The European Commission and Europa Nostra are recognising landscape architect Prof. em. Peter Latz with the European Heritage Award / Europa Nostra Award 2025 in the ‘Heritage Champions’ category as a pioneer of industrial heritage and landscape architecture in Europe. For more than five decades, he has shown how derelict ‘bad places’ can be transformed into ‘oases’, vibrant places for culture, ecology and public life.

In his most famous project, the Duisburg Nord Landscape Park, the disused Thyssen-Meiderich blast furnace plant was transformed into a multifunctional landscape as part of the IBA Emscher Park in the 1990s. The park, whose planning and realisation Peter Latz described in his book ‘Rostrot’ (Rust Red), attracts 1.2 million visitors annually and is a showcase project of the European Route of Industrial Heritage. Today, the park is protected as a garden monument.

He and his firm Latz + Partner, now headed by Tilman Latz and Iris Dupper, have also succeeded in combining history, functionality and ecological renewal in other significant projects. To name just a few, these include the Bürgerpark Hafeninsel, built in the 1980s on the bombed-out coal port of the city of Saarbrücken; the Plateau de Kirchberg in Luxembourg, where the motorway was transformed into an urban boulevard after the turn of the millennium; and the Parco Dora in Turin, built on and incorporating the proud legacy of the automotive industry.

Peter Latz taught at the universities of Kassel and Munich, held visiting professorships at Harvard and the University of Pennsylvania, and inspired generations of landscape architects. He was awarded the IFLA Sir Geoffrey Jellicoe Award, the Rosa Barba European Landscape Prize and the Friedrich Ludwig von Sckell Ring of Honour, among others.

‘His influence extends far beyond Germany – through his worldwide teaching activities, his great social commitment and a lasting impact on how post-industrial landscapes can be preserved and reimagined,’ the jury noted, among other things.

The prize is part of the European Heritage Awards / Europa Nostra Awards, which will be presented to 30 outstanding projects from 24 countries in 2025. They are co-financed by the European Commission as part of the Creative Europe programme. A total of 251 applications from 41 countries were submitted.

The award ceremony will take place on 13 October 2025 in Brussels as part of the European Cultural Heritage Summit.

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>> Further information about the prize

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