Robert L. Thayer is Emeritus Professor of Landscape Architecture and the founder of the Landscape Architecture Program at the University of California, Davis.  In his thirty-five year academic career he has written two books, several book-length monographs and over 100 academic articles and papers in the field of landscape architecture.  Holding degrees from Cornell University and Stanford University, Robert Thayer has spent nearly his entire professorial career at UC Davis, exceptions being appointments as James Hill Visiting Professor of Landscape Architecture at the University of Minnesota in 1988, and Beatrix Farrand Distinguished Professor of Landscape Architecture and Environmental Planning, College of Environmental Design, at UC Berkeley in Fall, 2006.

Professor Thayer was Chair of the UC Davis Department of Environmental Design from 1988-90.  He is also past Chair of the national Landscape Architectural Accreditation Board, with responsibilities for the certification of over sixty university graduate and undergraduate programs in landscape architecture in the United States.  He remains a member of UCD graduate groups in Geography and Community Development and has guided numerous Doctoral and Masters candidates. 

Thayer received nine awards for his research and writing from the American Society of Landscape Architects, including the society's highest annual award for any landscape architectural work, the 1994 President's Award of Excellence, for his book, Gray World, Green Heart:  Technology, Nature, and the Sustainable Landscape. In 2003, Thayer published LifePlace: Bioregional Thought and Practice, by University of California Press.   LifePlace won the Sierra Club's "Best Environmental Book" Award for the California Mother Lode Chapter in 2004. As an emeritus, Thayer continues his work on regenerative systems in landscape architecture, sustainable design, bioregional theory and practice, wind/renewable energy policy, and post oil-peak landscape re-localization.     

Thayer has held a professional license as a landscape architect in the State of California since 1974, and was formerly a principal partner in the planning and landscape architectural firm CoDesign, from 1983-2000.  Thayer was elected as a Fellow of the American Society of Landscape Architects in 1989, at the age of 42.  In June-July of 2004, he became the first Education Foundation Scholar of the New Zealand Institute of Landscape Architects.

Rob Thayer is active in local bioregional non-profit organizations and was a founding member of the UC Davis Putah Cache Bioregion Project and the Blue Ridge Berryessa Natural Area Conservation Partnership.  He also has served on the steering committees of the Putah Creek Council and Cache Creek Conservancy.

Professor Emeritus Robert Thayer (Landscape Architecture, 1973-2002) has been elected to the 2007 class of the Academy of Fellows of the Council for Educators in Landscape Architecture (CELA). The intent of the CELA Academy of Fellows is "to honor a faculty member's lifetime accomplishments in teaching, scholarship/creative activity and service.  The accomplishments must add up to excellent endeavor sustained over an extended period of time that is truly inspiring and significant.  Nominees are senior members of the academy and must have been a fulltime faculty at a member school (or schools) for a minimum of fifteen years."

Thayer (along with UC Davis colleagues Professor Emeritus David Robertson, English, Professor Peter Moyle, Wildlife and Fish Conservation Biology, Dean Dennis Pendleton, University Extension, and Dr. Joyce Gutstein, Director, Public Service Research Program) also received a U.S. Congressional Citation for Service with UC Davis' Putah - Cache Bioregion Project, 1993-present.

Rob Thayer is currently a visiting professor teaching graduate courses in landscape architecture and environmental planning in the College of Environmental Design at UC Berkeley.

Professor Thayer remains involved in research on the energetics of land use, local agriculture, and transportation. He rides a solar-charged electric motorcycle, one of the first such vehicles in Northern California.

He is an avid paddle sports enthusiast, and is working on an extramural book (The Pull of the Paddle: Canoe Cultures Past and Present) that explores the culture and design of Polynesian, Northwest Coast, Canadian, Greenland, and other indigenous canoes and kayaks of North America and the Pacific.

Since 1976, Rob Thayer has lived in Village Homes, a solar community in Davis.

• Fellow, American Society of Landscape Architects, since 1989.
• Member, American Society of Landscape Architects, since 1973.
• Member, Council of Educators in Landscape Architecture, 1977 to present.
• Member, Sigma Lambda Alpha (Landscape Architecture Honorary Society).
• National Jury for Planning and Urban Design, American Society of Landscape Architects Professional Awards Program, 1995.
• Master Advisor, Landscape Architecture Program
• Landscape Architecture Accreditation Board, member, 1994-present.
• Roster of Visiting Evaluators (ROVE), Landscape Architectural Accreditation Board, 1985-1994.

Professor Thayer's latest article, The World Shrinks, the World Expands: Information, Energy and Relocalization, can be downloaded for research and teaching purposes here.

LifePlace: Bioregional Thought and Practice (2003, UC Press)

http://www.ucpress.edu/books/pages/9485.html

University of California faculty, staff, and students only: access to the full manuscript is available at http://ark.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/kt167nc3z4/

Gray World, Green Heart (1994, Wiley)

http://www.powells.com/biblio?isbn=047157273x

http://www.asla.org/Members/awards/awardwinners/Awrds94.htm

Putah-Cache Bioregion Project

http://bioregion.ucdavis.edu/who/overview.htm

http://bioregion.ucdavis.edu/book/Contents.html

Blue Ridge-Berryessa Natural Area

http://www.brbna.org/mapintro.htm

http://www.brbna.org/CF/index.htm

Cache Creek Conservancy

http://www.cachecreek.org

Landscape Theory

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0812218213/002-9158624-8012807?v=glance&n=283155

http://www.caup.washington.edu/larch/academics research/reading.php

http://www.gsd.harvard.edu/research/publications/hdm/back/18_france.html

Regenerative Systems/Sustainable Design

http://web1.arch.hawaii.edu/events/EW99/thayer.htm

Wind Energy

http://www.mluri.sari.ac.uk/ccw/task-two/strategies.html

http://www.wind-works.org/articles/tilting.html

Village Homes

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1559636866/002-9158624-8012807?v=glance&n=283155

Awards & Appointments

http://nzila.co.nz/links_edfoundation.asp#2

http://www.asla.org/Members/awards/awardwinners/Awrds94.htm

http://www.asla.org/Members/awards/awardwinners/Awrds91.htm

http://www.asla.org/Members/awards/awardwinners/Awrds85.htm

http://www.asla.org/Members/awards/awardwinners/Awrds84.htm

http://www.asla.org/Members/awards/awardwinners/Awrds83.htm

4/17/08