Taiwan Today

Kuo Chung-twn unites aesthetics and environmental ethics in her work as a landscape architect.

  At age 73, Kuo Chung-twn (郭中端) is as busy as any other staff member at Laboratory for Environment & Form (LEF), which the landscape architect set up 30 years ago with her Japanese architect husband Horigome Kenji. Now president of the company based in New Taipei City’s Tamsui District, the energetic short-haired woman is often spotted at sites around Taiwan that are undergoing remodeling by the landscape design company. Among such locations are Nanliao Fishing Port in the northern city of Hsinchu and a 17-kilometer section of Suhua Highway in eastern Taiwan, with the projects commissioned by Hsinchu City Government and the Directorate General of Highways under the Ministry of Transportation and Communications (MOTC), respectively.

 “Even though private sector work is more profitable, I always do projects contracted by the government because they have a wider impact on society,” said Kuo, who is known for specializing in environmental protection, particularly of aquatic habitats. For her pioneering integration of aesthetics and environmental ethics over the past few decades, she won a National Award for Arts in 2021, becoming the first landscape designer to receive Taiwan’s most prestigious accolade for artistic achievement in the architecture category.
  Kuo was inspired to pursue a career in the field by Takamasa Yoshizaka, prestigious architect and professor at Japan’s Waseda University, where she studied as a doctoral student. In 1986 while she was still in Japan, Yilan Mayor Chen Ding-nan (陳定南) approached her about a landscaping project at the littoral area along the northeastern county’s Dongshan River. Working with several Japanese peers from her alma mater in Tokyo, Kuo co-designed Dongshan River Water Park. Her first project in her home country transformed the area into a publicly accessible and ecologically friendly waterway. The park, which opened in 1994, is widely recognized as an outstanding public work and remains one of Yilan’s top attractions today.

Natural Characteristics
“Landscape design isn’t simply about greening a place and growing some flowers. With the Dongshan River project’s blending of varied parts into a harmonious whole, Kuo showed the people of Taiwan the huge potential of landscaping done right,” said Chiu Ru-hwa (丘如華), secretary general of nongovernmental organization Institute of Historical Resources Management in Taipei City. After winning acclaim for her first endeavor in Yilan, the architect continued to take on jobs in the county, where LEF designed Luodong Sports Park and Mingchi National Forest Recreation Area, both of which feature a large body of water. Like Dongshan River, the two locations have been recognized by environmentalists for their adept use of ecological engineering techniques to encourage biodiversity. “Landscaping is often undertaken in service of tourism,” Chiu said. “But Kuo’s designs, which are impressive for their lack of pretension, also serve other purposes.”

Kuo embraces the concept of fixing rather than creating landscapes, aiming to return sites to their original state. To discover a site’s original condition before it was altered in the process of industrialization, she refers to the precise topographical maps of Taiwan made by the Japanese in the early 1900s during the Japanese colonial era (1895-1945). That is how Kuo confirmed that a landfill by Love River in the southern port city of Kaohsiung was a wetland more than 100 years ago, and LEF used the knowledge to transform the area into what became Zhongdu Wetland Park. Opened to the public in 2011, the park is a haven for nature-lovers and has won multiple awards, including gold in the environmental rehabilitation/conservation category of the France-based International Real Estate Federation’s 2012 World Prix d’Excellence Awards.
  Three years later the same honor went to Taipei’s Shanshuilu Eco-Park, another project prominent in Kuo’s portfolio. According to Kuo, the location was also a wetland before becoming a landfill. Thanks to LEF’s effort to recover the area’s ecosystem, Shanshuilu is now a major venue for outdoor recreation in eastern Taipei and further evidence of how a post-industrial area can become a standout example of conservation.

Past Preservation
In addition to addressing environmental issues, Kuo carefully considers materials and the handling of any on-site historical structures. She often uses wood when constructing new infrastructure as it is more eco-friendly. “It’s very durable—capable of lasting hundreds of years—while being highly recyclable and decomposable,” she explained. Many of her designs also entail extensive renovations of Japanese-era wooden houses, as she repurposes remnants of the past whenever possible in an extension of her philosophy to fix rather than create. 
  An example is the remodeling of a dilapidated former Japanese teahouse built in the 1930s on the grounds of Taipei Botanical Garden (TBG). According to Kuo, TBG initially intended to tear the structure down, but she fought to save it. “I saw its potential to shine again after major repair and refurbishment,” Kuo said. After years of work by LEF, the building and its small Japanese garden opened in 2014 under the name Nanmoncho 323 after the original address. “All top botanical gardens in the world have a Japanese garden, and now TBG boasts one too,” she added.

  Kuo’s renewal of historical architecture as part of her landscaping projects has garnered widespread praise. Among such endeavors was the restoration of an abandoned sawmill built more than 60 years ago in the village of Checheng in central Taiwan’s Nantou County. Commissioned by MOTC’s Tourism Bureau, the job turned the aging factory into Checheng Wood Museum, which showcases Taiwan’s once-thriving logging industry. Visitors can take in the mill’s cleverly designed original wood structure as they explore exhibits. “Thanks to Kuo, there’s a growing awareness of Checheng’s important role in our country’s history,” Chiu said. The museum won the top 2009 Taiwan Architecture Award, an annual honor presented by Taiwan Architect Magazine since 1979.

Inspirational Figure
The architect likewise sustains links to the past in her ongoing renewal of Nanliao Fishing Port. After using silt removed from the port to form a five-hectare grassy plain—where the local government has held the vibrant Hsinchu City International Kite Festival annually since 2017—and piling up earth to build a gently sloping embankment offering a spectacular view of the Taiwan Strait, LEF is planning to renovate the port’s infrastructure so the site can once again throng with active fishing vessels.

“This place is originally meant for the fishing industry, not for tourists,” Kuo said. “How can you call it a port if there’s very little such activity? It should be part of the landscape.” At the same time the company has been communicating with the local government and the owner of a nearby shipyard to ensure it remains unaffected by any development projects. Kuo hopes the shipyard can be turned into a museum in the future. “We have to enhance people’s awareness of its historical value and the need to preserve it,” she said.

Throughout her career as a landscape architect, Kuo has restored natural environments and aging structures while reviving cherished memories, just as her company is doing at Nanliao. “There’re already many people in the industry creating new buildings, so I chose to focus on the job that attracts less attention—improving existing terrain and architecture,” she said. With Kuo’s recent National Award for Arts recognizing the value of her life’s work, she is an inspiring example to the next generation of landscapers.
 

Write to Oscar Chung at mhchung@mofa.gov.tw