Maria Goula
Director of Graduate Studies, Professor, Landscape Architecture

Maria Goula is a licensed Architect and a Landscape Architect with a Ph.D. in Landscape Design Theory. For over 20 years she taught and worked professionally in Barcelona, Spain. She develops research on coastal tourism, with a focus on the interpretation and reinvention of leisure landscape patterns in an era of multiple uncertainties. The spectrum of her research covers the history of Mediterranean coastal tourism and expands to Landscape Architecture inquiry methods on the coast and leisure, internationally. As a designer, she is mainly interested in translating interdisciplinary knowledge on the coast into design protocols. For the latter she developed the concept of the second coast which operates as both a pedagogic tool as well as a lens to address heritage, memory, and resiliency on the coast. Since 2007 she lectured broadly on this concept in more than 25 Institutions in the world: USC, SEBS, Rutgers, OHIO State, UVA, in the US, SLU, Academy of Amsterdam, EMiLA Summer school, ECLAS, AUTH, NTUA, Universita degli studi di Ferrara, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Universidad de La Salle Colombia, Department of Architecture of Florence, Catalan Institute of Land Use [Institut Català de Sòl], Universidad de Alicante, University Polis, Albania, Cornell University [online open seminar online to Cornell and Ithaca community].
In the core of her practice and research resides an ambition to unveil, speculate and reflect on intrinsic values of ordinary landscapes in constant change. Maria is considered an expert in Mediterranean semiarid ordinary landscapes, a term she coined in her doctoral thesis, where she investigated how a particular application of design traditions in combination with conventional environmental values and cultural practices have excluded certain kinds of dynamic landscapes, such as torrents. The elaboration of landscape cartographies is the main tool to address the latter in order to enrich planning policy-making and design tools for resilient landscapes. Her awarded contribution as a leading researcher for the creation of landscape specific cartographies for two Landscape Catalogues commissioned and coordinated by the Catalan Landscape Observatory forged her experience beyond studio work. With her research on contemporary urban design, on contemporary cartography tactics, with the direction of Ph.D. candidates, and moreover, with collaborative and participative pioneer design work, she is working on reversing the attitude of design disciplines towards the aforementioned landscapes.
She is a foundation member of the scientific and organizing committee of the European/ International Landscape Biennial of Barcelona since 2000, a disciplinary event that gathers ground-breaking professionals and academics and is considered as one of the most important design critique platforms for Landscape Architecture worldwide. Maria is member of the Board of Foundation Landscape Architecture Europe-LAE, Wageningen, Netherlands, as well as a member of the Board of the Journal of Landscape Architecture. [JOLA].
Selected Publications
Books
- Bartumeus, S., Bellmunt, J., Cervera, M., Goula, M., Ruisánchez, M. Sardà, J., Zahonero, A., eds., 2018. Landscapes of Tomorrow. Catalogue of the 9th International Landscape Biennial, Landscapes of Tomorrow, Paysage, Cappelletti pp.360, ISBN 97888-907583-4-aa
Articles
- Goula, Maria, 2020. “A second coast: reflecting on coastal leisure landscapes” pp. 81-94. In Pié, R., Rosa, C., Vilanova, J.M., Porfido, E., Sabaté, J. (eds). 2020. Turismo y paisaje 2: sobre arquitecturas, ciudades, territorios y paisajes del turismo. Valencia: Tirant Lo Blanch. ISBN: 978-84-1832-972-2.
- Goula, Maria, Sturm, Alice, 2019. “From waterfronts to waterscapes: Discussing urban ethics on coastal designs in Catalonia, Spain” in Konstantinos Moraitis and Dr. Stamatina Th. Rassia, eds., Urban Ethics under Conditions of Crisis: Politics, Architecture, Landscape Sustainability and Multidisciplinary Engineering, Publisher World Scientific Books, ISBN 9-789813-14-1933 pp.241-263
- Goula, M., Spanou, I., Pérez Rumpler, P. 2019. “Toward a second coast: speculating on coastal values through landscape design studio”. (peer-reviewed publication through abstract submitted to the ECLAS call for papers under the theme of Teaching Landscape. Routledge ISBN 978-0-8153-8055-9, pp. 162-175
Awards & Honors
4.2019_Finalist in the NYS Governor’s Office reimagine the New York canals competition. Co-leader (with assistant professor Jamie Vanucchi). Advisors Frank Talsma H+N+S Landscape Architects, The Netherlands, Ricard Pié, Emeritus professor of planning, Barcelona Spain. in partnership with the Village of Clyde, NY and SOAR (Strengthening Our Area Residents, held by CCE).
7.2012_1st Prize International Competition "Collserola gates, an initiative to highlight the natural park and introduce nature to the city of Barcelona, located in the 15th gate Ciutat Meridiana. In collaboration with m&m, Michele Orliac and Miquel Batlle.
04.2011_“Territory” Award of the “Societat Catalana d’Ordenació del Territori” provided by the prestigious “Institut d’Estudis Catalans” for the elaboration of the Catalogue of Landscapes of the Girona Region; as co-author [CRPPbarcelona, DUOT, UPC].
2009_ Honors Award, UPC extraordinary research award for her Ph.D. dissertation, “The other landscapes, lectures on the variable image”.
10.2009_1st Prize International Competition "Project: Green Corridor Cerdanyola." (Member of the winner team led by: A. Zahonero, M. van Gessel, and A. Viador), Cerdanyola del Vallès, Barcelona.
Courses Taught
- LA 6010 Reassembling the Waterfront
- LA 3020 Infrastructure as Landscape
- LA 6900 Methods of Landscape Architectural Inquiry
- LA 5900 Introduction to Landscape Design Theory and Critique
Contact Information
440 Kennedy Hall
Ithaca, NY 14853
mg987 [at] cornell.edu
Education:
Ph.D. in Landscape Architecture
Master of Landscape Architecture
Universitat Politecnica de Catalunya
Degree in Architecture
Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
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