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SPEAKER Landscape architects, plant hunters, garden designers in France, Morocco, and Mexico
French landscape architects Éric Ossart and Arnaud Maurières conceive of the garden as a living experience that engages the senses, the imagination and the emotions. They began as nurserymen; Arnaud then founded the Mediterranean School of Gardens and Landscape in Grasse, whilst Éric spent five years as lead landscape architect at the Chaumont-sur-Loire Garden Festival. They have created all kinds of gardens in France, both private and public, but it is their exuberant ‘cosmopolitan’ arid and steppe gardens developed in southern Morocco and the Mexican highlands that have brought them the greatest recognition. Their talk at DeltaLand will focus on the creation of these low-wateruse, high-biodiversity gardens. The books and projects of these nomadic landscape architects promote a way of creating gardens that respects the climate and nature, based on adaptation to the environment and a sensitive relationship with time and the landscape.
SPEAKER Architect and landscape architect, designer of gardens and parks in Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, and Peru
For 40 years, this prestigious Chilean architect and landscape architect has been dedicated to the design of gardens and landscapes, seeking to ensure that each project is born from the site itself: its geography, climate, soil and vegetation. His work draws deep inspiration from the natural environment and the richness of native flora. Throughout his career, he has created nearly a thousand hectares of lush gardens and parks, both public and private, in various regions of Chile, Argentina, Uruguay and Peru, amongst other countries, and thus across a wide range of latitudes and climatic and soil conditions. At DeltaLand, Juan Grimm will present his approach to projects, ensuring that the design engages with nature, respecting the landscape’s processes and allowing the garden to integrate naturally into its surroundings. His Bahía Azul experimental garden, which he began creating 30 years ago on a cliff on the central Chilean coast, is considered one of the iconic gardens of the 21st century.
SPEAKER Landscape architect, founder of The Garden by Chio, based in Seville
Chio holds a degree in Agricultural Engineering from the Polytechnic University of Madrid (UPM), specialising in Environment and Land Use Planning. During her time at university, she took part in a research programme at the University of Florida on organic farming and furthered her training with a postgraduate degree in the Restoration of Historic Parks and Gardens at the UPM School of Architecture. In 2015, she founded her studio, The Garden by Chio, in Dubai, where she spent six years working mainly on private projects. She is currently based in Seville, from where she designs and manages gardens across Spain, projects into which she pours her paher passion for botany, her technical expertise and her commitment to sustainability and ecosystem conservation. At DeltaLand, she will explain the creation and maintenance of the rooftop garden at the Sherry Homes De La Riva development in Jerez de la Frontera, and the viability of such spaces in the most challenging climatic conditions.
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SPEAKER Landscape architect, science communicator, and botanist specializing in South African flora
The gardens created by this award-winning South African landscape architect are praised both for their visual impact and for their ability to tell stories, often inspired by the landscapes, people and history of Africa. He has showcased his projects at prestigious international exhibitions, including the Chelsea Flower Show in London, where he has received five gold medals and the Best in Show and Lawrence awards, and the Gardens by the Bay festival in Singapore, where his innovative designs have earned him multiple accolades. A familiar face on television, Leon Kluge has presented and contributed to numerous gardening and design programmes. His versatile approach, his vast knowledge and passion for plants, and his commitment to sustainability are channelled into public installations and private commissions in his native South Africa and countries such as China, South Korea and even Spain. In his talk at DeltaLand, he will continue to reveal the enormous botanical wealth of the Cape region.
PONENTE Botanist, horticulturist, and director of the Mediterranean Seeds and Bulbs nursery in Greece
Known online as Liberto Dario, Eleftherios Dariotis is a Greek horticulturist and botanist who has been passionate about plants since childhood. Today he runs two nurseries on the Greek mainland, one in Paiania, near Athens, where he grew up, and another under development in Crete, which together house a collection of over 8,000 species. To achieve this, he has carried out intensive plant hunting: over the last 13 years he has collected more 5,000 taxa, which he tests in his experimental garden without irrigation. Trained in horticulture in Greece, plant biology at the University of California, Davis, and holding a Master’s degree in Horticulture from the University of Reading in the UK, he has worked in municipal horticulture and landscaping and is a collaborator with several botanical institutions, for which he carries out collection and research work on rare and endangered plants. Liberto will focus his talk on the use of bulbous plants in gardening projects in the Mediterranean region.
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SPEAKER Architect and landscape architect, head of the R&D and Sustainability Department at Batlleiroig
Joan Batlle Blay holds a degree in architecture from the Barcelona School of Architecture at the Polytechnic University of Catalonia (UPC). In 2014, he joined Batlleiroig, an architecture and landscape architecture studio committed to the environment and to finding solutions to the climate emergency, where he is now a partner, head of the R&D and Sustainability department, and director of exhibitions. He is also an associate professor in the Department of Urban Planning, Territory and Landscape at the UPC. As a landscape architect, he has participated in notable Batlleiroig projects, such as the Agroparc Ametller Origen, the Rambla de la Girada, the covering of the Ronda de Dalt, the new LaMercedes eco-neighbourhood, and various public spaces and urban interventions in the Barcelona metropolitan area. As exhibition director, he has contributed to the studio’s presence at the Venice Biennale and in exhibitions such as Metròpolis Barcelona and Metròpolis Verda. In his presentation, he will address the importance of SUDS in landscape design projects.
SPEAKER Former Director of the Green Spaces and Environment Department in Nantes
From 2001 to 2020, Jacques Soignon headed the Parks and Gardens Department of the city of Nantes, in Upper Brittany, a role that contributed to the city’s international recognition in the fields of landscape architecture, horticultureand urban ecology. He is an engineer from the National School of Horticulture in Versailles and holds a Master of Science in Ecology from the University of Rennes. He is currently vice-president of the Conservatoire des Collections Végétales Spécialisées, an association dedicated to the recognition and protection of plant diversity in France. He also collaborates with the International Camellia Society and, since 2023, has been editing a literary collection dedicated to plants, Échappées végétales (Plant Escapes). At DeltaLand, the French expert will recount his 19 years’ experience in the maintenance of Nantes’ gardens and green spaces in a presentation that will highlight the magnificent spectacle of life offered by both cultivated and wild vegetation.
SPEAKER Landscape architect, landscape manager of the Les Colombières garden, and founder of La Compagnie des Arcades, which designs and maintains gardens in the Mediterranean region
Born in Arles, Frédéric Trifilio has spent nearly 35 years designing, planting, and maintaining gardens in the Mediterranean region. Together with landscape architects Éric Ossart and Arnaud Maurières (O+M), he restored the Les Colombières garden in Menton—created in 1920 by Ferdinand Bac and designated a Historic Monument—and subsequently took charge of its landscape management. At the same time, he studied botany, taught at the Antibes Institute of Landscape Architecture, and chaired the JAM (Jardiniers Autour de la Méditerranée) association, a platform for experience-sharing and exchange that brings together some 40 professional members. In 2006, he founded Les Jardins des Arcades in Provence, a company that brings botanical expertise, creativity, and knowledge of historic and contemporary gardens. Later, in 2021, he founded La Compagnie des Arcades, which brings together all the talents of landscape architecture around holistically conceived multidisciplinary projects. Together with his team, Frédéric Trifilio creates and maintains his own gardens, as well as projects by James Basson and O+M in the south of France and Marrakech.
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Carbón Vivo
Abel Zahinos Ruiz is a partner and Head of Business Development at Carbón Vivo, a cooperative specialising in the development and marketing of biochar-based fertilisers, soil improvers and growing media for agriculture, gardening and urban green spaces, which it markets under the LivingChar brand. This activated charcoal improves soil structure, promotes microbial activity and helps retain moisture, thereby increasing the efficiency of resource use—such as water—and boosting plants’ resilience to climate change, benefits which he will discuss at DeltaLand
Project Manager, Tierra Ingeniería y Paisajismo
For over 20 years, Tierra Ingeniería y Paisajismo has been creating and maintaining green spaces through a multidisciplinary team with backgrounds in engineering, architecture, horticulture and botany. On behalf of the company, which operates nationwide, Talía Olszewski, an agricultural engineer in charge of project management and head of the Green Space Creation Team, will outline the criteria to be taken into account for the effective development of truly sustainable gardens in continental climates, where this factor should not be seen as a constraint but as an opportunity.
Hunter i FX Luminaire
Trained as an agricultural engineer and with extensive experience in irrigation system projects, Imma Pedemonte currently works on landscape lighting installations with FX Luminaire, a leading company in lighting products for architecture and gardens, focused on advances in LED technology in this field and digital control with zoning, dimming and colour adjustment functions. In her PechaKucha talk, she will discuss the possibilities offered by landscape lighting and its transformative power, with the aim of being able to enjoy the garden at all hours and on every day of the year: a 24/365 garden.