Seymour Vietnam Veterans Project – Progress Photos

This gallery contains 5 photos.

Vietnam Veterans Memorial Project in Seymour

Melbourne based landscape architects and Landscaping Victoria member Australian Quality Landscape Landscape Design in conjunction with Sinatra Murphy Landscape Architects have been commissioned to design and build the Vietnam Veterans’ Commemorative Service Wall in Seymour Victoria.

Working with the Vietnam Veterans Association and Mitchell Shire Council, this exciting project is being developed through a series of work shops with the veterans commemorative wall committee. The Veteran’s story will be presented on 106 glass panels 83 metres long that includes over 60,000 names of those who served plus images and timelines. The wall is anticipated to be completed this month and officially opened in March 2013.

Robert Boyle Landscapes wins Landscape of the Year

Robert Boyle Landscapes’ Ivanhoe project was the big winner at this year’s Victorian Landscape Awards winning the prestigious Landscape of the Year plus the Landscape Design over 150m2 Award, Plants in the Landscape Award and Residential Landscape Construction over $300,000.

Judges felt that this project, set on a large riverfront property in Ivanhoe exemplified every outstanding quality of a professional landscape and one that the industry can be proud of as the industry’s top award winner.

For all the winners and more details on this project go to www.landscapingvictoria.com.au

Moira’s Garden – The Beginning by Beatrice Imbert

‘Moira’s Garden’ also referred to as ‘The Garden of Hope’ or ‘The Amal Garden’ (Amal meaning Hope in Arabic) started life as a thought provoking idea from Moira Kelly AO, International humanitarian during a medical rescue mission to Gaza in February 2004.

Moira had the opportunity to visit several families in the refugee camps, in their destroyed homes. She witnessed first hand the images never revealed to the rest of the world and this affected her tremendously. She had lived through the atrocities of the Bosnian War and had hugely contributed to the plight of the children and their parents there and understood better than most the daily struggles that they faced.

In the midst of this bleak picture, the children were still being children. They could be seen on the war torn streets playing with the rubble left over from bombed buildings, with make shift toys constructed from broken pieces of metal and other rubbish that they gathered to play with either on the street or on the beach. No matter what situation a child finds itself, a child is still a child and play is a vital part of their existence.

Her first hand experience of Gaza and the children had moved her to take action. She boldly expressed to the Director of the UHWC and political associates that she intended to create a place where the children of Gaza and their families could come and play in a happy, serene, clean environment that would provide them with a break from their daily troubles. She had observed that there was nowhere for the children to go.

In July 2007, Moira received a visit from an Ittihad representative who was bringing a sick child for treatment. He also brought with him a letter entitled ‘Moira’s garden’ and that after the 2005 Israeli evacuation of Gaza strip, most of the removed settlement land had become available. His first words were ‘We have your land’.  To her amazement, she was advised that 12,000 sqm of land had been put aside for a creation of master plan of which 5000 sqm was set aside for a ‘Children’s Garden’ for Moira and the Australian people to create and build.

And so Moira’s Garden began.

We expect the project to take approximately 3-4 years to complete on the ground. An initial plan is being prepared by Ian Potter’s Children’s Garden’s designer Andrew Laidlaw and we anticipate a cost of around $5 million that we will start fund raising for shortly… stay tuned.

Victorian Urban Green Alliance

Landscaping Victoria and NGIV have joined with the Sports Turf Association to form the Victorian Urban Green Alliance whose core mission is to influence green space policy to enhance the urban environment. This Alliance forms the start of an inclusive partnership with like minded groups to build a bigger stronger voice for issues that affect our industries and work on joint initiatives to promote the greater benefits of urban green space and our value to healthy living. The group will be looking to further partners to sign on to our core belief that “Green Space Delivers Healthy Living”. This is a great initiative that will benefit the broader horticulture industry in Victoria.

• Urban green space provide us with both physical and psychological benefit
• Urban green space creates a more comfortable and environmentally sound place to live.
• Urban green space is important to the attractiveness of a community and our overall level of happiness.
• Urban green space provides us with a place to interact.
• Maintaining urban green spaces in good condition is vital to the benefit of such spaces.

 

2013 Student Design Finalists announced

Judges announced the four finalists of the 2013 Plantmark MIFGS Student Design Competition this week. The four finalists Lee Bailey, Meg Geary, Renee Visentin and Peta Donaldson were shortlisted from a strong field of entries to have their designs constructed for the 2013 Melbourne International Flower & Garden Show. The theme for the competition was the Bush Fire Suburban Garden drawn from the CFA’s Landscaping for Bushfire Guide. Congratulations to all entrants and finalists.

50 Year Water Strategy for Melbourne

I attended a stakeholders meeting of the 4 water retail authorities; South East Water, Yarra Valley Water, City West Water and Melbourne Water on Tuesday this week to hear more about a proposed draft Water and Demand Strategy that is being considered by the Victorian Government that will plan Melbourne’s water needs for the next 50 years. It is fantastic that such an initiative is taking place to secure our water needs well into the future. The draft strategy also acknowledges that water use is linked to liveability and that better water management strategies will ensure that gardens, parks and sporting grounds can be maintained under any future proposed water restrictions.

First steps of bringing Moira’s garden to fruition is the establishment of a logo, website, facebook page and a trust fund. Beatrice Imbert, author and all round amazing energizer has joined the working group bringing with her a wealth of knowledge an unquantifiable list of contacts and a can do attitude that will keep things moving.

Beatrice Imbert, Fran holding Trishna, Moira and Julie Edmonds

 

New Landscaping Victoria President Paul Hamilton from Hamilton Landscapes

More members become licensed – numbers are growing!

Congratulations to our two newest Licensed Landsapers – Jamie Patterson from Transforming Landscapes and Dean Von Barany from DVB Australia. The numbers are growing more and more members obtaining their building registration and becoming Licensed Landscapers.