Landscapes are a massive part of new developments. From the aesthetic theme of the location to providing wellbeing-boosting green space for communities, a well-thought-out and professionally delivered landscape can be the icing on the cake of a successful project.
When they’re designed as infrastructure, landscapes can contribute to long-term value in projects. That’s one of the reasons we take pride in our collaborative relationships with landscape architects. The best public realm isn’t a finishing touch layered on at the end of a project; it should be an integral part of the development’s overall design. It sets the tone for how people arrive, it ties separate buildings together, and it quietly manages many of the unglamorous but critical functions like drainage, levels and loadings.
A key to getting the approach to landscape right is having a clear process of how to think about it and rigorous collaboration and planning between all the project partners from the earliest stages.
How we think about landscape
For us, landscape forms part of the civil engineering strategy rather than something separate. We don’t think of things like swales, basins, tree pits and falls as background features or cosmetic add-ons, they’ve got to be part of the network that makes a place work. When these are designed in from the very beginning, storage, conveyance and water treatment become visible and usable elements of the public realm. They add to the character of a neighbourhood while still doing the hard work of flood management and attenuation.
That balance between function and amenity is what makes a space resilient. When soft and hard elements work together, the landscape doesn’t just look good, it works hard too. Think of grassed swales and play lawns paired with paths, kerbs and steps that also act as conveyance routes. When those details are resolved properly, the space feels effortless and inviting on the surface, even though it’s quietly carrying out complex technical work in the background.
In short, landscapes are where engineering becomes visible. They’re also where people get their first impression of a place. That’s why we invest so much energy in making sure the technical side and the design vision are aligned from the start.
What’s more, having the right project team to work on the landscape is absolutely vital to its success. On some of our biggest projects, we’ve worked with Wright Landscapes to achieve some remarkable results.
Castle Irwell
Castle Irwell is a clear demonstration of how amenity space and surface water management features can be one and the same. The central public open space provides a large, flexible green area for recreation, but it also works hard when it rains. Swales, basins and shaped landforms manage water, transporting and storing it in plain sight, turning water management into part of the character of the place. Our role was to develop our concept design and embed the engineering into the ground modelling. Paths, cambers and kerb lines all double as flow routes, meaning the landscape itself manages any exceedance events.
To deliver that precision, we provided our 3D ground model, and the ground worker plugged a memory stick into a semi-autonomous vehicle, which excavated the exact ground profiles that had been designed. The result is a space that feels simple and generous on the surface, but is quietly performing the complex role of surface water management and compensation storage every time it rains.
Waterhouse Gardens
Waterhouse Gardens, on the former brewery land, has a very different character. The context is dense and urban, and the landscape is more crafted than naturalistic. Courtyards and routes are carefully considered, with a balance between hard surfaces, planting and shared outdoor spaces. From an engineering perspective, the challenge was to align drainage and levels with the architectural intent so the landscape reads as a single coherent sequence rather than disconnected pockets.
Here, the landscape does more than provide visual amenity. It has to choreograph movement through the development, create usable outdoor space for residents, and manage water across podium structures. We worked closely with the design team to make sure planting depths, tree pits and podium build-ups were resolved without compromising either the architecture or the programme. In projects like this, landscape really is part of the structure of the neighbourhood.
Stockport Interchange: engineering lightness into a rooftop park
Stockport Interchange takes the idea of landscape as infrastructure to another level. The two-acre rooftop park sits above a transport interchange, providing a new civic space for the town. Below the landscape sits a “blue roof system” where surface water can be stored. Above this, the design ambition was for an undulating landscape with play and biodiversity, but creating those forms in soil alone would have made the roof structure unworkable.
The solution was to work with the wider team to combine lightweight aggregates and engineered build-ups to create the required topography without overloading the frame. That meant the park could achieve the intended form, planting and drainage performance, while still protecting the structure below. The result is a park that connects the town centre, the station and the river, and which feels like a piece of ground-level public realm despite sitting on top of a building.
A word on delivery
“Public realm landscapes are such an important part of any development, often setting the stage for the public’s first interaction with the space in question. We love working with teams like renaissance who understand the importance of landscaping and it’s power to dramatically enhance a development’s character. This collaborative spirit empowers us to deliver spaces that will enhance projects, bolster functionality and provide wellbeing.“
Nathan Webster, Lead Landscape Architect at Wright Landscapes
None of these schemes would have come to life without the determination and skill of the delivery teams on site. Wright Landscapes were a constant presence across Castle Irwell, Waterhouse Gardens and Stockport Interchange, turning carefully drawn concepts into finished places. Their attention to detail, from technical planting build-ups through to crafted finishes, helped ensure that each project delivers both the everyday resilience and the long-term amenity that good public realm should provide.
