“Investigating the Long Term Impacts of Colonization Rampaging the Landscapes of the Global South — An Analysis of How Architecture and the Built Environment Enforce and Perpetuate Inequality in Karachi, Pakistan”
Research Sites: Sindh, Pakistan

When the British “relinquished” control [of Pakistan] in 1947 they implemented and nurtured a steep inequality creating an ultra-rich neo-colonial class that dominates the majority or working class of Pakistan. Leveraging my identity as a Pakistani and my fluency in Urdu, I will be able to travel throughout the city of Karachi and study the architecture of inequality that exists within the city. Interviewing landscape architects, architects, and urban designers within the academic and professional sphere. I also plan to create a 35mm film photography series documenting the harsh contrast of architecture, landscape architecture, and urban design.

“Better Than Concrete A Visual Analysis Of Urban Stream Restoration Projects”
Research Sites: San Francisco Bay Area

Through this project I propose a visual analysis of urban stream restoration projects in northern California, conducted through the development of photographs, physical models, and orthographic drawings. Concrete channelization of urban streams was prominent throughout the 20th century but failing concrete in urban waterways now poses an ongoing and expensive problem in many city landscapes, a problem that landscape architects are often tasked with tackling. Restoration ecologists and landscape architects have developed numerous methodologies and techniques for addressing stream restoration in rural contexts, but scholarship is sorely lacking for the concretized channels which dominate many urban waterways. While the climate of northern California is certainly not universal, my hope is that my analysis will provide insights into how landscape architects can design for concrete channel rehabilitation in a variety of American urban environments.

“(Re)Memorializing History”
Research Sites: Tokyo, Nagasaki, Hiroshima, Shanghai, Nanjing

Japanese historical revisionism attempts to rewrite imperial Japanese aggression and invasion in World War II as a noble mission to defend East Asia against Western colonization. By denying and minimizing tragedies like the Nanjing Massacre, the comfort women system, and other war crimes, Japanese revisionists minimize or deny their history of fascism and brutality in World War II. I am interested in how landscapes record these conflicting accounts of history, influencing collective memories, national identities, and cultural relationships. My research will focus on various World War II memorials located in China and Japan, where intense nationalistic conflict is fueled by a complex, antagonistic history.

“Placemaking Methods in Northern European Countries”
Research Sites: Amsterdam, Brussels, Luxembourg, Zurich, Liechtenstein 

The proposed project’s purpose is to compare, contrast, and evaluate innovative and modern methods of placemaking currently being implemented in multiple Northern European countries. This research will focus on how sense of place, nature, history, craft, and limits are being utilized in the urban design of each country. The cities being focused on include Amsterdam, Brussels, Luxembourg, Zürich, and Vaduz. This method could be translated into U.S. cities that have the infrastructure designed but are struggling to foster community within the residents. As urban design and placemaking practices are becoming more innovative and changing with society’s focus, it is important to note what is happening in other countries outside of the United States. Urban planning and placemaking focuses on creating spaces that are made for people and that focus on creating space which includes more than a physical environment. This research would be important for not only the other city planning students at Knowlton, but many other people of interest in the design field and school. One of the most important aspects of city and regional planning is looking outside of your perspective and current environment; this is where real growth and development happens.