Monthly Archives: May 2013

Chelsea Fringe Pop Up Park at Battersea Power Station


Among the great days in the life of a building project are the client’s commitment to the design, breaking the turf, topping out and handing over the completed project to the client. Between these high-days there can be longueurs – and vacant land. We have been waiting 30+ years for Battersea Power Station to be re-developed and it was an enlightened move by the developers to make a temporary park on the waterfront as a Chelsea Fringe Project. It benefits the public and attracts attention to the development: win-win. Self-appointedly, on behalf of the people of London, I also thank the Pop Up Foundation for publicising a set of good causes. As you can see from the video, the cause with most appeal for me was Find-a-Fountain. The aim is to rid the world of those evil plastic bottles in which water is sinfully sold for a higher price/litre than diesel fuel! It’s amazing that we let it continue. Just think how much good would result from banning the sale of bottled water:

  • less litter on beaches
  • less landfill
  • fewer litter collection vehicles
  • less oil used in making disposable bottles
  • less fuel in transporting bottles smaller shops, because they need no shelves for water

The Pop Up Event is very English: we love what their misguided detractors call Lost Causes.

Two modern Buddhist garden designs at the 2013 Chelsea Flower Show

After publishing six short videos on Buddhist gardens on this blog last week, you can well imagine that I was delighted to find two contemporary Buddhist-inspired garden designs at the 2013 Chelsea Flower Show: The Sound of Silence garden by Fernando Gonzalez and the Mindfulness garden by Martin Cook. Martin won a Gold Medal and Fernando a Silver-Gilt Medal – my explanation is that Fernando did not include flowers in his design. It is, after all, the Chelea FLOWER Show. My suggestion was that the wavy white mountains could stand in a lotus pond (following the traditional pattern of mandalas and mandala gardens). Congratulations to them both – I believe that Buddhist ideas have an illustrious future in gardens – less as representations of the Buddha than as interpretations of the Dharma. Fernando admires Japanese Zen gardens. They derive from Chinese ideas and I look forward to the day when Chinese landscape architects and garden designers recover their long-lost interest in Buddhist philosophy. That day will surely dawn.

Chelsea Fringe 2013 gardens and sponsorship opportunities

The Chelsea Fringe Garden Festival is in its second year. Congratulations to all who have helped make it happen – and especially to Tim Richardson, the Festival Director. What the Chelsea Fringe needs next is sponsors. I would like to suggest Richard Branson to sponsor the main event. He has given us the Virgin London Marathon, so why not the Virgin London Chelsea Fringe? It would also be good to have sponsors for Chelsea Fringe Show Gardens (see my suggested Chelsea Fringe Sponsorship Opportunities]. The right garden in the right place could give the sponsor more bangs/buck than an ordinary garden in the Chelsea Flower Show. London developers etc (eg of hotel gardens, office gardens, roof gardens and small public open spaces) could give them a special treatment and open them for the 3 weeks of the Chelsea Fringe. The developers of Battersea Power Station have an even better idea: they are LAUNCHING the development of a luxurious housing project with the creation of a 2.5 acre Pop-Up Park as part of the 2013 Chelsea Fringe Festival. The design is by LDA landscape architects, who also managed the delivery of the 2012 Olympic Park.

The Dragon Garden in Shey and Landscape Architecture for the Druk White Lotus School in Ladakh, India

This is the sixth of 6 videos on the relationship between Buddhism and garden design.
The Dragon Garden in Shey, Ladakh, India, is being made under the influence of Buddhism but is a secular school within the Indian School system. The architecture, based on an mandala, is by Arup Associates. The garden and landscape design is by the department of landscape architecture at the University of Greenwich in London. It extends the mandala concept outward from the school buildings. The Druk White Lotus School (DWLS) is under the patronage of the Dalai Lama and is funded by a UK-based charity, the Drukpa Trust.
The influence of Buddhism on garden design is explained in an eBook

Eco-Buddhism, landscape architecture, Ian McHarg and environmental ethics

Eco-Buddhism, landscape architecture and environmnetal ethics is the second of six videos on the relationship between Buddhism and the history of garden and environmental design.
Buddhism declined in many Asian countries during the twentieth century but became one of the fastest-growing faiths in Europe, the Americas and Australia. This led to an encounter with the environmental movement and a substantial literature has developed on what is called Eco-Buddhism, Green Buddhism or Environmental Buddhism. Though he did not advocate a Buddhist approach, Ian McHarg’s advocacy of Design with nature and of Lynn White’s argument against the Christian attitude to nature, associates McHarg with Buddhist Environmentalism.
The influence of Buddhism on Environmental Ethics is discussed in an eBook

Chinese Gardens: the influence of Chan and Pure Land Buddhism in China

Chan and Pure Land Buddhist Gardens in China is the fourth of six videos on the relationship between Buddhism and the history of garden design.
Buddhism spread to China from India. The practice of forming monastic communities with temples and gardens also took root in China but the Buddhist-influenced gardens made in China were not the same as any which are known to have been made in the India. They were Mahayana Buddhist Gardens and appear to have been influenced by Tibetan mandalas with lotus ponds, Buddha halls and representations of mountains. They were the subject of paintings in Tibet and of garden design in China. Chan (Zen) and Pure Land ideas also took developed in China and are likely to have influenced garden design.
The influence of Buddhism on garden design is explained in an eBook