Terence Cardinal Cooke Health Care Center in East Harlem. The experience proved life-altering, and Kamp resolved to dedicate his practice to exploring the web of relationships connecting design, nature, and health.
In this work, Kamp has sought to put people in touch with nature, regardless of their capabilities—from children with autism spectrum disorder to elders with cognitive and physical challenges. He has also explored these ideas in the larger realm, where his plans have revitalized schools, brownfields, parks, and urban waterfronts. By putting personal health on a continuum with environmental health, Kamp has demonstrated that design can help make communities more vibrant, resilient, and equitable.
In Nature, Design, and Health, Kamp chronicles his remarkable artistic journey through the stories of his projects for hospitals, cancer centers, elder communities, educational campuses, and other landscapes dedicated to health and well-being. Kamp’s belief in the power of nature to sustain and connect is summed up in his firm’s name—Dirtworks.
Buy the Book
Book review by Howard Frumkin, MD, DrPH, Trust for Public Land, San Francisco, CA, USA, and University
“David Kamp’s account of his remarkable career is a gift to all those who care about the intersection of nature, design, and health. I hope this book becomes standard reading in all landscape architecture programs. Kamp is an inspiring personal and professional role model, and the insights he shares are foundational for the field.”
Book review by Dr. John Zeisel, international expert on dementia care design, for SALUS
Insightful, at times surprising, and always instructive, I recommend Nature, Design, and Health to all landscape designers – students and professionals – and to all architects as well as non-designers with a love of gardening and desire to experience nature in all its intrinsic and designed glory.
Dr. Tony Kendle, Former Foundation Director, The Eden Project, Cornwall, UK
“I have read many landscape design books but never one quite like this. In his light, engaging style, Kamp takes his readers on an exploration of ideas and priceless insights, wrapped within a gentle memoir of unfolding understanding that offers a new approach to designing for individual, community, and environmental health. The book is a wonderful, timely reminder of how imagination and empathy can lead to a better world.”
Esther M. Sternberg, MD, author of Healing Spaces: The Science of Place and Wellbeing
“In this moving and beautifully illustrated book, David Kamp tells the inspiring story of his journey towards creating healing spaces through landscape design. The writing is as compelling as the author’s photographs and sketches of his inclusive landscapes, designed for those with disabilities and those without.”
Lora E. Fleming, MD, Emerita Professor, University of Exeter Medical School and Chair, European Centre for Environment and Human Health
"This visually beautiful and instructive book focuses on how designed landscapes can enhance the integral interactions between nature and humans, improving the health of both. It is an engaging, inquiring, and inspiring narrative that deserves to be read by medical and design practitioners, scholars and students, and everyone interested in our place in the natural world."
Jo Ivey Boufford, MD, Board Chair, The International Society for Urban Health
“Early on, David saw the importance of connecting nature and health in his landscape designs. Thanks to his pioneering efforts, the Masters students in my courses at the NYU School of Public Health seek out key partnerships with planners, architects, and landscape architects as they pursue careers in advancing health and health equity. These kinds of collaborations bring people closer to nature, improving mental and physical health, particularly for those living in cities.”
Professor Daniel Winterbottom, RSLA, FASLA
"In Nature, Design, and Health, the landscape architect David Kamp describes his lifelong search for spiritual, ecological, artistic, and humanistic approaches to landscape design. Kamp’s beautifully written autobiographical narrative inspires readers to seek ways of incorporating nature into their own lives, while demonstrating the potential of landscape architecture and environmental stewardship to improve global health."
Horticulture Magazine
“Nature, Design, and Health is a wholly worthwhile celebration of both Kamp’s work and the work that gardens can do.”
Library of American Landscape History is the leading publisher of books that advance the study and practice of American landscape architecture—from gardens and parks to city plans. LALH books educate the public, motivating stewardship of significant places and the environment, and they inspire new designs that connect people with nature.
Learn more at https://lalh.org/