September 16–18, 2026 | Los Angeles Convention Center | Los Angeles, California

What role can landscape architecture play in creating healthier, more resilient, and more nature-connected communities?

Thousands of landscape architects, designers, urban planners, ecologists, researchers, educators, manufacturers, and allied professionals will gather in Los Angeles September 16–18 for the ASLA 2026 Conference on Landscape Architecture, the American Society of Landscape Architects’ premier annual gathering.

This year’s theme, “Action! Design in Motion. Work in Progress.”, reflects a profession responding in real time to changing environmental, social, and cultural conditions.

Los Angeles provides a fitting backdrop. Water, ecology, infrastructure, public space, climate, and community needs intersect throughout the city, offering both challenges and real-world examples of how landscape architecture can shape the relationship between people, nature, and the built environment.

From Ideas to Living Landscapes

The scale of this year’s educational program is significant: 109 education sessions and 24 field sessions across seven education tracks.

Programming will explore resilience, ecology, sustainability, design innovation, project delivery, emerging technologies, professional practice, and other issues shaping the future of landscape architecture.

The field sessions are particularly valuable because they take learning outside the convention center and into Los Angeles itself, giving attendees an opportunity to see landscapes and adaptation strategies firsthand.

Rather than presenting landscape architecture as a finished product, the conference theme emphasizes design as an evolving process—one that must continually respond to climate, ecological systems, communities, and changing conditions.

Nature as Infrastructure

The conference also reflects an increasingly important shift in the built-environment conversation: landscapes aren’t simply the spaces surrounding buildings.

Trees, vegetation, soils, water, habitat, parks, green infrastructure, and other living systems can play functional roles in communities. They can help address heat, stormwater, biodiversity, ecological restoration, resilience, and human experience while creating stronger connections between people and the natural environment.

That systems-level perspective provides an important complement to conversations happening within architecture and interior design.

Biophilic design may focus on strengthening people’s connection with nature in the places they occupy, while landscape architecture works at scales ranging from individual sites to neighborhoods, cities, and regional ecosystems. Together, these disciplines demonstrate how nature can become more intentionally integrated throughout the built environment.

Exploring Los Angeles as a Living Laboratory

The conference’s location makes the field component especially relevant.

ASLA describes Los Angeles as a city shaped by infrastructure, ecology, public space, water, and community needs—conditions that create opportunities to examine how landscapes respond to environmental pressures while serving the people who use them.

Attendees will be able to move beyond classroom discussions and explore projects throughout the region, seeing how design strategies are being applied to real landscapes.

The emphasis on work that is still evolving also acknowledges something inherent to designing with nature: living systems change.

Plants grow. Climate conditions shift. Water availability changes. Communities evolve. Landscapes require stewardship and adaptation long after installation.

A Major Marketplace for Landscape Innovation

Beyond education, the ASLA EXPO brings hundreds of manufacturers, suppliers, and service providers together to showcase products, materials, technologies, and solutions for landscape architecture.

With more than 300 exhibitors, the EXPO provides another look at how the industry is responding to changing expectations around sustainability, resilience, materials, technology, and environmental performance.

For professionals interested in how plants and living systems are being incorporated across the built environment, the combination of education, field experiences, products, research, and cross-disciplinary conversation makes ASLA 2026 an important event to watch.

Ultimately, this year’s theme captures a central reality of designing with nature:

The work is never truly finished. Landscapes grow, adapt, and respond—and successful design must be prepared to evolve with them.