Reviews for Wisconsin's Rustic Roads: A Road Less Travelled

The average rating for Wisconsin's Rustic Roads: A Road Less Travelled based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2020-08-05 00:00:00 Gaw Masu Studies in repetition and order, orchestrations of movement in the landscape, and elements placed in geometric conversation," is how author Mary Myers describes the twenty-five-year career of San Francisco-based landscape architect Andrea Cochran. Poetic language suits these functional and often lyrical works of art. They are sensuous, captivating oases that absorb the eye in a totality of spatial composition. Andrea Cochran: Landscapes presents eleven residential, commercial, and institutional landscape projects in detail, including Walden Studios in Alexander Valley, California; the sculpture garden for the Portland Art Museum in Portland, Oregon; and the award-winning Children's Garden in San Francisco. Andrea Cochran seeks to put her clients' individual narratives in conversation with the land. Her work is distinguished by its careful consideration of site, climate, and existing architecture. A stacked plane of planters, each housing a different variety of succulent, mimics the compression found in hills banked against each other in the distance. Drawing on an encyclopedic knowledge of plant species, Cochran uses vegetation to blur edges, and porous and permeable materials to create grade changes that enlighten and disappear. Materials such as COR-TEN steel allow her to draw boundaries on the land with ultrathin edges while also reflecting the earthy tones of the soil beneath. Cochran's landscapes are clean, but not cold. In her hands, polished black concrete becomes both a quiet reflection of the sky and an instrument to amplify the sound of falling rain; locally quarried stone walls reflect the border walls between valley farms; twisted forms of olive respond to the spreading California oaks dotting distant hills. A combination of harmony, wonder, and surprise awaits wherever her sharp geometry and vibrant plant life meet. Featuring stunning photography, drawings, plans, and an essay by San Francisco Museum of Modern Art curator Henry Urbach, Andrea Cochran: Landscapes celebrates the first twenty-five years of a highly intuitive and reflective creative process. Andrea Cochran lives and works in San Francisco. She was a finalist in 2006 for the Cooper-Hewitt's National Design Award, profiled in Dwell as part of their "design leaders" series in 2007, selected as one of 40 "taste makers" of 2005 by House and Garden magazine the recipient of numerous professional awards and accolades. She is a frequent lecturer at universities and professional conferences Mary Myers lives and works in Pennsylvania and is the current chair of landscape architecture and horticulture at Temple University. She has written extensively for numerous journals and publications, including Landscape Journal, Landscape Review, and Landscape Architecture magazine and has been recognized with honor for excellence in teaching and research. She is a registered landscape architect.

Review # 2 was written on 2014-06-08 00:00:00 Lee Kaplan Editorial Reviews Tropolism: "The work of Andrea Cochran can be seen, to those of us who have admired landscape design abroad, as finally completing the process of freeing American Landscape Architecture from the curse of postmodern landforms and wacky color cuteness. The work is powerful, but never unbalanced or trendy. Her outdoor spaces are clean, trimmed, and suitable for the modernist sensibility, yet they never feel like accessories to a building. Instead they reverse the relationship: the buildings are totally permeated, even subsumed by Landscape." (February 23, 2009) Dwell: "Just like modern homes often bring the outside in, San Francisco landscape architect Andrea Cochrans exterior designs extend the modern aesthetic from indoors to the outdoors. A new book by Mary Myers celebrates Cochran's distinct talent.Published by Princeton Architectural Press, Andrea Cochran: Landscapes is not only a coffee table-ready book filled with stunning photography, it's also an incredible resource for DIYers looking to beautify their own backyards." ' Miyoko Ohtake (March 6, 2009)