Every year, FIU Landscape Architecture students get the opportunity to travel and experience life in the port city of Genoa, Italy, as part of FIU’s Study Abroad program. The experience gives them the opportunity to live and work in an exciting international environment that is close to many cultural treasures and design destinations in Italy and throughout Europe. During the Spring 2013 semester, a group of Landscape Architecture students took advantage of their semester abroad to visit Venice, Rome, Florence, and Milan, among many other locations.
For LA Students Craig Montenegro, Anna Miorelli, and Phillip Byrnes, the experience in Genoa broadened their horizons and allowed them to grow as designers. “We did a case study of San Marco in Venice, and we were able to dissect the Piazza through drawings. Just looking at how they put the space together so that it functions very efficiently even today was amazing,” said Craig Montenegro.
Situated on the northwestern coast of Italy, Genoa is known as a diverse city that continues to inspire both architecture and landscape architecture students. Students mentioned that the Genoa experience not only helped them acquire more knowledge about architectural history and design in general, but it allowed them to comprehend the power and importance of good landscape architecture in an urban context where piazzas and open spaces complement great architecture.
Chair and Associate Professor of Landscape Architecture, Roberto Rovira, visited the students during the Spring 2013 study abroad semester. In Florence, they visited the Villa Gamberaia in Settignano near Florence and took tours in areas around Rome that included the Villa Lante in Viterbo, the “Parco dei Mostri” in Bomarzo, and Villa d’Este in Tivoli.
“There is constant stimulation here from an active city environment, the way one lives every day, and the way one designs. The tools that I’m learning here which encompass sketching and other tools that are considered quite simple at first, but that I haven’t been able to indulge as much as I would like in the past have helped me grow as a student of landscape architecture,” mentioned FIU LA student, Anna Miorelli.
For more information about the Genoa program please visit www.fiugenoa.it/index.html.
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