Photo by Craig FritzTribune

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As viewed from a drainage culvert, a sculpture decorates the water retention structure that serves as a park at the corner of Spain Road and Imperate Street. The park in the High Desert neighborhood was designed by Sites Southwest and recently won an award from the New Mexico chapter of American Society of Landscape Architects.

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The quiet, well-tended park on Albuquerque's Northeast side could have been just another drainage pipe shuttling water from the Sandia Mountains to the river.

Instead, it's a place of flowers, trees, knowledge and art pulling residents of the High Desert neighborhood out of their homes and into the park's contemplative space.

That's one reason the High Desert Water Harvesting Garden and Storm Water Pond recently won one of several awards given by the New Mexico Chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects.

The society looked at landscape architecture across the state and recognized those that best exemplified creativity, visual interest, environmental sustainability, site responsiveness, cultural sensitivity and an ability to generate a sense of place.

Of the 22 entries, seven won awards. The High Desert project by Sites Southwest was the only one to receive the highest recognition: an award of excellence.

"It's been a real attraction," said Ray Berg, president of the board of the High Desert Residential Owners Association. "The thing that I think most people enjoy most about it is the flower and plants arrangement with all the colors."

Berg visits the park a couple of times a month. He heard of a wedding held there. He has seen photo shoots hosted at the combination of a garden and water drainage facility with gently sloping rock walls leading to a steel sculpture in the middle.

Jonathan Siegel, a local architect with the firm Siegel Design Architects and one of the judges choosing award winner, praised the project.

"It took a mundane or even problematic storm-water drainage situation and artfully and optimistically made it into an opportunity for beauty and interest and recognition of the forces of nature," he said. "There are lessons to be learned in all of our lives about taking a problem and making it into an asset, and about taking an issue we might take for granted and turning it into a really wonderful, playful opportunity."

Besides removing dirt from mountain water before sending it to the river through the city's drainage system, the facility sends any overflow to an adjacent garden.

Siegel said the awards, last given in 2001, offer a chance to highlight landscape architecture that expand people's conception of how to interact and live in their external environment.

Sites Southwest's entry, he said, was an example of the industry's taking a more holistic approach to its work that has grown along with an awareness of environmental issues. That means more and more designs are bringing an ethic of sustainability to limited resources, such as water in the desert.

"It's really special that this particular project was recognized because Sites Southwest is really all about sustainability," said Patrick Gay, principal and landscape architect with Sites Southwest. "The fact that the jury recognizes these types of projects as being important, I think, can help promote those ideals in the profession."

They're ideals Bob Oberdorfer has seen more and more. He's vice president of planning and design for Resource Technology Inc., another award winner and local engineering, landscape architecture, and environmental consulting firm.

The firm's award-winning project - Los Candelarias Village Center Streetscape in the North Valley - beautified a stretch of Candelaria Road.

Siegel called it "a delightful mix of artfulness and metaphor.

"The project was highly site specific, extracting images of the valley, and softening a bleak automotive stretch, making the place attractive and a cheerful set of discoveries," he said.

But landscape architects are only one part of innovation in the field.

"We also recognize the owners of the project," said Pat Westbrook, president of the New Mexico Chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects.

It takes clients such as High Desert Investment Corporation - the company that hired Sites Southwest - to make groundbreaking work happen, she said.

The High Desert project's approach arose partly out of necessity, explained Jack Eichorn, senior vice president with High Desert Investment Corporation.

A natural arroyo coming from the mountain cuts through the neighborhood. The water it carries needs a place to dump its dirt before jumping into the city's drainage system leading to the river.

With the area being highly visible, a straight-forward solution threatened residents with an eyesore, Eichorn said.

"We wanted to do something a little unique," he said. "We're really proud of Sites Southwest for what they came up with. Different colors of the plants that are there at different times of year are very beautiful."