Urban Well-Being in Nature

Apr 21, 2025, International Office，5-minute read

Launching at AXHU School of International Education Multi-Function Hall on the morning of Apr 18, the 2025 Culture & Art Festival was feting a community of landscape architecture second- and third-years, faculty and staff in the AXHU School of Urban Construction, during which the scheduling of theme event—BE WELL IN NATURE—turned into stellar performance with a full-rigged support from the School’s deputy dean YANG Ying; Tongji University professor ZHANG Deshun and assistant professor Mohamed; associate professor GUO Li at Sichuan Agricultural University; and over 80 experts with the social enterprises in this field, which was moderated by the Landscape Architecture Dept. managing director LI Yinan.

Scholars gathering at the core

Starting at 8:30 AM, the visiting professors aforesaid on the disciplinary front handled the talking points of “Residential Urban Vibrancy Living in Landscapes,” who explored widely the domains: the scientific development outlooks, sustainable ecosystem, regional culture and products of the environment, and more.

Stunned with some key cognitive issues while facing the “Landscape Architecture’s Challenges and Opportunities in Resonance, Integrity and Commonality,” Prof Zhang commended.

“According to the state-run strategies and international dynamics of what’s at stake when global climate change comes around, the ecological conservation and restoration might resort to university-level research-based solutions for teaching and learning updates in the major areas. The multiple breakthroughs through the interactions between ecological, social, and cultural factors into the future world, meanwhile, still leverage the interplay of centuries-old wisdom and modern technologies.”

With Prof. Mohamed’s new research outcome: “Integrating Nature for Urban Well-Being: From Tree Canopies to Window Views,” which proved the positive influence of natural landscapes on the human health in psychological conditions, and proposed an important concept of commingling the available natural elements nearby in helping the stereoscopic vision and aesthetic experiences thrive in all the seasons .

Consequently, “while shaping a people-centered urban living space, the ecological sublimity and sustainability to the core parts will be acting a critical, active, and creative role in the real world,” he said.

And Prof. Guo repurposed the traditional ideas of environmental protection and climate change, such as with her wider digital tech-based research with great intensity on the indigenous cultural connections: A Design of ‘Park City’—Western Shu Gardens, with which she expressed interest in the critical thinking and combined practices by and for all the local people, who agree to be co-building and co-living in a harmony of nature’s hospitality.’

Information-sharing on multiple fronts

During much of the Q&A interactivity session, there were so many participating students, who shared their academic stories and bigger questions, and then discussed openly with these leading, forward-looking experts on the spot, pursuing a broad range of substantive subjects across AXHU disciplines or in other contingent areas.

Some students questioned about “how to maximize individual’s academic performance during studying their undergraduate programs on campus; how to find their way into a different professional career of impact in the near future; how to check out a balanced development of Landscape Design regarding both ecological effects and economic benefits; and more.”

“Clearly, building economic momentum across the fundamental levels will have contributed to an ideal design of ecological reservation in tow, which is still being originally recognized for its dominance. So, both factors above should long be placed into a ‘symmetric matrix’ to evaluate in the untraditional workplaces at surging industries,” Prof. Zhang suggested.

Exemplified by the practical breakthroughs in innovation and transformation challenging at the Western Shu Gardens, a ‘new translation’ of the Chinese gardening traditions into some of other applied cases becomes very popular in recent years, Prof Guo shared inspiritingly on the site.

Trek in future sights

The meetings wrapped up along the way, during which all the faculty, students and staff have gained an impetus from the top-level scholars’ lecturing remarks specialized in the areas of Landscape Architecture to craft a mix of new ideas to underpin a time of high-quality disciplinary construction at AXHU.

And the School administration will continue to drive much innovation and transformation through academic exchange like this big moment and industry-level cooperation with aggressive claims, while advancing the Chinese strategic framework of “Well-being in Natural Beauty.”