AAAAAA okay.
I just finished my Semester 1 and I’m still processing it.
This last project genuinely broke my brain for a while. There was too much reading, too much thinking, too many ideas colliding at once, and it took forever to explain what I was even trying to do. Early reviews were rough - a lot of “we don’t understand what you’re trying to achieve” - and honestly, they were right. I was holding too much at once.
But iteration is the most powerful thing on planet Earth. Designing over and over again, explaining the work to multiple people, and experimenting with different visual styles eventually led to a really banging final review. I honestly couldn’t have asked for more. They loved it, gave great constructive feedback, and I can now die peacefully. Hehe.
@slolston mentored me through all my shit days to finally see a bright end. I am indebted to you.
@holterl you gorgeous man thankyou for the photos ❤️
About the project: Rooted Neighbours
What if climate action began below our feet?
This project treats soil as a living network, not a surface. The design proposed community building through soil building - where soil health is developed over time through mycorrhizal relationships, chop-and-drop cycles, and layered plant communities.
It’s a slow project by design - not about planting trees but about growing soil. Fast plants start the work, specifically designed fungi associations carry it forward, and climax trees benefit decades later.
And you humans can participate in a coppicing carnival while enjoying a bbq on the river side. Thats the vibe.
We hosted a partaay in the food forest and it was hands down, one of the best things I have ever done. We had flower crackers and wild leaf rolls and water apple sorbet. But you have to eat it to truly find out how GORGEOUS the menu and the food was.
Absolutely everything was sourced from the 2 year old forest and it was peak summer so it was a tough harvest. More fruits and flowers- things you eat fresh, less vegetables and greens to cook and make a meal with.
We kinda killed it regardless. 🍀
Wish I could you tell you more, but somethings are only experienced offline.
Welcome to my first ever medicinal landscape project: SOM
SOM is a holistic wellbeing space, designed to nourish the mind, body and soul through Ayurveda, Yoga, Sound Healing and Naturopathy.
The brief was to design a landscape that supports all of these experiences. We decided to dive deep into the stories of the region to find ancestral remedies and medicinal herbs. What you see in the post are a few of the 50 different species that we identified and planted. The landscape is now a combination of small private gardens attached to each therapy room and a large common garden that can facilitate medicinal plant tours and explorations.
We are in the process of integrating the leafs, stems, seeds and flowers of these plants in the therapies offered at SOM. Different parts of plants can be used as packs, scrubs, essence, detox teas, potlis, powders and so on.
I’ll tell you my 3 favourites:
1. Crushing and smelling the leaves of the camphor tree gives me the best sensory overload 🍀 Camphor leaves can be used directly in a lot of massage oils and potli remedies.
2. Stevia, which I pluck and eat everytime I visit has a superb flavour. It’s a natural alternative to sugar, the leaves can be directly added to teas and drinks. Even though there is some speculation around stevia, I quite like it.
3. The anti-inflammatory black turmeric, (which is actually blue on the inside!?!) kind of dies in the winter and then comes back in the summer. It’s real magic. As of 2016, Black turmeric has been listed as an endangered species by the Indian Agricultural Department. Find it in the last photo. I cant even begin talking about its health benefits.
Let me know what you think??!?!?
#permaculture #medicinalplants #ayurvedicplants #medicinalherbgarden #medicinalgarden #foodforest #herbsforhealth
There is no end.
Not in love.
Not in nature.
Definitely, not in death.
In fact, death makes a forest come alive in a way that no designed intervention can.
These site images from Franklin park frame dead trees side by side with the life that bursts out of it - in an alternating carousel. Call it what you want you want - detritus, biodiversity, food, energy, wood, carbon, mushrooms, lichen, moss, termite, wood bugs, woodpeckers.
It is life as much as it is death.
Whatever it might be, would you call it the end?
Posting a dump before I forget how grateful I am.
Landscapes in view:
Badlands at Death Valley
Monument valley in the Navajo District
Grand Canyon (duh)
Sedona
I see why people stay in America. Maybe they stay for capitalism and money, but I see what could make me stay.
No I am just kidding.
I have to design for death this semester.
So I decided to start with love.
Isn’t it obvious?
Isn’t the numbness of death the exact opposite of the intensity of love?
Because hate is nothing but love in a mask.
For context - Bubbles is the Northern Red Oak outside my room. I have shifted my life to orient it towards him this semester. My study table, my pillow, my carpet, my thoughts, my heart, my time - Bubbles is the centre of my universe, starting new moon of 2026.
#treestagram #treelovers #naturing #harvarduniversity
I have been petrified of winters for as long as I can remember. The moment I got into Harvard, my biggest fear wasn’t the coursework or the move, it was Boston winters: minus fifteen degrees, endless snow, the cold that seeps into your bones. My most persistent feeling wasn’t excitement, it was fear.
And honestly, it is as brutal as I imagined, worthy of the fear. But it also holds a beauty so unique that it can only be understood by living inside it. Don’t get me wrong: it’s tough, painful even. I’m writing this with a fever and a sore throat because I don’t know when to stop.
And yet, winter opened up a whole new dimension. Snow accentuates every line and curve of a tree, resting on its branches so softly, as if there is love between the two. Tree forms emerge with a clarity I had never seen before. It’s a way of seeing I didn’t know I was blind to, and a sight I would give a million dollars for. But I can’t because I’m in debt.
Last week I was at the Middlesex fells reservation - a state park in Massachusetts. Unlike national parks, state parks are managed by the state government and seem to belong more to the people that national ones. You can bike, run, walk your dog - truly make that landscape a part of your everyday. In contrast, national parks are usually strict about ‘conservation’ and are more of a visiting/tourists like experience.
My Indian gang, do you know of state parks in India that let you use the space as a recreation? No ticket, no entry just free flow? I know sections of forests in the hills are like that but are they regulated state parks with budgets and maintenance teams? My understanding is that there are national reserves and wildlife sanctuaries but no state parks. But I can be very very wrong.
Nonethelss, we went to volunteer to create culverts that would prevent flooding on the trails. @julia_lotvin@holterl truly did that while I picked up a total of 10 stones. I did sketch and collect some cooler things, I believe.
I am posing with the dawn redwood in the background - because monuments are over rated and we should all pose with pretty trees.
I thought winters would make trees boring - stripped down to basic bark. But to my surprise it reveals them in such raw honesty that I kinda loved it.
I thought winters would make trees unidentifiable to me. Instead their uniqueness shines even more brightly in the leafless form - seed pods, bud scales, and branch tips sparkle like marvels of botany.
Here is a series a of canopies - or non canopies that I found stunning.
Swipe till the end to see phases of a tree over just 3 months. And further ahead if you want to see my human babies beyond plant babies.
It’s funny - the things I actually want to post rarely fit here. They have to be translated, softened, made palatable for the Instagram scroll.
Maybe this isn’t the platform for that kind of work. But I love it anyway, so I will continue to corrupt the purity of design and art with the reality of people and photographs.
To all architecture friends, do you remember the Nolli plan with public vs private spaces demarcated in black and white? I think landscape architecture can have its own natural nolli version that is wild vs manicured. Or humans vs all natural creatures? Bring a more persistent, scalable way to design for everything(beyond humans)?
🌿 Thinking Like a Forest — now exhibiting at the Kirkland Art Gallery, Harvard GSD.
This exhibit grows from an 8-acre forest landscape I’ve been designing in Gujarat, India — a food forest experiment that explores how design can listen to land rather than control it. My first ever installation invites you into an 8-minute immersive experience that emulates the feeling on being (in) nature.
All the music in the experiment is created through plant sonification using PlantWave — translating the bio-data of living plants into sound. The composition follows the logic of forest succession: beginning with the delicate frequencies of pioneer species like moss, lichen, and fungi, and slowly building toward the layered harmonies of climax species such as pines and oaks. The soundscape evolves as a forest does — patiently and progressively.
Alongside the installation is a guidebook I’ve been compiling — a living document of strategies, drawings, and reflections from the forest — with the hope that it can become a tool for small-scale farmers and designers who want to regenerate land through design.
This project is my attempt to ask: what happens when we start thinking like a forest? 🌱
Thankyou @vj_phulwadhwa@_ahir_akash_@woodsatsasan@teyjuice@holterl for helping out with the production :)
@maitahagad for the gorgeous photos. Grateful for all you amazing people ❤️
Hoping this is the first to many!
