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Mikyoung Kim named the 2018 ASLA Design Medal recipient

MikyoungKim_Photo_smallMikyoung Kim (MLA ’92), design critic in landscape architecture, is the recipient of this year’s Design Medal from the American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA). One of the most prestigious honors bestowed upon a landscape architect, the Medal recognizes an individual “who has produced a body of exceptional design work at a sustained level for a period of at least ten years,” according to the ASLA’s website. One Medal is awarded per year.

“It is a tremendous honor to be recognized and supported by my peers and clients. This recognition is an amazing moment for me because it not only honors the work of my office, but also highlights the importance of resiliency, restoration, and creative thinking,” Kim said in a press release.

The founding principal and design director of Boston-based Mikyoung Kim Design, Kim led the Fall 2017 GSD option studio “Civic Spaces in an Age of Hyper-Complexity: From Protest to Reverie” with Bryan Chou, Design Leader at Mikyoung Kim Design. The firm recently received the National Design Award from Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum.

In Kim’s nomination materials, author and thought leader Sarah Goldhagen remarked: “Mikyoung shows that landscape design and environmental art can be a public amenity, a social condenser, and a sustainable practice while simultaneously being a poetic art that captures and sustains our all-too-often-distracted attention, confers a graceful sense of play, and instigates deep imaginative thought about the many ways that every day landscapes can enrich peoples individual experience and social congress.” (View all of Kim’s supporting nominations.)

The 2017 ASLA Design Medal was awarded to the GSD’s Gary Hilderbrand (MLA ’85), the Peter Louis Hornbeck Professor in Practice of Landscape Architecture. Previous GSD alumni and faculty winners include Andrea Cochran (MLA ’79) in 2014, Stuart Owen Dawson (MLA ’58) in 2013, Peter Walker (MLA ’57) in 2012, Michael Van Valkenburgh in 2011, Richard Shaw (MLA ’76) in 2009, Richard Haag (MLA ’52) in 2007, and Lawrence Halprin (BLA ’44) in 2003.

Kim will officially receive her award at the 2018 ASLA Annual Meeting and EXPO, to be held October 19–22 in Philadelphia.