The Aesthetics of Contemporary Planting Design

(Hardback)

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Description

Planting design is, rather obviously, a complex topic, spanning as it does art, science, social need, and moralityespecially during these days of increasing planetary environmental threat. Although certainly not denying the importance of scientifically appropriate practices, the symposium The Aesthetics of [Contemporary] Planting Design addressed planting design today, proposing a renewed concern for the cultural and aesthetic aspects of the landscapes that result.

This book, which has been developed from the original presentations at the symposium, presents the thoughts of a select international group of landscape architects and historians who discuss the subject of planting design through the lens of their own work as well as the work of others, both contemporary and historical. They suggest that, as in real estate, the most important factor in selecting plants is location, location, location. Certainly the Californian situation is far more forgiving than the aridity and other restrictive environmental conditions endemic to the Sonoran desert, or the frost and short growing seasons of Nordic lands that direct Scandinavian landscape architects to rely on native birches, pines, rowan, and moss. Most of us would agree that there are plants sensible for each climatic zone.

Addressing environmental conditions is but the first step in the equation, however. There are also the issues of combination and composition.

With contributions by Laurie Olin, Tim Richardson, Cristina Castel-Branco, Erik Dhont, Andrea Cochran, Christine Ten Eyck, Mario Schjetnan, Thorbjrn Andersson, Kate Cullity, Richard L. Hindle, Alexandre Chemetoff, and Peter Walker

Reviews

"In 2018, a dozen practitioners and scholars presented at the University of California, Berkeley, for a two-day symposium hosted by the Department of Landscape Architecture and Environmental Planning to discuss planting design under the very real specter of climate crisis. The organizer and editor Marc Treib, Honorary ASLA, gathered presentations materials and transformed them into The Aesthetics of Contemporary Planting Design: 13 essays, each with a different take of the artistry and politics of the subject." --Landscape Architecture Magazine

Author Bio

Marc Treib is Professor of Architecture Emeritus, University of California, Berkeley, and a historian and critic of landscape and architecture who has published widely on modern and historical subjects in the United States, Japan, and Scandinavia. Recent books include Pietro Porcinai and the Landscape of Modern Italy (co-editor, 2016); Landscapes of Modern Architecture: Wright, Mies, Neutra, Aalto, Barragn (2017); The Landscapes of Georges Descombes: Doing Almost Nothing (2019); and Thinking a Modern Landscape Architecture, West & East: Christopher Tunnard, Sutemi Horiguchi (2020).