Description
This book explores and aims to demonstrate landscape architecture’s potential for multidimensional sustainability through realized projects and initiatives to early to mid-level higher education students and a wider interested audience. It is intended to provoke and inspire discussion, further research and offer design solutions through a selected array of thought-provoking quotes, pertinent images, over 200 projects and works, study and discussion questions, interviews with noted professionals and further readings.
“The thing itself is one; the images are many. What leads to a perceptive understanding of the thing is not the focus on one image, but the viewing of many images together.”
Rudolf Steiner, Goethe’s World View (1897)
Designed to mirror the multifaceted, interdisciplinary, integrated nature of landscape sustainability, the book’s aim is one of breadth, and it intentionally encompasses a wide cross-section of topics. Such broad-scale, systems-thinking is crucial for effective conception of the theory and practice of both sustainability and landscape architecture. Depth is therefore sacrificed in favor of presenting a wide spectrum encouraging the reader to seek additional knowledge through suggested further readings, quoted works and project examples. Further readings intentionally combine old and new, as many current sustainability trends and theories are rebadged classics.
The various textual and image components are threaded together through the framework of a discussion structured into chapter topics, each representing a key thematic area of multidimensional sustainable landscape architecture: ecology; pollution; infrastructure; food; art and aesthetics; social sustainability; light touch; and performance. These chapter topics are divided into a series of sub-themes and supported by (predominantly) realized projects, images and interviews, which have been positioned to reflect chapter focus.
Chapter 1 begins with a brief overview of historic environmental events. Chapter 2 examines ecological landscape topics with a focus on multidimensional, progressive and emerging areas for planning and landscape architecture. Chapter 3 demonstrates landscape’s ability to remediate, mitigate and heal terrestrial and aquatic environments from industrialism’s ongoing toxic legacy, through designed natural processes and ecosystem service provision. Chapter 4 explores possibilities to increase sustainability of transport and energy infrastructure networks through expanding disciplinary scale. Chapter 5 presents multifarious dimensions of landscape and food, aiming to convey their importance for landscape practice. Chapter 6 explores activist environmental possibilities in landscape, and sustainability’s relationship with aesthetic and immersive experiences of nature and beauty. Chapter 7 touches on a wide range of social sustainability concerns and possible expanded territories including ethical, strategic, educational, health, economic and political dimensions. Chapter 8 showcases natural and cultural place concerns, highly attuned, ‘light-touch’, and sensitive work and in an increasingly globalized and homogeneous world, such practice is as important as it has ever been. Chapter 9 explores how ratings and performance approaches can capture and quantify landscape’s capacity as a productive agent rather than merely consumptive, distinguishing landscape architecture from other design disciplines. The final chapter explores, questions and defines possible future scope for landscape architecture.
As this book is focused on completed projects and works bridging theory and practice, some unrealized and emerging theories have received little attention. Project text and imagery aims to unpack hidden subtleties often invisible in completed landscape architectural photographs. Where possible, ‘before’ or time-lapse imagery as well as drawings and diagrams have been included to clarify environmental processes, strategies and components, and to assist perception of the landscape architect’s sometimes invisible guiding hand. A glossary defines terms and concepts used throughout (these may differ depending on regional variances, design jargon, or trends). Interviews are presented in the interviewees’ own words and have not been edited. Consequently, length has been cut and the complete interviews are available online at the companion website, www.bloomsbury.com/zeunert-landscape-architecture.
Further resources are suggested and available online. The greatest of care has been taken to ensure that all project details and attributions are up to date at the time of writing.
Joshua Zeunert
February 2016