Landscape is usually the space left over after development.
It has been described as amenity, setting, mitigation, public realm, planting, open space or the green element of a scheme. All of those words have their place, but they can also understate the role landscape now needs to play in towns and cities.
The pressures facing urban environments are becoming more complex. Climate adaptation, heat, water management, biodiversity loss, social isolation, health inequality, movement, air quality and long-term land value are no longer separate issues. They meet in the spaces between buildings. They are shaped by streets, squares, parks, thresholds, routes, edges, courtyards, river corridors and the wider networks of green and blue infrastructure that hold places together.
That is why we believe nature should no longer be thought of as a soft asset. It is civic infrastructure.
This is not a semantic shift. It changes how projects are briefed, valued, funded and judged.
A well-designed landscape can slow water, reduce heat, support biodiversity, connect communities, encourage walking, improve access, create places for rest and support long-term resilience. These are not decorative benefits. They are functional, social and economic outcomes. They affect how places perform and how people experience daily life.
Natural England's Green Infrastructure Framework, launched to support planners and developers, points in the same direction. It describes green infrastructure as a practical tool for creating greener towns and cities, with a target to help increase urban residential green cover to 40%. The C40 Knowledge Hub also frames nature-based solutions as a way for cities to manage climate risks while offering wider benefits, including health and employment outcomes.
The point is not that landscape architects should claim to solve every urban problem alone. They cannot, and they should not. The point is that landscape-led thinking is increasingly central to how better answers are found.
This has implications for clients. If landscape is treated as infrastructure, it needs to be included early. It cannot be value-engineered at the end of a process without weakening the wider project. It cannot be reduced to surface treatment, compliance planting or a late-stage visual enhancement. Its value depends on integration: with planning, architecture, engineering, ecology, transport, drainage, community need and long-term stewardship.
It also has implications for designers. We need to become more precise about the benefits we claim. The language of sustainability is now everywhere. The next step is to show what the design actually changes. Does it reduce heat stress? Does it improve access to nature? Does it support active travel? Does it increase biodiversity? Does it help make a place more usable, inclusive and loved over time?
The Future Business of Architecture report argues that the coming decade will reshape the work, structure and value of built environment practices. It identifies climate, technology, demographic change, client expectations and future work types as major forces affecting practice. For landscape architecture, that means the opportunity is not simply to respond to change, but to help shape it.
Gillespies has worked for decades in the complex territory where landscape, planning, architecture, infrastructure and public life meet. The work has often been about more than appearance. It has been about making places function, endure and matter.
What is changing now is the need to make that value more explicit.
Cities will continue to need buildings, transport, housing, schools, healthcare, workspaces and cultural destinations. But they will also need shade, soil, water, biodiversity, movement, public life and adaptability. They will need spaces that help people cope with hotter summers, heavier rainfall, loneliness, pressure on public services and the daily strain of urban living.
That is not a soft brief.
It is one of the defining infrastructure challenges of the next generation.
