#forewordFriday

In 2005, following two decades of professional accolades, Margie Ruddick created a new kind of garden that landed her in court. Through selective mowing, planting, pruning, and frequently doing no maintenance, the internationally renowned landscape designer, a winner of the Cooper Hewitt National Design Award, created a wild landscape that—while beautiful—was unlike any front yard her neighbors had ever seen.

With Chasing the Red Queen, Andy Dyer offers the first book to apply the Red Queen Hypothesis to agriculture. He illustrates that when selection pressure increases, species evolve in response, creating a never-ending, perpetually-escalating competition between predator (us) and prey (bugs and weeds).

Americans are increasingly demanding more walkable and transit-friendly neighborhoods that provide a higher quality of living. Despite pockets of revitalization, however, most US metros continue to follow old patterns of sprawl and central city decline. 

In Urban Acupuncture, architect and urbanist Jaime Lerner celebrates “pinpricks” of urbanism—projects, people, and initiatives from around the world that ripple through their communities to uplift city life.