Landscape design? (unemployed, degree, find a job, wages)

[PSBlows]

Anyone here work in landscape design? How do you like it? What are the job prospects?

[brightdoglover]

I looked into it and have known of people interested in urban design and related fields. I think it's always been a tough field to find work in. Likely you'd want to be somewhere where there's some serious home-owning money.
I believe the school for landscape design at UMass Amherst is well regarded.

[PSBlows]

I'm in Northern VA, and Virginia Tech's landscape architecture program was ranked #1 in the country for 2009...but it's freakin expensive.

[azoria]

Two of us were just hired as groundskeepers for a community, me (an experienced groundskeeper) and the other person is a landscape designer with a degree and a goldmine of knowledge. It just took him two years to find a job.

Landscape design is a great job in good times, but is completely tied into the construction industry. When construction goes south, landscape designers are unemployed. New construction is forecast to be nearly non existent for some years to come as the US is wildly overbuilt in both commercial and residential properties.

This is NOT a good time to move into landscape design.

[phrumpster]

Landscape as the previous poster noted is tied to the construction industry.
As far as wages go it's at the low end of the totem pole.
Are you aware of the differences between landscape designer and landscape architect?

[nicet4]

Originally Posted by PSBlows

I'm in Northern VA, and Virginia Tech's landscape architecture program was ranked #1 in the country for 2009...but it's freakin expensive.

There's a lot more to this field than one might think. Must be a cross between civil engineer and and surveyor.

Typical drawing by registered landscape architect http://img707.imageshack.us/img707/4166/fp1o.jpg for an industrial site development.

Scale on this drawing is 1"=100' so it's about 3,000 feet from left to right side of the drawing.

You will notice not a whole lot in the way of what some may think as "landscaping" but there is a lot dealing with dealing with storm water, erosion control and earthwork. This site is on the side of a hill slopes approximately 30 feet from southeast to northwest corner. Building finished floor elevations will all be equal which means taking about 10 to 15 feet of dirt from the southeast side of the site to the northwest side of the site.

As far as compaction requirements, we wouldn't want our $100 million project to sink, this would tend to upset some investors, it would be the landscape architects job to tell the developer what needs to be done... the landscape architect would be able to tell what soil conditions are after all. As far as planting flowers, bushes and things there isn't a whole lot on this other than planting grass.

Architects right now are suffering greatly with nearly 50% unemployed as I write this. Right now it sucks to be an architect.

Originally Posted by phrumpster

Landscape as the previous poster noted is tied to the construction industry.
As far as wages go it's at the low end of the totem pole.
Are you aware of the differences between landscape designer and landscape architect?

I added your comment because I didn't point it out like you did. Very big difference with a landscape architect at least having a shot at a job right now whereas a new landscape designer would have a very long future at Starbucks.

I am curious, is this what you think of the job as being? Right now it is... it is the only thing out there.