2007 VA ASLA Awards

Analysis and Planning Professional - Capitol Square Landscape Master Plan

Merit Award

Project: Capitol Square Landscape Master Plan
Project Director:  Rhodeside & Harwell
Landscape architect / project manager: Kevin Fisher
Landscape architect: Rebecca Finn
Client:  Capitol Square Preservation Committee
Public outreach: Deana Rhodeside

When Thomas Jefferson designed Virginia's Capitol after a Classical Roman temple, its setting became integral to the design. Recalling the Acropolis in Athens and Capitoline Hill in Rome, Jefferson sited his temple to represent government on a prominent hill in Richmond overlooking the James River. About twelve acres surrounding the Capitol comprised a "publick square" that evolved into Capitol Square in the nineteenth century.

Capitol Square's first landscape effort took place in 1816 with the installation of a formal French par-terre design. Two years later, a cast- and wrought-iron fence was fabricated and installed to "regulate" the Square. The fence remains in place today. In 1850, John Notman designed a picturesque overlay to "modernize" Capitol Square. Notman's design was installed incrementally over the next decade. The final major landscape development on Capitol Square occurred after the Capitol was enlarged in 1906. A drive was installed around the perimeter of the Capitol to accommodate automobiles.

In 2002, the Virginia Department of General Services partnered with the Capitol Square Preservation Council, a citizens advisory body to the General Assembly and the Governor, to develop a Landscape Master Plan for Capitol Square. The landscape architecture firm was contracted to develop a plan that would establish "intermediate and long-range goals for the renovation of plantings, site improvements, and programs for enhancing the visual aspects" of Capitol Square. In the ensuing research, it was discovered that Capitol Square is a nationally significant urban landscape and that major components of its two nineteenth-century landscape designs remain intact.

The Capitol Square Landscape Master Plan recommended improvements to Capitol Square based on three principles:

I. Preserve and enhance the historic integrity of the Square.

II. Reduce the impact of vehicles on the Square and improve the pedestrian experience.

III. Improve the visual openness of the Square and enhance views of the Capitol building and the monuments.

Since 2004 the Landscape Master Plan has been the guiding force in the decision-making process. A $100 million restoration and expansion of the Capitol began shortly after the adoption of the Landscape Master Plan. Removal of materials and restoration of the landscape elements disturbed during construction over the past two years. Particularly significant was the re-alignment of walkways to their configuration established in the 1850 John Notman plan. Design and fabrication of a memorial to the civil-rights movement in Virginia in the 1950s is currently underway. Perhaps the most noticeable enhancement to Capitol Square came with the Joint Rules Committee's agreement to end parking in the Square.

The Capitol Square Landscape Master Plan documented the historic landscape resources and its surviving historic fabric. At the same time, it established recommendations that allow the Square to continue to function effectively as a significant public park and as the working seat of government for the Commonwealth of Virginia.