Leading Landscape Architects, Architects, Scholars and Others Speak out about Threat to the Weyerhaeuser Corporate Headquarters
Media Contact: Nord Wennerstrom | T: 202.483.0553 | M: 202.255.7076 | E: nord@tclf.org
Weyerhaeuser has been called the "finest corporate campus in the world" and worthy of National Historic Landmark status
Washington, D.C. (February 2, 2021) - The Cultural Landscape Foundation (TCLF) today launched an international letter-writing campaign to prevent inappropriate development at the acclaimed Weyerhaeuser Corporate Headquarters, in Federal Way, Washington, called the “finest corporate campus in the world” and worthy of National Historic Landmark status. It was originally designed by landscape architect Peter Walker, founding principal of Sasaki, Walker and Associates (SWA) and PWP Landscape Architecture, and Edward Charles Bassett, partner at Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM). The campaign has resulted letters from significant landscape architects, architects, scholars and leaders throughout the design community. The letters are addressed to Federal Way Mayor Jim Ferrell – the city issues land use and construction permits – and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Seattle district commander Colonel Alexander Bullock – the Corps is conducting a review because wetlands are affected.
Weyerhaeuser, which was completed in 1972, is now owned by the Los Angeles-based developer Industrial Realty Group, which plans to build 1.5 million square feet of warehouse space at the 425-acre site. Officials at IRG are ignoring a mid-1970s master plan that details appropriate areas for development and have rejected design assistance from Walker, SOM partner Craig Hartman, and SWA managing principal René Bihan.
Leading landscape architects including Laurie Olin, Bill Johnson, Gary Hilderbrand, Debra Guenther, Brice Maryman, and Weyerhaeuser designer Peter Walker, along with scholars Marc Treib, Richard Longstreth, David Streatfield, Gwendolyn Wright, Nicholas Adams, Scott Melbourne, and Kenneth Helphand, architects Joeb Moore and David Goldberg, Docomomo US, noted design critic and architectural historian Alexandra Lange, and others are speaking out. A microsite features the letters and members of the public are encouraged to contact Mayor Ferrell and Colonel Bullock.
Here are excerpts from the letters:
David Streatfield, professor emeritus of Landscape Architecture and Urban Design and Planning at the University of Washington – Weyerhaeuser is “unquestionably the finest corporate campus in the world.”
Thaisa Way, program director, landscape and garden studies, Dumbarton Oaks, Washington, D.C., and professor, Landscape Architecture Department, College of Built Environments, University of Washington – Weyerhaeuser is “an international icon of Modernism.”
Laurie Olin, founding principal of OLIN and National Medal of Art recipient – Weyerhaeuser is “a treasure of modern architecture, site planning, community benefit and environmental leadership.”
Richard Longstreth, professor emeritus, George Washington University – Weyerhaeuser “merits National Historic Landmark status.”
Alexandra Lange, noted design critic and architectural historian – “When Weyerhaeuser’s … complex was new, it was simultaneously the last word in the suburban corporate estates that flourished during the postwar era … and the first word in environmental consciousness as company branding.”
Marc Treib, professor emeritus of architecture at the University of California, Berkeley – Weyerhaeuser “remains the best preserved and most outstanding corporate campus in the United States, arguably in the world.”
Bill Johnson, founding principal of Johnson, Johnson and Roy and classmate of Peter Walker at Harvard Graduate School of Design (1956) – Weyerhaeuser is a "world-acclaimed place of distinction."
Gwendolyn Wright, professor emerita, Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, Columbia University – “I consider it the most significant corporate campus in the world.”
Gary Hilderbrand, founding principal of Reed Hilderbrand and the Peter Louis Hornbeck professor of landscape architecture at Harvard Graduate School of Design – Weyerhaeuser “is rightly considered by many to be a national treasure.”
Scott Melbourne, author of Refining Nature: The Landscape Architecture of Peter Walker – the “Weyerhaeuser campus is a gem.”
Joeb Moore, founding principal at Joeb Moore & Partners, Architects – “As an architect I find this building and landscape inseparable and one of the most important projects of post-war II twentieth century.”
Peter Walker, original landscape architect at Weyerhaeuser, founding principal of Sasaki, Walker and Associates (SWA) and PWP Landscape Architecture – “In my 60 years of landscape architecture projects, which include the Nasher Sculpture Center in Dallas, the National September 11 Memorial with Michael Arad in New York City, and the U.S. Embassy in Beijing, Weyerhaeuser Headquarters is perhaps the most important and certainly the dearest to my heart.”
About The Cultural Landscape Foundation
The Cultural Landscape Foundation (TCLF) is a Washington, D.C.-based education and advocacy non-profit established in 1998 with a mission of “connecting people to places.” The organization educates and engages the public to make our landscape heritage more visible, identify its value, and empower its stewards. TCLF is also home to the Cornelia Hahn Oberlander International Landscape Architecture Prize.
# # #