ONE LANDSCAPE began in an ecological hotspot in the Western Ghats of India. Sensing that this precious landscape  would soon face environmental degradation , two brothers, Denzil and William de Souza, patiently acquired nearly 3,000 acres of land in the region. Since the 1990s, Margie Ruddick has collaborated with the de Souza family to safeguard this endangered landscape for future generations. The team pursued sustainable planning and building practices in the design for a 320-acre, income-generating wellness retreat at the heart of the site, planting more than a million trees and shrubs to restore the degraded landscape.Their work led to the development of the Shillim Institute, an educational foundation dedicated to conservation, sustainability, and wellness within the iconic Sahyadri Range of the Ghats. The Shillim Institute moves beyond a traditional “environmental” view of sustainability by recognizing the equally important roles of the arts, economics, culture, and faith in safeguarding wild landscapes. The Shillim Institute programs have expanded to include innovative approaches to cultural preservation, arts education, and community health. Today, the Shillim Institute has become a leader in promoting conservation of the Western Ghats, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and ecological hotspot

ONE LANDSCAPE was founded as a sister organization to the Shillim Institute, both to expand its programs and to bring its practices and values beyond the Western Ghats. With the arrival of composer and educator Martin Brody as co-director in 2012, ONE LANDSCAPE  collaborated with the Shillim Institute to create the Pawana Collective, which acts as a catalyst for a cohesive culture and conservation initiative in the Western Ghats. We also created a second collective in the northeastern United States, focused on the wild coastal landscape at the eastern end of Long Island, in Napeague. Our Napeague Collective documents the remarkably diverse landscapes within the unique region where the Peconic Estuary meets the Atlantic Ocean. Through work ranging from photography to performance art, and by mapping the diverse habitats, the collective reveals these wild landscapes in new ways while emphasizing the importance of safeguarding this fragile environment.

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In the coming years, ONE LANDSCAPE will bring together similar collectives in other wild landscapes—whether remote or urbanized—to promote cohesive conservation plans that integrate conservation, culture, and community.