Charles Waldheim

Charles Waldheim is the John E. Irving Professor of Landscape Architecture and Chair of the Department of Landscape Architecture at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design. His teaching and research examine the relationships between landscape and contemporary urbanism. Waldheim coined the term “landscape urbanism” to describe the recent emergence of landscape as a medium of urban order for the contemporary city. Waldheim has authored numerous articles and chapters on the topic, and edited The Landscape Urbanism Reader. His writing on landscape and contemporary urbanism has appeared in Landscape Journal, Topos, Log, Praxis, 306090, Canadian Architect, and Landscape Architecture Magazine. Citing Detroit as the most legible example of urban industrial economy, Waldheim is editor of CASE: Lafayette Park Detroit and co-editor, with Georgia Daskalakis and Jason Young, of Stalking Detroit. Waldheim is a licensed architect and principal of Urban Agency, a multi-disciplinary consultancy in design and contemporary urbanism. Waldheim received the Master of Architecture from the University of Pennsylvania where he was awarded the Paul Cret Medal for Master’s Thesis Prize and the Wil Melhorn Prize for work in architectural theory. He has taught and lectured on contemporary urbanism across North America, Europe, Australia, and Asia. Waldheim is recipient of the Rome Prize Fellowship from the American Academy in Rome; the Visiting Scholar Research Fellowship at the Study Centre of the Canadian Centre for Architecture; the Cullinan Chair at Rice University, and the Sanders Fellowship at the University of Michigan. He is presently writing the first book-length history of Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport: Chicago O’Hare: A Natural and Cultural History.