Pollak, Linda

Designer

Affiliations:

• Principal, Marpillero Pollak Architects, 1998 to the present
• Design critic, Harvard Graduate School of Design, 1998 to 2004
• Assistant Professor, Harvard Graduate School of Design, 1992 to 1997

Key projects:

• New Stapleton waterfront, 2003 to the present: New York, New York, USA
• Eibs Pond Park Environmental Classroom, to 2001: Staten Island, New York, New York, USA

Papers and other published materials:

• Berrizbeitia, A., & Pollak, L. (1999). Inside Outside: Between Architecture and Landscape. Minneapolis: Rockport Publishers.
• Pollak, L. (2006). Constructed Ground: Questions of Scale. In The Landscape Urbanism Reader (pp. 125-139). New York: Princeton Architectural Press.

Education:

• Master of Architecture, Harvard Graduate School of Design, 1981 to 1985

Intellectual positions:

• "Constructed" ground brings environmental terms into focus.
• Conventions of representation such as figure-ground drawings blind designers to landscape.
• Rather than separate functions to minimize conflicts, they should be juxtaposed and layered in tension.
• The designs for landscapes should come from functional systems and social considerations.
• When the literal substrate and nature of places is lost. Landscape becomes optional.