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Webinar Description:
Native plants are fundamentally different than the plant palette of exotic species and “nativars” developed for the green industry. For example, they are often dormant in the summer or winter, have shorter periods of seasonal blooms and other seasonal interest, may reproduce aggressively, and are sometimes available only seasonally. Any planting design approach that uses native plants must take these considerations into account to maximize their benefits. These benefits include a lower need for water, soil amendments, and other resources, the environmental and ecological services that they provide, and their ability to both inspire and be the constituent parts of designs that evoke the poetics of local natural environments.
Professor Hopman has been developing a planting methodology since 2014 that maximizes the benefits of native plants and minimizes the perceived issues with their use. He calls this methodology: “aesthetically qualified native urban polycultures”. These polycultures are carefully selected densely intermingled combinations of native plants designed for the small planting areas typically available in metropolitan areas.
This lecture will explain the rationale for using native polycultures, how and why the locally native plants are selected, and the design principles, with installed examples and lessons learned. Questions from the audience will be addressed to facilitate the adoption of this important innovation for bringing ecological and environmental performance into metropolitan areas.
Learning Objectives:
1. Learn about ecological issues associated with using exotic plants and nativars.
2. Learn how intermingled combinations of native species (polycultures) maximize the benefits of using native plants.
3. Learn an easy and scalable methodology for creating intermingled combinations of native plant species using the plants you already know.
David Hopman
David Hopman, ASLA, PLA is an advocate for using aesthetically qualified native polycultures of plants in planting designs. Some of his ideas on the topic can be found in ten ‘The Field’ posts for the planting design PPN on the ASLA website (google “Hopman PPN”). He is the author of the forthcoming book, Creative Regional Design: Renewing the Aesthetics of Landscape in Environmental Design and Planning with a foreword by Frederick R. Steiner (Staunton, VA: George F. Thompson Publishing, in association with the Center for the Study of Place).
Professor Hopman designed and implemented the first extensive green roof in the Dallas/Fort Worth area in 2008 above the Life Sciences Building at UT-Arlington. He was in charge of the Sustainable Sites Initiative (SITES) certification for The Green at College Park on the UT-Arlington Campus; one of the first three projects worldwide to receive certification (in February of 2012). Landscape architecture practice experience as a registered landscape architect includes Kings Creek Landscaping, Huitt-Zollars, Inc., RTKL (now CallisonRTKL), Mesa Design Group, Inc., and a current independent practice.
Since accepting the position as a professor in the Graduate Program in Landscape Architecture at The University of Texas at Arlington in 2004, Professor Hopman has energetically pursued a faculty role bridging practice and research. The courses he teaches reflect his research interests in regionalism, design theory, plant materials and ecology, ecologically performative landscapes, and landscape aesthetics.
