Max Albin Schardt

Max Albin Schardt of Kentfield passed into the next realm peacefully at the age of 83 on November 2, 2020 after a year-long battle with cancer and lung disease. He was born in Sacramento on January 28, 1937, to Donna Greenhalgh of Orangevale, CA and Max Louis Schardt, who had emigrated as a boy from Munich, Germany. Max grew up in Vallejo and San Francisco, trying his best to adapt his budding, iconoclastic personality to the public school system. He went on to attend UC Berkeley 1955-1961, where he studied architecture and landscape architecture. There, he met Molly Kent at a Christmas party. They married in 1962.

Max called himself a landscape planner. He was not licensed by the State of California and most likely didn’t care, and certainly didn’t want a bunch of landscape architects testing him on his knowledge of design and plants. In spite of, or perhaps because of this, he was an extraordinary designer of landscapes, especially gardens. After he graduated, he joined the firm, Lawrence Halprin and Associates, where he worked on some large projects, such as The Sea Ranch and the Monterey Custom House Plaza. Later he designed interior landscaping for the International Terminal of the San Francisco Airport with Barbara Stauffacher Solomon. His mid-sized projects included the Ramah Navajo School in New Mexico, and the Santa Clara Mission Cemetery. But it was always gardens that interested him the most. His gardens were unique and always memorable.

Max’s knowledge of both architecture and landscape architecture gave his work a unique style. He loved plants and used them to provide structure to a space, more than as decorations. He was influenced very much by Asian gardens, not at all Versailles.

His eye was fierce and discerning. His criticism of architecture and landscaping he considered thoughtless or clichéd was withering. At the same time, he was very fond of play, both in design and in person. He passed on this passion for organizing space to his sons, though also forbidding them from practicing architecture as a profession.

After retiring in the late 1990s, Max devoted his energies to artistic endeavors, helping his sons design their homes and gardens. He attended Burning Man three times, which led to him providing key insights for his son’s immersive art pieces. He also discovered a deep appreciation of dance arts, and took up dancing himself in a modern jazz and Zumba class, unleashing further his playful, creative spirit.

His search for beauty, both natural and cultural, took him to Asia. He visited China several times with Molly, an Asian art historian. Then he discovered trekking in Nepal, one of the great loves of his life. He went on to explore Tibet and Bhutan.

Max is survived and deeply missed by his wife Molly, his sons Christopher and Fred, his daughters-inlaw Betty and Shelly, and his grandchildren Sawyer, Kent, and Ruby. A small memorial was held with extended family in his beautiful garden in Kentfield, the garden upon which he fussed for the last 50 years.