This article explores a growing movement that reimagines play as a way to reconnect people with nature through community-centered, ecologically responsive spaces. Through the lens of four projects we made, it highlights how working with natural systems and local materials can create immersive environments that foster creativity, stewardship, and biodiversity. These spaces move beyond traditional playgrounds by encouraging open-ended interaction, intergenerational use, and deeper relationships between people and the land. Ultimately, the work suggests that thoughtfully designed landscapes can serve not just as places for recreation, but as living systems that nurture connection, learning, and a sense of belonging.

In this interview, Bryan challenges the idea of “weeds,” re-framing them as vital contributors to healthy, evolving gardens rather than problems to eliminate . By understanding common plants like dandelion, clover, and goldenrod, gardeners can shift from control to stewardship—supporting soil health, pollinators, and a healthier ecosystem.

Throughout the Northeast, small streams wind quietly behind houses, beneath roads, and through forgotten strips of woods. Though often overlooked, they remain living systems, carrying memory and motion beneath the surface of development. Dry Brook’s history reveals how these modest waterways shape the character, risks, and architectural possibilities of the communities built around them.

More than half the world’s population identifies as female, yet our public spaces continue to be designed primarily by, and for, men. The consequence? An unacceptable number of women and girls do not feel safe in their own communities.

Tallamy did important work, but popularizing ideas does not equal inventing them, and focusing only on lawns and plants misses deeper structural issues.

People come to garden coaching because they’ve had enough of doing things the hard way—or the wrong way. They've tried digging, dumping, spraying, planting, and watching it all fizzle. They’re frustrated. The land isn’t thriving, and neither are they. Deep down, they know the problem isn’t just the soil or the weeds. It’s the whole way we’ve been taught to treat the places we live on.

If you’re going to plant a tree, why not plant one that feeds us and feeds the beneficial insects?  Who doesn’t want backyard grown peaches, apples, pears, plums, and cherries?

The health and vigor of many wetland environments is dependent on the presence of willow species. These water-loving plants provide benefits not only to the abiotic integrity of an ecosystem, but are also highly valuable to numerous insects and animals.

The model making process drives our site analysis on our many projects. In our studio, we combine drone photography, geospatial mapping, field collected data, and topographic surveys to quickly create scaled plans of existing conditions.

The groundnut (Apios americana) is an unusual specimen in the plant world, possessing an eclectic set of characteristics rarely seen bundled together in a single species. The roots, or rather tubers, have been used as a staple food source for millennia by the various indigenous tribes of North America. 

When it comes to choosing plants for your yard or garden, it’s important to obtain species that originate from a close geographic area. Plants with local genotypes are more likely to establish themselves and thrive than those from distant locales.

It is well known that the amount of carbon currently in the Earth’s atmosphere has reached dangerously high levels.  Humanity needs to not only reduce carbon emissions, but also to capture and store carbon.