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Contributing Institution:
University of California, Berkeley. College of Environmental Design. Environmental Design Archives
Title: Walter Hood Collection
Creator:
Hood, Walter
Identifier/Call Number: 2014-09
Physical Description:
50 Linear Feet:
12 cartons, 8 boxes, 7 flat files, 14 models and 57 GB (13,351 files)
Date (inclusive): 1980-2014
Abstract: The Walter Hood Collection spans the years 1980-2014 and includes files created by Hood and his firm Hood Design Studio. The
collection is organized into five series: Personal Papers, Professional Papers, Office Records, Project Records, and Digital
Files. These records contain project files, drawings, firm portfolios, photographs, models, and personal sketch books.
Physical Location: 3200A Regatta
Language of Material:
English
.
Collection is open for research. Digital files are available with advanced request in the Environmental Design Archives (EDA)
reading room, and are not available online. Boxes 4-8 contain the physical media that digital files originated from. Access
to digital files on original carriers is prohibited; users will be provided with access copies. Technical limitations may
hinder the EDA's ability to provide access to some digital files.
All requests for permission to publish, reproduce, or quote from materials in the collection should be discussed with the
Curator.
[Identification of Item], Walter Hood Collection, Environmental Design Archives, University of California, Berkeley.
Arrangement and description of this collection was funded by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Manuscript materials were processed in 2019, and digital materials were processed in 2020. The digital files in this collection
were received on 235 pieces of media (224 compact discs, 1 floppy disk, 10 zip disks). Logical copies of all media were made
using Data Accessioner; 23 carriers which contained out of scope content, or were unreadable and files could not be retrieved,
were removed from the collection. Logical copies were analyzed using TreeSize. Temporary files and system files were identified
and removed, and files were screened for personally identifiable information (PII). Files were not reformatted, and file names
are original to the creator. Original disks were retained and are included in the collection. Processed files were exported
in their original formats and file structures to Merritt for long term preservation.
Physical Characteristics and Technical Requirements
Digital content is found in Series V: Digital Files. Technical limitations such as obsolete file formats, lack of required
software, or file degradation may hinder the EDA's ability to provide access to some digital files. Advance notice is required
for use.
For a complete inventory of the contents of Series V: Digital Files, see the attached file directory.
Walter Hood (1958- ) is an artist, designer, landscape architect and professor at the University of California, Berkeley's
Landscape Architecture and Environmental Design Department (Chair, 1998-2002). Hood was born in Charlotte, North Carolina,
and has spent more than two decades living and working in Oakland, California. He received his bachelor's degree in Architecture
from North Carolina University (1981) and received both Master of Architecture and Master of Landscape Architecture degrees
from the University of California, Berkeley (1989). Since 1992, his firm, Hood Design Studio, has participated in research,
art installations, architectural and landscape commissions, and urban design. Hood's innovative public spaces are known for
the way they embrace the essence of urban environments and for their links to urban redevelopment and neighborhood revitalization.
His projects such as Oakland's Lafayette Square and Splash Pad Park have been lauded as transformational. Other significant
projects include the gardens and landscape of the new de Young Museum in San Francisco, the landscape for the California African
American Museum in Los Angeles, and the Sculpture Terrace for the Jackson Museum of Wildlife Art in Jackson, Wyoming. As a
leading national landscape architect, Hood's winning competition entries include designs for the Center for Civil & Human
Rights in Atlanta, GA; and the public artwork, Garden Passage, in Pittsburgh, PA.
Hood's published monographs include Culture Now, National Design
Triennial,(Princeton Architectural Press, NY, 2000), Blues
& Jazz Landscape Improvisations (Poltroon Press, 1993), Urban Diaries (Spacemaker Press, 1997), and Everyday
Urbanism, Urban Diaries: Improvisation in West Oakland, CA (Monacelli Press, Inc.,
1999). His essay "Macon Memories" is included in Sites of Memory:
Perspectives on Architecture and Race (Princeton Architectural Press, 2001). Most
recently, he edited the volume Black Landscapes Matter with
Grace Mitchell Tada (University of Virginia Press, 2020).
His work was featured in the 2006 exhibit, "The Good Life: New Public Spaces for Recreation," at the Van Alen Institute in
New York. Hood was the 2009 recipient of the prestigious Cooper-Hewitt National Design Award for Landscape Design and has
exhibited and lectured on his professional projects and theoretical works nationally and abroad. Recently, his work was featured
in the Museum of Modern Art's exhibition, Reconstructions: Architecture and Blackness in America (2020).
Hood has been a fellow at the American Academy in Rome in Landscape Architecture (1997); received a Distinguished Master of
Fine Arts from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2010); is a recipient of the Academy of Arts and Letters Architecture
Award (2017); was awarded the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize (2019); and is a MacArthur Fellow (2019).
He teaches in the Department of Landscape Architecture and Environmental Planning at the University of California, Berkeley
and is the creative director of Hood Design Studio in Oakland, CA.
Sources:
Hood Design Studio website, www.hooddesignstudio.com
College of Environmental Design website, www.ced.berkeley.edu/ced/faculty-staff/walter-hood
Walter Hood Collection, Environmental Design Archives, University of California, Berkeley.
The collection is organized into five series: Personal Papers, Professional Papers, Office Records, Project Records, and Digital
Files. Within each manuscript series (Series I-IV), the archivist has imposed order where original order was not evident.
The Digital Files series has maintained original order. Media such as compact discs, floppy disks and zip disks were numbered
in the order in which they were found in the collection. The file structures contained on each piece of media has been maintained
and recreated through logical copies. Please see the attached file directory list for a complete inventory of all available
files.
The Walter Hood Collection comprises both manuscript materials and digital records. The manuscript materials are organized
into four series: Personal Papers, Professional Papers, Office Records, and Projects Records. The manuscript material consists
primarily of project files and drawings, firm portfolios, photographs, models, and personal sketch books. Physical and digital
files for design work span the length of Hood's career from 1996-present, but primarily focuses on projects completed in California.
Well documented projects include Lafayette Square Park, Oakland, CA (1998-2001); Splash Pad Park, Oakland, CA (2001-2002);
the de Young Museum, San Francisco, CA (2001-2005); and the Oakland Waterfront Promenade, Oakland, CA (2002-2005).
Digital records are located in the Digital Files series, which contains content that is pertinent to each of the series listed
above. This series consists of project records created for Hood Design Studio, and is cross-referenced on the Project Index
under a column titled "Digital." Files include photographs of projects, drawings, presentation files, and video files. Original
file formats include .tiff, .jpg, .psd, .ai, and .dwg. There are 13,351 digital files in this series (57 GB), dating from
1994-2010 according to their "Last Modified" dates.
SMWM Collection, 2013-01, Environmental Design Archives. College of Environmental Design. University of California, Berkeley.
Berkeley, California.
Subjects and Indexing Terms
Landscape architects -- California.
Landscape architecture, Modern -- 20th century -- California -- San Francisco Bay Area.
Landscape architecture records.
Landscape architecture drawings.
Landscape design
Urban design