Mary Ritchie

MLA Landscape Architecture

Touching Ground: Embodied Methods of Design

What forms of knowledge emerge through embodied engagement with material and the context it is situated within?

How might we practice landscape architecture if embodied, place-based knowledge were treated as integral rather than supplementary to the design process?

This thesis argues that landscape architecture must more intentionally integrate embodied, outdoor practices into the design process in order to foster a deeper understanding of and engagement with the primary medium of the field: the land itself. When we study a site through digital means, we detach our bodies and minds from the physical material we are working with. Embodied practices encourage a slower, more attentive mode of observation that engages both mind and body through tangible actions and sensory experiences. Through physical touch and sensory engagement, we gain insight into a place across many scales, from the granular texture of soil to the vast networks each microscopic particle is entangled within. By engaging in alternative modes of observation, I aim to study how a hyper-situated understanding of place can inform design practices that are adaptive and responsive to the existing conditions shaping and influencing the boundaries of a site.

A hand holds a clump of soil with exposed roots against a blurred grassy landscape. Large orange text reads “TOUCHING GROUND,” with smaller text below reading “Embodied Methods of Design,” “Mary Ritchie,” and “MLA Thesis 2026.”

Touching Ground: Embodied Methods of Design
2026
Cover image for MLA Thesis

The image introduces the thesis focus on tactile engagement, embodied observation, and material-based methods of site investigation in landscape architecture. Digital photograph with text overlay.

A person sits in a sandy dune landscape while making a bowl-shaped form in the ground. Marsh grasses and trees extend across the background beneath a clear sky.

Touching the Dune
Digital video stills

Frames from a video documenting a fieldwork process at RISD Beach. The video shows the process of making of a bowl-shaped form directly in the sand at the front of the dune. The work explores tactile engagement, site observation, and material-based methods of understanding landscape through touch and making.

A person sits on a forest floor covered with grass and leaves while shaping a bowl-like form in the ground by hand.

Touching the Forest
Digital video stills

Frames from a video documenting a fieldwork process at RISD Beach. The video shows the process of making of a bowl-shaped form directly in the forest floor. The work explores tactile engagement, site observation, and material-based methods of understanding landscape through touch and making.

Rendering of seven 3D-scanned plaster ground casts arranged in a transect, showing varied bowl-shaped forms and textures collected from different points across a landscape.

Transect of Ground Casts

A series of 3D scans of plaster casts made from bowl-shaped impressions formed directly in the ground along a transect through the landscape. By moving across different points in the landscape, the casts reveal variations and relationships between form and texture at a granular scale. Together, the collection functions as a tactile mapping tool that captures embodied observations and material traces of the environment.

Aerial image of RISD Beach with circular markers indicating locations of bowl-shaped ground casts.

Spatial Context Map

Aerial map diagramming an area from bay to forest, marking locations where bowl-shaped ground casts were made along a transect at RISD Beach in Barrington, RI.

A hand sculpts clay pieces arranged in rows, overlaid with complex graphs and text about internal and external artistic processes, exuding a reflective tone.

Diagram of Focus during an Iterative Making Process

This diagram maps shifts in attention during a repetitive form-making process. It compares how different conditions—such as walking in the landscape versus sitting in a studio—affect focus. Variables like environment, movement, and sensory input are introduced to show transitions between internal concentration and external awareness. The visual graph tracks how focus changes over time, highlighting the relationship between embodied movement and observational attention during making.

A collage of historical images depicting different land use narratives over time in what is now called Barrington, RI.

Historical Narratives Timeline

A timeline collage mapping changing relationships to land in Barrington, Rhode Island, from Indigenous stewardship to contemporary private land ownership land. The sequence layers historical imagery and text to show shifts in land management practices over time.

On the left, a black and white map shows streets and waterways, labeled "A Map of Barrington". On the right, a collage depicts the same landscape with images of trees, daisies, a bird in flight, and a paw print, labeled "A Map of Sowams."

This paired mapping exercise compares two ways of representing the same landscape to explore how place names shape relationships to land and how different forms of representation communicate different kinds of knowledge. One map depicts Barrington in a conventional architectural style. The second map represents Sowams through a collage of images of plant communities that I observed and served as spatial cues for where I am in the landscape.

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