Landscape architect whose designs reclaim toxic sites wins international prize

Landscape architect Julie Bargmann, who for 30 years has transformed postindustrial and sometimes toxic sites into inviting spaces, is the winner of the first Cornelia Hahn Oberlander International Landscape Architecture Prize, a biennial award of $100,000 given by the Cultural Landscape Foundation.

Bargmann is a professor at the University of Virginia and founder of D.I.R.T. (Dump It Right There) studio, best known for designs that reimagine contaminated and neglected urban sites. Her notable projects include the Urban Outfitters headquarters at the U.S. Navy Yard in Philadelphia, winner of a 2014 American Society of Landscape Architects Honor Award for its innovative salvaging strategy that reused concrete chunks, saving them from becoming landfill. Her design for Vintondale Reclamation Park, a 35-acre site in Vintondale, Penn., included a natural water filtration system and won the 2001 National Design Award from the Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum.