Sarah Coleman

Master of Landscape Architecture, The Ohio State University, 2020
Bachelor of Fine Art, The Maryland Institute College of Art, 2010

Sarah Coleman is an Assistant Professor of Landscape Architecture, teaching design studios as well as in the History, Theory, and Practice sequence. Sarah’s research explores layered cultural landscapes and investigates processes of meaning-making in the landscape. Her recent work, undertaken as part of a Fulbright Scholarship, explored the historic health landscapes of the Sadgeri Plateau in the Republic of Georgia. Her project examined the potentials of an interpretive trail to reinscribe coherence between dispersed natural and cultural remnants of the subalpine region.

Interest areas in research and practice:
Sarah’s work investigates overlays of the past and present, both the physical and invisible inscriptions that shape the use and understanding of places. Her art historical background informs an understanding that all design—the professional, the historic, the everyday—is a frame for looking, as expressive of a certain set of beliefs and values and as an interface that choreographs or incites certain kinds of behavior, actions, or experiences in place that cohere with those values. She examines the ways in which competing frames interposed on a single landscape surface complexity or tension, can result in growth and change, conflict or erasure. Through design research, Sarah explores the ways that design might take a critical stance on the current conditions of a site, and situate itself amidst these shifting meanings.