Inspired by social concerns, designers combined artistic principles, civil engineering techniques, and agricultural methods to create new shapes for our land. Fredrick Law Olmstead was the one of the firsts to really establish this profession. He had become the father of American landscape architecture. It is his visions that will always guide the professions philosophy. H.W.S. Cleveland, Olmstead's friend, and numerous others created a more established profession with new forms of designed landscapes emerging on the American scene. Among these new forms was the urban park and recreational spaces that evolved from gardens to cemeteries as well as parks, clubs, golf courses, resorts, and zoos. Women were also on the rise in the profession. It was landscape architect Beatrix Farrand that actually founded the ASLA. She is best known for designing the Dumbarton Oaks gardens in Washington D.C. The designer of the landscape around Tara for "Gone with the Wind" and many other early film sets was also a young women that went by the name of Florence Yoch. Around this time period the parkway emerged as an accepted landscape feature. Planning entire communities became an important practice and this started a new era of designing residential areas. Now in the twenty first century, women make up almost half of the profession (World Book 58.) The architecture profession must continue providing constant changes to improve the well being of society and nature. Today, this field has matured and is expanding into new and exciting horizons. "It has been said that the profession has reached the point where it now has the ability to invent its own future" (Tishler 1.) There is an inadequate public appreciation for the value of design and planning in enhancing the quality of life in our communities. People don't realize how much a design for their yard can change the appearance and value of a house.
