Diane Kostial McGuire (in memoriam)
Statement: Diane Kostial McGuire (1933–2019) was a well-known landscape architect who championed the cause of women in the field. A native of San Diego, Diane received a B.S. in landscape architecture from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1954, followed by an M.S. in 1956. She received the Distinguished Alumni Award from UC Berkeley in 2003, as well as an honorary degree from the Boston Architectural College in 2012. McGuire & Watson, Landscape Architects and Site Planners, a Boston-based firm founded in 1975, completed a number of private and public commissions, including the acclaimed gardens of the Society of the Cincinnati in Washington, D.C., in 1984.
Diane was better known as a scholar, educator, and mentor. In 1965 she founded the landscape design program at the Radcliffe Seminars, where she offered courses in the intellectual history of garden art that inspired legions of women and later became the program’s first director. From 1965 to 1981, she was Landscape Architect for Radcliffe College, and later for Wellesley College and Harvard University. She also served as an advisor to Dumbarton Oaks, during which time she edited Beatrix Farrand’s Plant Book for Dumbarton Oaks (1980) and organized the first scholarly symposium on Beatrix Farrand in 1982. She was co-author, with Diana Balmori and Eleanor McPeck, of Beatrix Farrand’s American Landscapes (1984), which brought Farrand’s career to a wider audience. She also was a professor of landscape architecture at the University of Arkansas from 1981 to 1984. In retirement she enjoyed her house and garden in Little Compton, Rhode Island, which was the setting for many delightful convenings with fellow landscape architects and historians.
I first met Diane in 1986 when she returned to the Radcliffe Seminars to teach, and it was through her that I was introduced to the academic discipline of landscape history as well as the joys of garden visiting. Through our many years of friendship, she was an astute critic and a devoted mentor. In 2003 Diane and I were among the founders of The Beatrix Farrand Society at Garland Farm in Maine, where we worked on educational programing and established a research library for the organization. Diane’s easy-going charm and firm convictions will be missed.
—Judith B. Tankard
