Charles A. Birnbaum, FASLA, FAAR
Founder and President, The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Charles A. Birnbaum is the Founder and President of The Cultural Landscape Foundation (TCLF). Prior to founding TCLF, Charles spent fifteen years as the coordinator of the National Park Service Historic Landscape Initiative (HLI) and a decade in private practice in New York City with a focus on landscape preservation and urban design. Since taking the helm at the foundation in 2008, Charles’ projects include two web-based initiatives: What’s Out There? (a searchable database of the nation’s designed landscape heritage) and Cultural Landscapes as Classrooms. He has authored and edited numerous publications including the new series, Modern Landscapes: Transition + Transformation (Princeton Architectural Press, 2012-14), Shaping the American Landscape (UVA Press, 2009), and Design with Culture: Claiming America’s Landscape Heritage (UVA Press 2005). In 1995, the American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA) awarded the HLI the President's Award of Excellence and in 1996 inducted Charles as a Fellow of the Society. Charles served as a Loeb Fellow at Harvard’s Graduate School of Design during which time he founded TCLF. In 2004, Charles was awarded the Rome Prize in Historic Preservation and Conservation and spent spring/summer of that year at the American Academy in Rome. Charles has served as the visiting Glimcher Distinguished Professor at Ohio State’s Austin E. Knowlton School of Architecture and since 2011 has been a visiting professor at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture and Planning. In 2008 Charles was awarded the Alfred B. LaGasse Medal from the ASLA and in 2010 he was awarded the ASLA President’s Medal by the Society’s President, Angela Dye. Since 2011 Charles has also been a frequent contributor to The Huffington Post.

Photo by Charles A. Birnbaum