Sara Zewde is something of an architectural wonderkid- part landscape architect, part urbanist, part sociologist and cultural anthropologist, and-as of this month-the Landscape Architecture Foundation’s 2014 Olmstead Scholar. image via Walter Communications.

Sara Zewde argues that while the traditional monument commemorates a singular event or individual by placing an object in a space that is a break from its surroundings, the 400-year practice of African enslavement demands a different approach. “For Afro-descended people, you wake up every day with the legacy of slavery,” she says. “How do you deal with that spatially?”

One approach is to translate cultural practices into spatial ones. Samba or capoeira, two hallmarks of Brazilian culture with strong African influences, both traditionally operate in circular gatherings known as rodas. In her design, Zewde incorporates patterns and shapes modeled after these gatherings. For her audience in Rio, the concept clicked immediately, Zewde says. Plants were another way to grapple with slavery’s living legacy. When the Earth’s landmasses were all part of the supercontinent Pangaea, what is now Brazil and Africa were joined at the hip. Zewde’s proposal to plant vegetation that would have been familiar to enslaved Africans arriving on Rio’s shores is a gesture toward that human moment, as well as the site’s geologic history.....Continue Reading

Inspiration for Zewde’s design, shown in this rendering, came from Afro-Brazilian rituals and cultural practice. image © Sara Zewde

Zewde’s design for the African Heritage Celebration Historical and Archaeological Circuit includes native African plants, as shown in this rendering. image ©Sara Zewde

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