2000x200 Site Visit

The third project for the digital media module was titled 200 x 2000: A Transect, I choose to look at a old railway line close to my home, the railway used to go from Witham to Maldon in Essex, but i shortened it a little by just looking at the section between Witham to Wickham Bishops. The brief instructed us to look at a site defined as a corridor and should contain a mix of land uses and be monotonus in charater. We were to conduct a site inventory and townscape analysis of the corridor using photographs, sketches, and written observations and then produce various layers for the corridor.

The images below are taken from the site visit I took.

Pets in the City.

Q: It is inevitable the Anne Whiston Sprin's discussion of pets in the city will arouse strong feelings in you. Where do you stand? Should there be legal limits on animals in a urban setting? Should there be culls?

Reading: Two chapters from Anna Whiston Sprin's The Granite Garden

Where do I stand? Good question. Before we had this lecture this would have never of crossed my mind. My opinion would have been... Why would'nt people want pets in a city? and I'm not even a animal lover. I've had a dog as a pet since a young age and we live in the country but I've never really took much of an interest. However going back to the question another question I would put forward would be... Is it fair on the pet to live in urban city? Is it fair to have a dog thats kept in a flat all day while the owner works a 9 to 5 job? I think not.
Another point would be animals (pets) do; like green spaces improve peoples wellbeing the same way its therapy for people to garden. Others will have life long pets that keep them sane.
Therefore my final answer would be animals should not be banded for cities I personally feel that its totally unreasonable unless of cause the environment is completely unsuiable for the animal itself.

Q: Think about your own relationship with food? Chances are you make explicit links between food and the body as a matter of course, but how often do you think about food as product of the landscape and as a shaper of landscape systems? How about as it shapes our social and cultural lives?

This subject has become increasingly brought up and spoke about in my life recently. With our new design project Golden Lane Estate and trying to think about a sustainable lifestyle, food production and landscape systems being a big part of this. After last weeks lecture (4th February) titled urban territory I’ve really started thinking about the effect us as human beings have on the landscape.


It’s amazing the effect that just knowing a little more about this subject has had on me as a person, and it makes me wonder if children were taught about the subject throughout education maybe they would have more of an impact in the future.

I'm a big lover of food and good food at that - and i do believe that good quality food tastes better meaning i believe in 'good food'. Since I've been young we’ve always had a vegetable patch and I've never took much interest but I beginning to realise that I should have. I and my sisters think its crazy when dad will come in with an armful of leeks and we’ve been in onions that came out of the garden since August and there is still plenty hanging up in the barn. It almost makes me proud to eat home grown vegetables’ now. :)

Looking at the wider picture however I begin to wonder is it really possible help the situation, food is vital to everyday life and people do take it for granted but its because they don’t know any different, people don’t think about it and I think if they the country would be in major panic! It’s scary to think how far our dinner has travelled just to get on out plates for dinner time.

Sustainable Design: Case Study

Sustainable Design: This is something that I feel I really need to look at more and research into. Sustainability is something that is used so much around me and in lectures. And in our design projects I hear other students mention the word 'Sustainable' over and over again. And I sit and think... yeah I know what it means but I don’t feel I know quite enough about it to be comfortable with the subject.

So my in this case study I would like to research and learn about a designer and spaces that have been sustainable and find out why and how they are!
I started my research with CABE and there section on 'sustainability' and they started with this quote... "We embed sustainable design in all our work and encourage sustainable living by helping to create buildings and spaces that fulfil environmental, social and economic needs." http://www.cabe.org.uk/sustainability The main phrase which popped out to me being "the fulfil environment, social and economic needs" Fulfil being the all important word to me! To fulfil something is pretty special and exciting. Something to do, carry out it’s almost a promise. The next quote also summed the meaning of sustainability up pretty well too “Sustainable design and good design are mutually reinforcing. Good design is not just defined by how a building, space or place looks. It is also about whether it is responsive to context, adaptable, uses resources efficiently and delivers value over its whole life.”
Researching some of the Case Studies on Sustainable design, I looked at projects all over the world and one of the first ones to jump out at me was a project in Portland, USA, called green streets. http://www.cabe.org.uk/case-studies/green-streets This city has on average 98 centimetres of rain a year.

They have come up with a solution that uses curb side planters that absorb flash flood water run off, a simple design really but what a great idea! And with these planter full of shrubs and trees they have also 'provide shade, air-cooling and colour to the street. "The street’s pavements were retrofitted with a series of specially designed planters that collect storm water, filter it, divert it away from the usual storm water drain – which runs directly into the Willamette River and instead allow it to be absorbed gradually back into the water table."

Sustainable design has so many different ways to take. It’s the fact that every site as its own needs and individual points that it need to became sustainable yet even with all of that it’s still possible for everywhere to be sustainable.

Can Parks Cure Social Ills?

What an enjoyable lecture...


So let’s get things straight.

The word 'Cure' taken from the online dictionary means:

1. Restoration of health; recovery from disease.
2. A method or course of medical treatment used to restore health.
3. An agent, such as a drug, that restores health; a remedy.
4. Something that corrects or relieves a harmful or disturbing situation: The cats proved to be a good cure for our mouse problem.
5. Ecclesiastical Spiritual charge or care, as of a priest for a congregation.
6. The office or duties of a curate.
7. The act or process of preserving a product.

So let’s get things straight cure means recovery, or to restore so in other words as said in the lecture the word stands for complete recovery and that’s something that although we wish it could isn't completely true. So then let’s take the next part of the question... Social ills? Bullying, Racism, Delinquency, Addiction etc.
So lets think about this and yes I believe to extent parks/open spaces/green spaces can 'help' with social ills.
So I’ve started looking into this more and health is a big factor that can be cured by green spaces and there have been numerous occasions in the news where this topic has been brought up. For example the one below.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/8307024.stm

I also found a PDF file from the http://www.cardiff.gov.uk/ website that also talks about green spaces and social ills. It first talks by explaining exactly what a social ill is... ‘Any behaviour which causes, or is capable of causing nuisance, harassment, alarm or distress to persons from a different household!’ This report explained the issues of delinquents having a green space to run riot in. So this proves that it’s not always possible. I do think though these problems do go round in circles having somewhere in which social ills can occur i.e. A park gives the opportunity to let problems arise.
However in personal experiences I think being out in an open space whether it be a parkland or heath even sports fields you do feel a lot happier, however it comes down to the individual in the end and as we discussed in the lecture boredom is a main factor to this problem... so therefore I think this is the main issue that needs to be addressed, not whether there is enough green spaces.

Green Space!

Question 1: Preparing for Rotterdam. The wider Context.

Excited about the study tour decided to get some background knowledge on the city and the surrounding dutch landscape before visiting.

Google Results: Dutch Landscapes from the air. Grid systems?

Images from Multimap - Wow I do love these map programmes.

Just a sworm of Glasshouses and production fields is the Netherlands.

It's completely mad, I'm amazed by this difference of it and that's just from the air. Googling images on multimap and google earth etc. Opens your eyes so much to the world around us.

Contemporary Garden Design that expresses planes????

Both Laurie Olin and Peter Walker discuss the genius of Andre Le Notre. Simo and Walker say of him, via a discussion of Roberto Burle Marx, that he "... places objects on a plane not to glorify the object but to express the plane itself. And however enriched with patterning and planting, the plane remains taut."


What is meant by this? Can you find examples in contemporary garden design or landscape architecture that expresses this?
To me this question is really about the landscape in the wider sense; Coastlines and mountain ranges. And relating back to previous blog thinking about the enclosed garden and how that only works in context with surrounding areas. In the same way in which this question says ‘places objects on a plane not to glorify the object but to express the plan itself’ the same way a garden designed in a way the works slides into it context along the plane, relating this to vistas and views from the garden and along the context plane, then enriched with patterning and planting. The use of landscape brings me to some of the designs of Antony Paul and when i went to an SGD Conference last year, he shwed us images of his designs and i really felt the fitted in with the landscape surrounding the design.

Below are some of the images to show the plane of landscape and background..

Spatial laboratory for Landscape Design!

If the enclosed garden has "the character of an interior," How is it possible that it can also serve as a "spatial laboratory for landscape design?"


Reading - The Enclosed Garden (Rob Aben & Saskia de Wit)
A garden is enclosed in the fact that it has its own individual surroundings and elements that make it a garden in its self. And I suppose this does make it have its own interior. Again there will always be the outside design, where ever the garden is in the world it will always have a context - landscape design. Referring to the reading the quote ‘Just this compactness and scale makes the enclosed garden suitable for an outdoor room where one can engage with nature.’ - A spatial laboratory perhaps.
I’m not sure I completely understand the author of this reading and to me most of it is opinion because all gardens of cause are different and therefore his points don’t relate to everywhere, although a very interesting thought to think this way. However i not keen and dont feel i could speak on relationship with the landscape and garden in this much depth, we could say, to have a say in quotes like this.

Me personaly i do think the words interior and laboratory do in some ways relate to the landscape and surroundings almost definatly.

How is a Garden Like and Unlike a Campsite?

OOoooo interesting subject... Relating this to my personal experiences first before I do the reading of 'Robert L. Thayer, Jr' I had a lot camping holidays when I was younger and there were quite a few similarities of how I felt in my own garden at home and how I felt on holiday in the campsite. For one general point I always loved being outdoors (I still do) I also think that makes a big difference to how I look at different things relating to landscapes and the environment. But going back to campsites, the feeling of being free is something that is similar between the two, being able to explore and have exciting adventures in the outdoors. Spatially there quite thought out like gardens as well the way you’re directed around the space of the campsite, to the toilet blocks and children’s play areas, and the same as in a garden different features attract different people and ages of people.
Ok so on to the reading...
"Personal Dreams and Pagan Rituals" Robert L. Thayer, Jr.
First of all I thought this was a lovely little read, however my first view of the reading was its all about personal preferences Thayer links his own garden completely to his own personal experiences within the world and its also nice that he links his garden design with experiences his had with his wife Lacey as there do share the garden together. But back to the main question... How is a garden like and unlike a campsite? Well honestly (and this may be a pretty straight forward way of looking at the question) but I think it’s up to you whether your garden is seen like a campsite or not. Thayer wanted his garden to remind him of his days camping and his journey through the Yukon Territory something that he found very spiritual and therefore his wanted to relate his own personal garden back to this. I think that’s lovely and personally its wonderful way to put a design on your own personal space.
So after reading and thinking about my own personal views a garden should be how the people/person who uses it, want it to be. Somewhere in which they feel safe and the space should also provide them with what they need it to provide... whether it be an open space or a campfire circle.

The most Important Functions of Gardens!

Wow these questions are so broad! Ok so functions of a gardens..

I remember covering this briefly last year in Spatial Design Studies & Landscape Interpretation - so cheating a little I have got and my old notes to find some very valid points on the subject!

Starting with - surely different places around the world must have different views on this question, places like Philippines where in certain places every inch of the land is re shaped to enable the people to grow food to produce a living and survive! But then again can you call a crop a garden? I think so, its one place I would love to go! It’s defiantly an extraordinary landscape and landscape in a whole in some people’s eyes can be seen as a garden!

Other points I picked up from my previous notes were..

1. Wildlife
2. Environmental factors
3. Art
4. Sculpture
5. Feelings/Emotions
6. Food production - as discussed above.
7. Somewhere to retreat!
8. Sustainability
9. Land use
10. Inspiration
11. Entertainment

The list could quite obviously go on!

But to me, personally gardens are for people (the public or individuals) to enjoy! Somewhere is which children grow up and become adults.. for me my garden at home has always been a fun place whether it be helping my Dad build the various out buildings in our garden, playing badminton over a piece of string tied from the birch to 'Mum's Shed'. Having water fights with my sisters with water pumped from the well, or even feeding the chickens and then having them chase you for more food! Its only now that I realise that the garden was when I was younger, was there for having fun enjoying myself being in the open air and feeling free! Now however I see it in so many other ways.. I look at the plants.. Construction details.. The spatial design.. How I feel when I move through the spaces.. All things I been almost 'trained' to do at college, and I think it a way its almost a shame as I don’t tend to enjoy the space as much anymore.. But on the other hand I understand the space a lot more!

Me & My Cousins over the summer having FUN in the garden playing Rounders!

So my final answer would have to be.. ENJOYMENT - and in I way I want to say 'understanding'!

Is there a difference between Landscape Architecture & Landscape Garden Design?

Well well, isn’t this an interesting subject!! and being on the course 'Landscape Garden Design' (100 times better than the LA - only kidding!) I am pretty certain that I have a different view to this than most of the other students on the Digital Media module.

I'll start by saying what most people think - which is that Landscape Garden Design is for designing small back gardens and Landscape Architect is for design massive open spaces.. Ok so that’s to the extremes, and if that was true who does the middle bits like the green spaces around new housing estates and primary schools. So basically when does the landscape get to a point where it to big for a Garden designer or to small for an Architect? Personally after the many debates I have had with numerous of people (architects/LGD’s/Lectures and people outside of the College) I have come to conclusion that maybe there is differences and id like to think there was, however I doubt in the near future we come to any conclusion about what they are!

One of many debates over the subject with the LGD's & LA's, The Globe.

However I will try to explain those few points that have been brought up throughout the discussions/debates..

Point 1 - the scale of different projects of the landscape.
Point 2 - the fact Architects study a degree in architecture and LGD’s study a degree in Landscape & Garden Design.
Point 3 - The amount of money each will earn when qualified.
Point 4 - Plants and Horticultural knowledge also come into play when discussing the differences.
Point 5 - The difference between who designs private land and public land - Architects/public and LGD’s/private.
Point 6 - Urban design.
Point 7 - How do Architects and Landscape Architects relate?
Point 8 - The Landscape Institute & The Society of Garden Designers.

So really to put it in a very broad sense it’s the stereotypical view of each profession. And the fact of the matter is LA’s look down the noses at LGD’s the same way Architects look down there noses at LA’s.. This being such a shame and I feel very passionate about this matter all areas of design are very important in society has a whole and another thing society needs is for people to work together! Therefore instead of having this divide between us I really think we such all work together.. In fact over the past few months I have really enjoyed thinking about Landscape Architecture it’s a very vast subject and very interesting.. I hope in the future they do become more one subject than an area with such a vast gap between then!

So in conculsion is there a difference between the two? YES - but i cant answer what it is! :)

My Blog..

Finally got round to starting my new blog; after picking up the Digital Media Communications module half way through the first semester of my second year as a BSc (Hons) Landscape & Garden Design Student at Writtle College. So finished my first year on my degree all those months ago in May 2009 on a high and raring to get going on the second year. After a pretty hectic summer visiting lots of different places. But why hasn’t this semester flown by!? Were in week 9 already and although it’s quite a step up from the first year I’m loving every second of it.

The subject of my degree 'Landscape and Garden Design' is something that is very much my passion, being the young age of only 19 I realise I still have many more years of experience to gain the much needed knowledge of the subject which I know I will carry on learning about for the rest of my life, however I do my best to broaden knowledge in the spare time I do get, working part time at a local garden centre which I’ve been at for the past 2 years in January also helps me develop my plant knowledge something that following design, comes a close second interest in my life.
I've always been interested in the outdoors and the living world, and design and form is something that really inspires me, so I’m looking forward to progressing in this module over the next year.

Echinacea at the Lost Gardens of Heligan (August 2009) One of the visits over the summer.