Charles A. Birnbaum, FASLA, FAAR
President & CEO, The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Charles A. Birnbaum, FASLA, FAAR, is the president, CEO, and founder of The Cultural Landscape Foundation (TCLF). Prior to creating TCLF, Mr. Birnbaum 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. One of his major projects is the web-based initiative What’s Out There®, a searchable database of the nation’s designed landscape heritage. He has authored and edited numerous publications, including the Modern Landscapes: Transition and Transformation series (Princeton Architectural Press, volumes printed in 2012 and 2014); Shaping the American Landscape (UVA Press, 2009). In 1995 the American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA) awarded him the President's Award of Excellence and, in 1996, inducted him as a Fellow of the Society. He served as a Loeb Fellow at Harvard’s Graduate School of Design, during which time he founded TCLF. In 2004 Mr. Birnbaum was awarded the Rome Prize in Historic Preservation and Conservation and spent the spring and summer of that year at the American Academy in Rome. In 2008 he was the visiting Glimcher Distinguished Professor at Ohio State University's Austin E. Knowlton School of Architecture. That same year the ASLA awarded him the Alfred B. LaGasse Medal, and in 2009, he received the ASLA President’s Medal. In 2017 Mr. Birnbaum received The ASLA Medal, the Society's highest award. He is a frequent contributor to The Huffington Post.

Amphitheater at Meredith College designed by Dick Bell, FASLA, Raleigh, NC