Comments on: In search of Sustainable Gardens…

By: Christine

Christine — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 03:10:26 +0000

Yes. They are cute cars – but I can’t imagine myself driving one. Two factors against these cars from my perspective are their lack of interior room and the feeling of vulnerability on road.

For budding car designers here is your big opportunity….[ http://inventorspot.com/articles/audi_calling_next_generation_electric_vehicle_designs_43265 ]

By: Tom Turner

Tom Turner — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 11:24:47 +0000

Perhaps I should have said that the truths of science are everywhere the same – and science is beased on reason.
Zaha’s car reminds me of one of two of my favourite car designs: the KR200 and the BMW Isetta 300 – with maybe a dash of Beetle thrown in – I would describe her taste, and mine, as retro-Germanic.

By: Christine

Christine — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 06:08:22 +0000

I am not sure that reason is everywhere the same….

Also I don’t think design is a purely a ‘reasonable’ activity. So as not to get into a debate about science versus creationism I offer the following piece of evidence from the architectural world – a car designed by Zaha Hadid.
[ http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/07/another-reason-we-like-prefab.php ]

By: Tom Turner

Tom Turner — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 06:31:43 +0000

I think the problem with Modernist Theory is more than context-insensitivity.
Modernism rests design theory upon REASON. It turns away from BELIEF.
REASON is everywhere the same.
The principles of REASON are everywhere the same.
Therefore DESIGN should be everywhere the same.
This is the basic explanation for the construction of what the public damns as ‘matchbox architecture’ appearing all over the world. The designers of these ‘tower blocks’ have treated architecture as a mass-producable commodity, like cars and mobile phones, which can be endlessly repeated in every type of environment.
I see the ‘blocks’ as dysfunctional because of their heavy energy demands and because most people in most countries would rather live and work in different types of buildings.
The highest concentrations of people-unfriendly and environment-unfriendly blocks is now in China. They turned away from a 5000-year-old design tradition to adopt a fundamentally North European/US urban form.
PS none of this is to deny the abstract beauty and purity of the best Modernist designs – in which group I would place Mies van der Rohe’s Barcelona Pavilion.

By: Christine

Christine — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 04:31:27 +0000

I would think context insensitivity is generally a fair criticism of modernism…Although there are some remarkable poetic exceptions.[ http://www.demel.net/fs-ronchamp.html ]

Do you have particular examples in mind when you speak of ‘dysfunctional’ functional modern architecture?

By: Tom Turner

Tom Turner — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 16:04:46 +0000

I admire strict functionalism, minimialism, truth to materials and much else about the principles of modernism. But I also criticize Modernism for (1) context insensitivity (2) the self-deception of making dysfunctional buildings where were purportedly functional.

By: Christine

Christine — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 04:22:35 +0000

The idea with modern architecture in general, although not with modern designers in specific, was that modernism as something discernably new – a decisive break with the past. So in that sense, context insensitivity was part of the mandate.

Something of this originating impetus can be understood through the lineage of the Bauhaus designers and their relationship to Peter Behrens:

“Young Gropius, though, was far less enamored than his forebears of the old revitalized Italian and Greek styles. He first went to work for Peter Behrens, a painter-turned-architect whose severe or at least austere buildings rejected old-world designs in favor of what he saw to be authentic (that is, innovative — not derivative or replicative) and useful (no extraneous elements and decoration). Behrens’ best-known structures are industrial, built of modern materials like steel and glass. They adumbrate those that Gropius — and the architects Le Corbusier and Mies van der Rohe, both of whom also apprenticed with Behrens — would conceive in years to come.”
[ http://www.hoover.org/publications/policyreview/83183772.html ]

By: Tom Turner

Tom Turner — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 07:34:48 +0000

They make a great list of garden design principles – and, as always, make me wish modernism had had more influence on garden design. Modernism produced some terrible buildings and it could have produced many more brilliant gardens.
Modernism had little influence on the Chelsea Flower Show in the twentieth century but is having more and more influence in the twenty-first century. See this year’s review http://www.gardenvisit.com/garden_design/shows_festivals/chelsea_flower_show/2010_rhs_chelsea_flower_show.
Part of the problem for modern architecture, as often discussed on this blog, was its lack of ideas on how to achieve context-sensitivity. Garden designers have often shown a remarkable ability to make the same mistake but this flies in the face of the underlying logic of garden design and goes against the classic principle of consulting the genius of the place.

By: Christine

Christine — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 06:25:42 +0000

Tom, I hope you don’t mind but I have taken the liberty of exploring some of your ideas above….

First, a little on Church’s design theory. His design process relied on four principle:

1)Unity – which is the consideration of the schemes as a whole, both house and garden;
2)Function – which is the relation of the practical service areas to the needs of the household and the relation of the decorative areas to the desires and pleasures of those who use it
3)Simplicity – upon which may rest both the economic and aesthetic success of the layout
4)Scale – which gives us a pleasant relation of parts to one another.

By: Christine

Christine — Mon, 07 Jun 2010 05:50:41 +0000

In the article ‘The Pool that Changed the World’ points to another important influence of the Californian Garden movement on a sustainable asethetic (born ironically from financial rather than environmental concerns);

“California was screaming for an idiom of its own – one of drought resistant plants tolerant to the climate and simplified schemes suited to an informal alfresco lifestyle.” p80.

(Dwell June 2001 pp78-81)