Staff / Dr Luca Csepely-Knorr
Lecturer
0161 247 1121
Dr Luca Csepely-Knorr is leader of Year2 at the BA Landscape Architecture course and also coordinates the Humanities units. In addition to studio teaching, she lectures on 20th-century landscape architecture and urban design history and theory.
Luca’s research is multidisciplinary in its approach. Her cross-disciplinary interest in the theory and history of urban open space design derives from her education in a variety of subjects. She has an MSc degree in Landscape Architecture (Corvinus University, Budapest), an MA degree in Art History (Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest) and an MEd in Teaching Art History (Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest). She is particularly interested in the impact Western thinking had on Eastern European landscape and urban design theory at the turn of the 20th century.
Her PhD dissertation (Corvinus University, Budapest) investigated and described the evolution of modernist open space design theory through the comparative analysis of written and pictorial primary sources of public park theory from the middle of the 19th century to the early decades of the 20th century. The research summarized the most important theoretical changes and their international implications, rendering possible the examination, description and evaluation of Hungarian public park theory in an international context.
Due to the generous support of the RIBA Goldfinger Scholarship 2010, Luca is working on her MPhil degree in urban design history at the Manchester Institute for Research and Innovation in Art and Design. In her research, she investigates town planning movements at the turn of the 20th century from a landscape architectural point of view. She intends to describe and compare the urban design principles of the English landscape architect and civic designer Thomas Hayton Mawson (1861–1933) and the Hungarian architect Bela Rerrich (1881–1932), who was a key figure in the Hungarian urban design theory of the 20th century and the first teacher of garden design at the Royal Horticultural School (Budapest).
Before joining the MSA in 2011, Luca was appointed as a teaching assistant at the Department of Garden and Open Space Design at the Corvinus University of Budapest.
Research
A selection of recent research outputs.Journal Articles
Csepely-Knorr, L., 2011. 'The Birth of the Theory of Urban Green Systems in Britain and Hungary. Correspondence between Thomas H. Mawson and Béla Rerrich concerning Urban Design Principles', Acta Universitatis Sapientiae Agriculture and Environment, 3 (Supl.) (2011), 37-49.
Csepely-Knorr, L. and Sarospataki, M, 2009. ''A “Gellérthegyi Paradicsom” – A Budai Arborétum Felső kertjének építéstörténete a II. világháborúig' (The Building History of the Upper Garden of the ’Budai Arboretum’ until World War II )', 4D Tájépítészeti és Kertművészeti Folyóirat (4D Journal of Landscape Architecture and Garden Art), 2009/14, 2-25.
Presentations
Csepely-Knorr, L. and Szabo, Gy., 2012. 'The Aesthetics of Town Planning and its Relation to Landscape Architecture in the 20th Century', TAMOP-4.2.1.B-09/1/KMR-2010-0005 Research Programme, Final Conference. 18-20. 01. 2012. Budapest..
Csepely-Knorr, L. and Szabo, Gy., 2011. 'From England to Hungary. Correspondence between Thomas H. Mawson and Bela Rerrich concerning aesthetic principles', ECLAS Conference Ethics/Aesthetics, University of Sheffield, Sept 7-10, 2011.
Csepely-Knorr, L., 2010. 'Frederick Law Olmsted’s Public Parks, Parkways and Their Influence on the Continent', Fábos Conference on Landscape and Greenway Planning,, Budapest, Hungary, July 8-11, 2010, in Proceedings of Fábos Conference on Landscape and Greenway Planning, 671-678.
Csepely-Knorr, L., Gergely, A. and Olah, A., 2010. 'The Use of Archive City Plans in Contemporary Urban Planning', ISUF, 17th Conf. Int. Seminar on Urban Form, Hamburg, Germany, August 20-24, 2010, in www.isuf2010.de/Papers/Csepely-Knorr_Luca.pdf.
Csepely-Knorr, L., 2010. 'The ‘Art of Place Making’ and Social Change', ‘Beauty will save the world’: An Interdisciplinary Postgraduate Conference on Art and Social Change, University of Bristol, September 7-8, 2010.
Other Outputs
Csepely-Knorr, L., 2011. ', 'Urban Design and Landscape Architecture in the UK and Hungary: Thomas Mawson and Bela Rerrich'', guest lecture.
