Women landscape architects have to be twice as good as men – this was the message Boston-area landscape architect Carol Johnson gave to Marion Pressley, who worked with Johnson 1969-1983. Much of Johnson’s early work focused on public housing and college campuses. Later Johnson expanded her portfolio to include public parks, beginning with the Cambridge Common; this is the area of her career for which she is best known.
Pressley recalls that Johnson was an adventurer whose annual excursions ranged from rafting down the Amazon River to climbing mountains in Tibet.
In Boston, she made women realize they could have their own firms. Johnson created the first woman-owned firm of any appreciable size in the Boston area. By the time that Pressley left in 1983, Johnson’s firm’s portfolio expanded well beyond Boston to include projects in many cities, such as John Marshall Park on Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington D.C. In her work Johnson was sensitive to the history of the site along and deft with the use of plant materials. Pressley recalls that Johnson was totally involved in every project and with every project detail.
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