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Landscape architects

Also called Landscape designer (licensed), Site designer, Park designer, Urban landscape architect, Landscape planner

In brief

In May 2025, BLS counted 19,600 US landscape architects, with median pay of $79,870 a year. Of the BLS counts since 2021, the highest was 20,370, in May 2023, close to the May 2025 count. The earliest figure here is an estimate of 500 from 1900, not measured the same way as today's count. The last full technology era for landscape architects: Integrated BIM-landscape platforms, 2015 to 2023.

What the sources say

Official outlook

BLS projects employment to grow 4.4% from 2025 to 2035.

BLS Employment Projections 2025-35

AI exposure studies

  • 36.8% of this job's tasks are exposed to large language models. Not a forecast of job losses. Eloundou and others, 2023
  • 0.045 estimated probability that the whole occupation could be computerised, over an unspecified number of years. Not a forecast of job losses. Frey and Osborne, 2013

Since the 2013 prediction

In 2013, Frey and Osborne put this job's probability of computerisation at 0.045. BLS counted 16,330 of these jobs in May 2013 and 19,600 in May 2025. The count moved sharply in one step, May 2020 to May 2021, when BLS changed how it estimates these counts, so no change is derived here.

Data as of BLS OEWS May 2025; BLS Employment Projections 2025-35. BLS publishes these counts as yearly survey snapshots and cautions against reading them as a precise trend. In May 2021 BLS changed how it estimates these counts (a model-based method using three years of survey data) and moved fully to the 2018 occupation codes, so part of a change across 2021 can come from the method rather than the work.

Last updated .

Cite this page
APA

Future History. (2026, October 11). Landscape architects: jobs and pay since 1900 [Data set; data as of BLS OEWS May 2025; BLS Employment Projections 2025-35]. https://futurehistory.earth/timeline/17-1012

Chicago

Future History. "Landscape architects: jobs and pay since 1900." Data as of BLS OEWS May 2025; BLS Employment Projections 2025-35. Last modified October 11, 2026. https://futurehistory.earth/timeline/17-1012.

BibTeX

@misc{futurehistory_17_1012, author = {{Future History}}, title = {Landscape architects: jobs and pay since 1900}, year = {2026}, month = oct, howpublished = {\url{https://futurehistory.earth/timeline/17-1012}}, note = {Last updated 2026-10-11. Data as of BLS OEWS May 2025; BLS Employment Projections 2025-35}, }

The access date is today's date on your device.

drag to travel through time
187519001925195019752000now
Country
2026
Known then as Landscape Architect (Olmsted-era professional title, informally used)
Known then as Landscape Architect (ASLA era, pre-licensing)
Known then as Landscape Architect (growing state registration era)
Known then as Landscape Architect / Licensed Landscape Architect (CLARB era, CAD transition)
Known then as Landscape Architects (BLS SOC 17-1012)
Known today as Landscape Architects (BLS SOC 17-1012)
Projected to still be called Landscape Architects (BLS SOC 17-1012)
Data from the May 2025 survey
US Employment
20K
Est.

Stated in source: BLS OEWS

Official statistic
Report an error
Median Annual Wage
$79,870
Est.

≈ $77,822 in 2024 prices (derived by us, CPI-adjusted)

Official statistic
Report an error
Beat · 1863

Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux officially adopt "landscape architect" as the title for their professional practice in their work for the New York park commissioners. Olmsted rejects "landscape gardener" as inadequate to describe a practice involving engineering, ecology, and public social science. The Library of Congress Olmsted Papers timeline marks 1863 as the year the title enters official use.

Beat · 1899

January 4, 1899: The American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA) is organized at the New York office of Parsons and Pentecost with eleven founding members: John Charles Olmsted (President), Nathan Franklin Barrett, Beatrix Farrand, Daniel W. Langton, Charles N. Lowrie, Warren H. Manning, Frederick Law Olmsted Jr., Samuel Parsons, George F. Pentecost Jr., Ossian Cole Simonds, and Downing Vaux. Beatrix Farrand is the only woman among the founders. The society establishes a national examining board in 1910 and launches the quarterly journal Landscape Architecture the same year.

Beat · 1900

Harvard University offers the first university degree in landscape architecture in 1900. The Department of Landscape Architecture at Harvard's Graduate School of Design (then the Lawrence Scientific School) would become the model for university programs nationally. By the mid-20th century, several dozen university programs existed; today there are approximately 70 accredited programs in the United States.

Beat · 1969

Ian McHarg publishes "Design with Nature" (Doubleday, 1969), formalizing overlay mapping as the foundational methodology for ecological landscape planning. McHarg argues that land use decisions should be driven by ecological suitability analysis rather than solely by economics or property ownership. The book becomes the intellectual foundation for what would later become GIS-based site analysis. It reshapes curriculum at landscape architecture schools and expands the profession's scope from design aesthetics into environmental science.

Beat · 1970

The Council of Landscape Architectural Registration Boards (CLARB) is founded, establishing a national body to administer the Landscape Architect Registration Examination (LARE) and coordinate state licensing boards. By 1970, most US states had some form of landscape architect registration. CLARB's formation creates a genuinely national credential structure: a landscape architect passing the LARE in one state can seek reciprocal licensure in others without repeating the full examination.

Beat · 2009

The 2007-2009 recession devastates design-profession employment. ASLA member surveys conducted between 2008 and 2012 reported that the profession lost approximately one-third of its workforce during the recession and its aftermath. Private real-estate development, commercial construction, and residential landscape design all contracted sharply; public agency landscape architecture work also declined as state and local governments cut capital budgets. Student enrollment in landscape architecture programs fell by nearly half from the 2009 peak by 2012. The recession accelerated consolidation in the profession: smaller sole-practitioner firms were absorbed into larger multi-discipline firms or closed.

Beat · 2021

The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA, also called the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law) is signed in November 2021, allocating $65 billion for water infrastructure, billions for federal lands trail and park improvements, and substantial funding for nature-based solutions to flood and drought resilience. Landscape architects are the designated design authority on most of the parks, trails, green corridors, and stormwater-management components. The ASLA estimates that the IIJA and Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) together represent the largest federal investment in landscape architect-relevant project types in history.

How to read this number

OEWS is a point-in-time survey snapshot, not a continuous time series; BLS advises against using it for year-over-year trend comparison.

Each dot is a cited figure over time; the dotted line only links them (values between aren't measured). Hollow dots are estimates.

Official statistic: Copied by a script from a statistics agency table or a published study's table, not retyped by hand. BLS figures and the forecast and exposure tables are also re-checked against that table on every data run. Researched context: Researched from the cited source rather than copied from it by a script, so it is not machine-checked yet. Spot a mistake? Each figure has a “Report an error” link.

Cited forecasts · present → 2035

Will AI replace landscape architects? What the research says

Each figure is stated by the named source; we publish no forecasts of our own. Where sources disagree, we show the disagreement rather than an average.

Each figure is stated by the named source; we publish no forecasts of our own. Where sources disagree, the spread is the honest signal.

What published forecasts say
Forecast change in the number of people doing this work, as published by each named source. Bars share one scale on every role, centred on zero and reaching the end at ±30%. Grey marks a small change, 3% or less either way.
BLS Employment Projections 2025-35
→ 2035
+4.4%
BLS National Employment Matrix, 2025-35 cycle, line for SOC 17-1012 (Landscape architects): 23.5 thousand jobs in 2025, projected 24.5 thousand in 2035, a change of +1.0 thousand (+4.4%). Matrix employment counts all jobs in the occupation, including self-employed workers (16.7% of this occupation in 2025). The average for all occupations in this cycle is +3.5%.
Official statisticReport an error
How exposed is this work to AI (research measures)
Scores as published by each study. Each row says what it measures. These measure what AI could technically do, not forecasts of jobs lost.
Eloundou et al. (2023), "GPTs are GPTs"
2023 study · Share of tasks exposed to LLMs (β, human-rated)
36.8%
of tasks
What this measures

Published occupation-level exposure from the paper's occ_level.csv for O*NET-SOC 17-1012.00 Landscape Architects. Shown: human-rated β = 0.368, the share of the occupation's tasks an LLM could do in at least half the time at equal quality, counting tasks that need LLM-powered software at half weight (β = E1 + 0.5 × E2). Other published measures for this occupation: human-rated α (LLM alone) 0.053 and γ (all LLM-assisted) 0.684; GPT-4-rated β 0.421. This measures how much of the work an LLM could touch, not how many jobs disappear.

Official statisticReport an error
Frey & Osborne (2013), "The Future of Employment"
2013 study · Probability of computerisation (2013 model)
4.5%
probability
What this measures

Published appendix value for SOC 2010 17-1012 Landscape Architects: probability of computerisation 0.045, rank 133 of 702 (rank 1 is least computerisable). Frey and Osborne estimated in 2013, with a Gaussian-process classifier on O*NET variables, how likely the whole occupation is to be technically automatable over "some unspecified number of years, perhaps a decade or two". It is a probability for the occupation, not a share of tasks and not a forecast of jobs lost.

Official statisticReport an error
Today, in this role

What's changing day to day for landscape architects

Three parts of your work where AI is already doing real lifting, and what stays yours.

AI is sitting alongside you hereProduce client presentation visualizations using Lumion 2025 or D5 Render 3.0: import Vectorworks Landmark or Civil 3D site model

Produce client presentation visualizations using Lumion 2025 or D5 Render 3.0: import Vectorworks Landmark or Civil 3D site model; use AI object recognition to auto-populate vegetation, hardscape, and site furniture; configure lighting, season, and atmospheric conditions for multiple views; generate photorealistic still images and walkthrough animations for design review presentations, public hearings, and regulatory submissions.[8],[9]

Tools picking this up
Where your edge is

AI-generated renderings can misrepresent planting maturity (renderings show growth while contracts deliver caliper trees), slope steepness, and maintenance condition. Set explicit expectations with clients about rendering conventions: vegetation shown at maturity, plant densities as specified not as installed. Reserve time in the visualization workflow for art direction: the landscape architect's feel for plant groupings, seasonal color sequences, and how morning vs. evening light reads on a water feature is the differentiator between generic and compelling presentation images.

AI is sitting alongside you hereSelect plant species for a project site using Land F/X AI plant wizard to generate a constraint-filtered shortlist (sun, water budget, USDA zone, native status, root volume) from the full BLS/USDA plant database

Select plant species for a project site using Land F/X AI plant wizard to generate a constraint-filtered shortlist (sun, water budget, USDA zone, native status, root volume) from the full BLS/USDA plant database; evaluate AI shortlist against ecological performance goals, client aesthetic preferences, and maintenance realities; finalize planting design in Vectorworks Landmark with AI-assisted plant scheduling and automatic callout generation.[7],[6],[1]

Where your edge is

AI plant selection tools optimize for quantitative constraints but cannot replicate the experienced landscape architect's feel for how a planting will perform over several years: storm resilience, seasonal interest sequencing, maintenance cost in local labor markets, or the ecological succession dynamic of a native meadow. Develop a specialism in regional ecology: knowledge of local ecotype provenance sources, invasive species risk, and climate-adaptive cultivar selection is a durable differentiator that AI shortlists cannot yet supply.

AI is sitting alongside you herePrepare planting specifications and construction documents in Vectorworks Landmark: use AI-assisted plant schedule generation from the design model

Prepare planting specifications and construction documents in Vectorworks Landmark: use AI-assisted plant schedule generation from the design model; export to CSI MasterFormat via Land F/X; use ChatGPT to draft specification section prose (warranty language, installation standards, substitution protocols) from ASLA standard templates; review AI-generated language for project-specific requirements, local climate warranties, and contractor substitution constraints before sealing the document set.[6],[7],[1]

Where your edge is

LLM-drafted specification language tends to reproduce generic ASLA standard language without project-specific modifications: it cannot insert the correct warranty duration for your jurisdiction's climate zone, the specific irrigation system brand the owner has standardized on, or the maintenance contractor's preferred mulch depth. Build a prompt library with your firm's standard project types and owner requirements so AI output requires minimal structural rewriting, but always review warranty, substitution, and acceptance testing clauses against the project's unique conditions before sealing.

Get started with these tools

Where landscape architects go next

Natural next steps for someone with your foundation: not exits, evolutions.

What each move takes

A direction you could grow

Architectural and Engineering Managers

Senior landscape architects with several years of experience frequently move into practice leadership roles (principal-in-charge, studio director, or A/E management) where the primary value shifts from design production to business development, team leadership, and firm strategy. As AI tools accelerate documentation and visualization production, firms increasingly need managers who understand the AI-augmented workflow well enough to set productivity targets, evaluate tool investments, and train junior staff, making experienced landscape architects with technology fluency the most attractive internal candidates for these roles. The transition requires developing project financial management, people leadership, and business development skills that design-focused practitioners rarely exercise at senior associate level.

What you'd add
  • · Project financial management: earned-value tracking, fee utilization, project profitability analysis in Deltek or similar
  • · Business development: RFP strategy, client relationship management, go/no-go decision frameworks
  • · People management: performance reviews, staff utilization planning, mentorship of junior designers
  • · Contract administration at the principal level: AIA B141 owner-landscape architect agreements, risk allocation, professional liability
  • · AI workflow governance for landscape practice: tool selection, prompt library management, quality control protocols for AI-assisted deliverables
What it takesSome new skills to pick up
Tools of the era

How has the work of landscape architects changed since 1863?

The tools that defined the work, one line per era. Select an era to see how it reshaped the work.

  • Drawing board, ink on linen/mylar, surveying instruments, and field observation

    For almost a century after Olmsted and Vaux coined the professional title, landscape architecture was an ink-and-paper craft. Plans were drawn by hand on linen or mylar, lettered with mechanical guides, reproduced by blueprint, and revised by erasure and redraw. Site analysis meant walking the ground with surveying instruments (theodolite, level, chain), recording elevations and features in field notebooks, and translating those observations into hand-contoured plans. Plant specifications were typed on a separate sheet and cross-referenced by hand to the planting plan. The drawing board was the workstation; the reference library was the office's physical collection of plant encyclopedias, soils surveys, and architectural standards. The richness of a firm's drawing archive was its intellectual capital.

  • Photographic reproduction, land form model, and early IBM-era punch-card mapping

    The postwar period brought two significant production tools to the profession: photocopying (replacing the expensive blueprint process) and scale models. Physical land-form models in cardboard and foam became standard on large public projects, allowing clients and community groups to read three-dimensional proposals without needing to interpret contour plans. The first academic experiments with computer-assisted landscape analysis emerged in the 1960s: Ian McHarg's "Design with Nature" (1969), which formalized overlay mapping as a design and planning methodology, became the intellectual foundation for what would eventually become GIS. Harvard's Laboratory for Computer Graphics developed SYMAP (Synagraphic Mapping System) in the 1960s, the first software to generate contour maps from data input. These tools were confined to research institutions; they had no practical impact on the daily drawing-board work of most practitioners.

  • AutoCAD (Autodesk, 1982) on personal computers

    Autodesk's release of AutoCAD in December 1982 was the first CAD software targeted at the personal computer rather than mainframe or minicomputer workstations. For landscape architects, adoption in the profession began in earnest in the mid-to-late 1980s as PC prices fell and the software became capable enough for production drawing. AutoCAD replaced hand drafting for site plans, grading plans, construction details, and planting plans. What had previously taken a drafter several days to produce on a drawing board could now be produced and revised in hours. Layer management allowed separate drawing components (grading, planting, hardscape, utilities) to be developed and plotted independently. The profession's production economics changed fundamentally: a smaller number of staff could produce the same drawing volume, but the range and complexity of what a firm could offer expanded significantly.

    Effect on the work

    AutoCAD eliminated the specialized "drafter" role that had previously existed in larger landscape architecture firms: a professional whose primary task was ink-on-mylar production drawing. By the mid-1990s, most landscape architects were expected to draft their own work at the computer. The number of non-licensed production drafters in the profession contracted. Whether this reduced overall employment in the profession or simply changed its skill composition is unclear from available data.

  • GIS (ArcInfo, ArcView, then ArcGIS) for site analysis and planning

    Geographic Information Systems entered mainstream landscape architecture practice gradually through the 1990s following the commercial release of Esri's ArcView 1.0 in 1991. GIS made Ian McHarg's overlay mapping methodology computational: soil surveys, flood zones, slope analysis, existing vegetation, ownership parcels, and utility infrastructure could all be layered, queried, and analyzed digitally rather than by hand on mylar overlays. For large-scale projects (regional greenways, campus master plans, natural resource assessments), GIS became essential. For smaller firms doing residential or commercial site work, it remained a specialty tool used more on public agency and planning projects than on design commissions. By the early 2000s, ArcGIS was standard in university landscape architecture programs and in firms with significant public-sector or planning project work.

  • 3D modeling and real-time visualization: SketchUp (2000), Lumion (2010), Rhino + Grasshopper (parametric)

    The early 2000s brought accessible 3D modeling to landscape architecture through SketchUp (originally @Last Software, released 2000; acquired by Google 2006; Trimble 2012) and the development of Rhino with Grasshopper for parametric surface modeling. What had previously required specialist rendering studios or expensive 3D packages (3ds Max, form Z) could now be accomplished by a landscape architect with a mid-range laptop. Client presentations shifted from hand-drawn perspectives and physical models to flythrough animations and interactive 3D views. Lumion (2010) introduced real-time rendering with photorealistic vegetation and atmospheric effects, making it possible to produce convincing landscape visualizations in minutes rather than hours. The effect on project communication was dramatic: public hearings for contested park and streetscape projects became more participatory because non-technical community members could actually read and respond to the design proposals.

  • Integrated BIM-landscape platforms: Vectorworks Landmark, Autodesk Civil 3D with stormwater modeling

    Building Information Modeling (BIM) reached landscape architecture practice in the mid-2010s primarily through two platforms: Vectorworks Landmark (which added BIM-compatible data structures and IFC export to its existing landscape drafting toolset) and Autodesk Civil 3D (which became standard on infrastructure-scale projects where landscape architects coordinate with civil engineers on grading, drainage, and utility design). Autodesk InfoDrainage allowed green infrastructure elements (bioswales, rain gardens, permeable paving) to be modeled hydraulically at the schematic design stage, giving landscape architects quantitative stormwater performance data they could use in permit applications and sustainability certifications (LEED, SITES). Climate Positive Design's Pathfinder tool (launched around 2020) calculated the carbon sequestration of planting designs, responding to public agency requirements for carbon-accounting on parks and streetscape projects.

  • AI-assisted design: Land F/X AI plant wizard, Lumion 2025 AI object recognition, ArcGIS GeoAI, ChatGPT for specs and proposals

    The 2023-2026 period brought purpose-built AI to nearly every major task in landscape architecture practice. Land F/X's AI plant selection wizard narrows a database of hundreds of thousands of species to a project-specific shortlist based on constraints (sun, water budget, USDA zone, root volume) in seconds. Lumion 2025 added AI object recognition that automatically replaces placeholder geometry with high-resolution plant and furnishing models. Autodesk Civil 3D's Grading Optimization tool uses machine learning to iterate grading surfaces against slope, drainage, and cut-fill constraints. ArcGIS Pro's deep learning tools automate vegetation mapping from aerial imagery. ChatGPT and similar LLMs are now widely used for proposal drafting, site analysis report writing, and planting specification language. AI adoption in landscape architecture is accelerating fastest in rendering, documentation, and plant selection workflows. Landscape architects who command the full AI-augmented stack can take on more projects, produce better-performing designs, and pitch quantified climate-resilience credentials that win public-sector work under IIJA and IRA funding streams.

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Landscape Architects employment and pay by year

On record since1863
Latest US employment19,600 (May 2025)Source: BLS OEWS May 2025Official statisticReport an error
Latest US median pay$79,870 (May 2025)Source: BLS OEWS May 2025Official statisticReport an error
Outlook+4.4% by 2035Source: BLS Employment Projections 2025-35Official statisticReport an error

In other countries

The latest figure each country's statistics agency publishes for this job. Each uses its own occupation definition, survey basis and currency, so the numbers are not directly comparable with each other or with the US figures.

  • Canada (NOC 21201)

    Employment, 2020
    2,030, Statistics Canada Census 2021 Official statistic Report an errorStatistics Canada Census of Population 2021: number of persons with employment income in NOC 21201 Landscape architects, Canada, reference year 2020. A recipients basis (anyone with employment income during the year), slightly broader than a point-in-time employed count. Statistics Canada Open Licence.
    Median pay, 2020
    C$77,500, Statistics Canada Census 2021 Official statistic Report an errorStatistics Canada Census of Population 2021 (Table 98-10-0586): median employment income for NOC 21201 Landscape architects, Canada, reference year 2020, full-year full-time workers (the basis comparable to the US OEWS full-time median). Statistics Canada Open Licence.
View all 27 years of cited US data, each linked to its source
YearUS employmentAnnual pay (median unless marked)SourceReport
1900500n/aEst., Wikipedia / ASLA Researched contextReport
19302,500n/aEst., History of landscape architecture Researched contextReport
19708,000$12,000Est., CLARB About page (organization founded… (employment) Researched contextEst., University of Missouri Libraries (pay) Researched contextReport
199016,000$35,000Est., BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook (employment) Researched contextEst., University of Missouri Libraries (pay) Researched contextReport
200318,910$50,480BLS OEWS May 2003 Official statisticReport
200417,960$53,120BLS OEWS May 2004 Official statisticReport
200520,220$54,220BLS OEWS May 2005 Official statisticReport
200622,130$55,140BLS OEWS May 2006 Official statisticReport
200721,890$57,580BLS OEWS May 2007 Official statisticReport
200821,130$58,960BLS OEWS May 2008 Official statisticReport
200918,940$60,560BLS OEWS May 2009 Official statisticReport
201016,680$62,090BLS OEWS May 2010 Official statisticReport
201115,760$63,240BLS OEWS May 2011 Official statisticReport
201215,750$64,180BLS OEWS May 2012 Official statisticReport
201316,330$64,790BLS OEWS May 2013 Official statisticReport
201418,110$64,570BLS OEWS May 2014 Official statisticReport
201519,820$63,810BLS OEWS May 2015 Official statisticReport
201619,420$63,480BLS OEWS May 2016 Official statisticReport
201719,040$65,760BLS OEWS May 2017 Official statisticReport
201818,660$68,230BLS OEWS May 2018 Official statisticReport
201920,280$69,360BLS OEWS May 2019 Official statisticReport
202020,730$70,630BLS OEWS May 2020 Official statisticReport
202117,430$67,950BLS OEWS May 2021 Official statisticReport
202218,120$73,210BLS OEWS May 2022 Official statisticReport
202320,370$79,320BLS OEWS May 2023 Official statisticReport
202419,580$79,660BLS OEWS May 2024 (employment) Official statisticBLS OEWS May 2024 (pay) Official statisticReport
202519,600$79,870BLS OEWS May 2025 Official statisticReport
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