# Kongjian Yu

Kongjian Yu (simplified Chinese: 俞孔坚; traditional Chinese: 俞孔堅; pinyin: Yú Kǒngjiān, is a Chinese landscape architect, urban planner, and professor known for his work in ecological urbanism, sponge cities and climate resilience. He is a professor at Peking University and the founder of Turenscape, a design firm specializing in landscape architecture, urban planning, and ecological restoration. Yu is widely recognized for developing the sponge cities concept, which promotes nature-based solutions for urban water management. His research has influenced national policies in China and has been applied in urban planning worldwide. Yu has been heralded by Michael Sorkin and others as “a hero of effective advocacy within a system fraught with perils” and recognized as a leader in ecological urbanism and the constructive postmodernist approach towards ecological civilization.
Early Life and Education
Yu was born in 1963 in Dongyu Village, Jinhua, Zhejiang, China, into a farming family. Growing up in a rural environment, he developed a deep connection with nature and gained firsthand experience with traditional agricultural water management systems, such as rice paddy irrigation, ponds, and wetlands. These early experiences influenced his later work in landscape architecture and ecological urban planning.
Yu earned his Bachelor and Master of Landscape Architecture degrees from Beijing Forestry University. In 1992, he pursued a Doctor of Design (DDes) at the Harvard Graduate School of Design(GSD), completing his dissertation on ecological security patterns in 1995. His research integrated landscape ecology, urban planning, and hydrology, forming the foundation for sponge city development and large-scale ecological restoration.
At Harvard, he was influenced by scholars such as Carl Steinitz, Richard Forman, and Ian McHarg. His dissertation was "Security Patterns in Landscape Planning: With a Case in South China".His Security Pattern theory later became the foundation for China’s Ecological Conservation Redline policy, a national strategy for biodiversity protection.
Academic and Professional Career
Academic Contributions
After returning to China in 1997, Yu joined Peking University, where he established the College of Architecture and Landscape Architecture and served as its dean. His research focuses on ecological planning, climate resilience, and flood mitigation. He returned to teach at Harvard as visiting professor from 2010 to 2015.
Yu has published over 300 academic papers and 20 books on topics such as landscape urbanism, green infrastructure, and sponge cities. He also founded the journal Landscape Architecture Frontiers, which explores nature-based solutions for urban resilience. His theories and designs have influenced policy-making and environmental planning in China and internationally.
Turenscape and Design Philosophy
In 1998, Yu founded Turenscape, an interdisciplinary design firm focusing on landscape architecture, urban planning, architecture, and ecological restoration, which Fast Company called one of The 10 Most Innovative Architecture Companies of 2021 for “balancing China's hyperspeed urbanization with green sponge cities.”Under his leadership, Turenscape has completed over 1000 projects in over 200 cities worldwide, integrating traditional Chinese water management techniques with modern urban planning. .
Yu’s design philosophy is rooted in the idea of ecological security patterns and adaptive urbanism. He advocates for the "Big Feet Revolution", a concept that prioritizes resilience, functionality, and sustainability over ornamental aesthetics and defined landscape and urban design as the Art of Survival, His approach embraces natural processes such as seasonal flooding, designing cities to coexist with water rather than resist it.
Notable Projects
Yu has led numerous projects that integrate sponge city strategies, flood resilience, and ecological restoration.
* Houtan Park, Shanghai – A wetland park created for the 2010 Shanghai Expo, using phytoremediation to clean polluted water.
* Qunli Stormwater Park, Harbin – A former wetland transformed into an urban flood management system.
* Red Ribbon Park, Qinhuangdao – A minimalist ecological park integrating urban recreation with habitat restoration.
* Sanya Mangrove Park – A restored coastal wetland designed to enhance biodiversity and reduce urban flooding.
* Jinhua Yanweizhou Park – A floodplain park that allows seasonal flooding while supporting urban biodiversity.
* Haikou Meishe River Restoration– A degraded urban river transformed into a dynamic waterway that mitigates flooding, improves water quality, and integrates green spaces.
* Haikou Jiangdong Beach Park – Features a “breathing seawall”, a nature-based coastal defense against erosion.
* Benjakitti Forest Park, Bangkok – A flood-resilient urban wetland designed to store and purify stormwater.
* Nanchang Fishtail Park – A transformation of a former coal ash dump into a resilient landscape that enhances climate resilience, restores habitats, and provides vibrant green public spaces.
* Kaban Lakefront Project, Kazan, Russia – An ecological restoration initiative that revitalized an urban lakefront, improving water quality and providing a vibrant public space, demonstrating how Sponge City principles can be applied in cold climate regions.
* Fengjiajiang National Coastal Wetland, China – A large-scale coastal ecological restoration project that enhances flood mitigation, water filtration, and biodiversity conservation.
* Zhongshan Shipyard Park: The design accommodated variable water levels and balancing river-width regulations for flood control, and reuses the remnants of rusty docks and machinery.
Awards and Honors
Yu has received numerous international awards for his contributions to landscape architecture, ecological urbanism, and climate resilience, including:
Achievement Awards
* Cornelia Hahn Oberlander International Landscape Architecture Prize (2023)
* Cooper Hewitt National Design Award in Landscape Architecture (2023)
* Sir Geoffrey Jellicoe Award (2020)
* Election to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2016)
* Fellow of the American Society of Landscape Architects (2012)
* Honorary Doctorates – Conferred by Sapienza University of Rome (2017) and the Norwegian University of Life Sciences (2019) for his groundbreaking research in sustainable landscape architecture.
* National Overseas Chinese Achievement Awards (2003) and National Overseas Pioneer Award（2005）.
* The Chinese National Gold Medal of Fine Arts (2004) .
Project-based awards
* 16 ASLA (American Society of Landscape Architects) Awards
* 9 World Architecture Festival (WAF) Awards
* 6 AZ Awards
* Urban Land Institute (ULI) Global Award for Excellence
Publications
Yu has publishedextensively on landscape urbanism, ecological security, sponge cities and sustainable water management. Notable books include:
* Sponge City: Theory and Practice (2016) ISBN 9787112194896.
* China National Ecological Security Patterns (2012)
* Art of Survival: Positioning Contemporary Landscape Architecture (2006)
* Negative Planning (2005)
* Yu, Kongjian (2019). Ideal Landscapes and the Deep Meaning of Feng-Shui: Patterns of Biological and Cultural Genes. CA, USA: Novato. ISBN 978-1-943532-75-9.
* Yu, Kongjian; Li, Dihua; Li, Hailong; Qiao, Qin (2012). China National Ecological Security Patterns. Beijing, China: China Architecture & Building Press. ISBN 9787112136841.
* Yu, Kongjian; Li, Dihua; Li, Hailong; Zhang, Lei (2012). The Grand Canal National Heritage and Ecological Corridor. Beijing, China: Peking University Press. ISBN 9787301202036.
* Yu, Kongjian; Wang, Sisi; Li, Dihua (2011). Regional Ecological Security patterns, The Beijing Case. Beijing, China: China Architecture & Building Press. ISBN 9787112136636.
* Yu, Kongjian (2009). Back to Land. Beijing, China: Commercial Press. ISBN 9787108030801.
* Yu, Kongjian (2006). Art of Survival: Positioning Contemporary Landscape Architecture. Beijing, China: China Architecture & Building Press. ISBN 9787112087365.
* Austin, Gary; Kongjian Yu (2016). Constructed Wetlands and Sustainable Development. London: Routledge. ISBN 978-1138908994.
* Saunders, William S. (2012). Designed Ecologies: The Landscape Architecture of Kongjian Yu. Berlin: Birkhaeuser. ISBN 978-3034607384.
* Yu, Kongjian; Mary Padua (2007). Art of Survival: Recovering Landscape Architecture. Mulgrave, Victoria, 3170 Australia: Images Publishing Group Pty Ltd. ISBN 978-1864702514.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location (link)
* "Experiencing landscape is the root of landscape design. Udo Weilacher interviews Kongjian Yu in: nodium, Magazine of the Alumni-Club Landscape at the Technical University of Munich 2017 (PDF)

### Articles

* 1995, Yu, Kongjian, Cultural variations in landscape preference: comparisons among Chinese sub-groups and Western design experts, landscape and Urban Planning, 32(2):107-126.
* 1995, Yu, Kongjian, Security Patterns in Landscape Planning with a Case Study in South China. Doctoral Thesis, Graduate School of Design, Harvard University, MA. USA.
* 1996, Yu, Kongjian, Security patterns and surface model and in landscape planning. Landscape and Urban Planning. 36(5)1~17.
* 2006, Yu, Kongjian, Dihua Li and Nuyu Li, The evolution of Greenways in China, Landscape and Urban Planning, 76: 223-239
* 2007, Yu, Kongjian and Mary G. Padua, China's cosmetic cities: Urban fever and superficiality, Landscape Research, Volume 32, Issue 2: 255 - 272
* 2008, Yu, Kongjian, Li Hailong Li Dihua, the Negative Approach and Ecological Infrastructure: The Smart Preservation of Natural Systems in The Process of Urbanization. Journal of Natural Resources. Vol.23 (6): 937–958.
* 2008, Yu, Kongjian, Zhang Lei and Dihua Li, Live With Water: Flood Adaptive Landscapes in the Yellow River Basin of China, Journal of Landscape Architecture, 2:6-17
* 2009, Yu, Kongjian, Beautiful Big Feet: Toward a New Landscape Aesthetic. Harvard Design Magazine (Fall/Winter), 48-59
* 2009, Yu, Kongjian, Wang SI-Si, Li Di-Hua, The Function of Ecological Security Patterns as Urban Growth Framework in Beijing, Acta Ecologicica Sinica, Vol.29 (3):1189-1204.
* 2010, Yu, Kongjian, Qiaoyuan Park: An Ecosystem Services-Oriented Regenerative Design, Topos, 5:26-33.2010, Yu, Kongjian, Landscape as Ecological Infrastructure for an Alternative Urbanity, In: Mohsen Mostafavi (ed.), Implicate & Explicate, Aga Khan Award for Architecture, Lars Müller Publishers, pp. 282–283
* 2010, Yu, Kongjian, Five Traditions for Landscape Urbanism Thinking, Topos, (71):58-63
* 2010, Yu, Kongjian, The Good Earth Recovered, Return of Landscape" Edited by Donata Valentien, Jovis publishers, Berlin (page:225-233)
* 2010, Yu, Kongjian, the Big-Foot Revolution, in: Mohsen Mostafavi with Gareth Doherty, Harvard University Graduate School of Design) (eds.) Ecological Urbanism, Lars Müller Publishers, Page282-291
* 2011, Yu, Kongjian, Ecological infrastructure leads the way: the negative approach and landscape urbanism for smart preservation and smart growth, in Matthias Richter and Ulrike Weiland (Editors), Applied Urban Ecology: A Global Framework, pp. 152–166.
* 2011, Yu, Kongjian, Landscape as a living system: Shanghai 2010 Expo Houtan Park, in Matthias Richter and Ulrike Weiland (Editors), Applied Urban Ecology: A Global Framework (editor), pp. 186–192.
* 2011, Yu, Kongjian, Sisi Wang & Dihua Li: The negative approach to urban growth planning of Beijing, China, Journal of Environmental Planning and Management, 54:9,1209-1236
* 2012, Yu, Kongjian, The Big Feet Aesthetics and The art of Survival. Architectural Design, Nov/Dec. No.220:72-77.
* 2013, Yu, Kongjian, Integration Across Scales: Landscape as Infrastructure for the Protection of Biodiversity in: John Beardsley (Editor), Designing Wildlife Habitats, 241–71, Dumbarton Oaks, Trustees for Harvard University, Washington, D.C., Printed in the United States of America.
* 2014, Yu, Kongjian, Complete Water, in: Anuradha Mathur and Dilip Da Cunha (eds.) Design in the Terrain of Water. Applied Research + Design Publishing with the University of Pennsylvania, School of Design.pp. 57–65.
* 2016, Yu, Kongjian, Think like a king, act like a peasant: the power of a landscape architect and some personal experience, in Christophe Girot and Dora Imhof (Eds.), Thinking the contemporary landscape, Princeton architectural press, 2016, pp164–184
* 2016, Yu, Kongjian, Creating deep forms in urban nature: the peasant's approach to urban design, in Frederick R. Steiner, George F. Thompson and Armando Carbonell (Eds.), Nature and Cities—The Ecological Imperative in Urban Design and Planning, Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, pp95–117
* 2017, Yu, Kongjian, Green Infrastructure through the Revival of Ancient Wisdom, American Academy of Arts and Sciences Bulletin, Summer 2017, Vol. LXX, No.4:35-39
* 2020 Yu, K., Beautiful China and the Mission of Landscape Architecture, in Beautiful China: Reflections on Landscape Architecture in Contemporary China edited by Richard J. Weller & Tatum L. Hands, ORO Editions, 2020, pp22–29
* 2020, Kongjian Yu Wins 2020 Sir Geoffrey Jellicoe Award; Read His Full Speech. DIRT, American Society of Landscape Architects, The Dirt Contributor, 10/08/202010/12/2020
* 2021, Yu,K. Sponge City: Planning and Design and Political Design, In: Design Studio Sofie Pelsmakers and Nick Newman, Architecture and The Climate Emergency. Everything Needs to Change, RIBA, 47-55.

## Publications about Kongjian Yu and Turenscape
### Books

* Shioppa, Caterina Padoa; Yu, Kongjian (2019). Turenscape 1998–2018. Melfi, Italy: Libria. ISBN 9788867641727.
* Terreform (2018). Letters to the Leaders of China: Kongjian Yu and the Future of the Chinese City. New York, USA: Terreform. ISBN 978-0-9960041-8-3.
* Saunders, William (2012). Designed Ecologies: The Landscape Architecture of Kongjian Yu. Basel, Switzerland: BirkhÃuser Architecture. ISBN 978-3034607384.