The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious...It is the fundamental emotion that stands at the cradle of true art and true science. –Albert Einstein
Pongal marks the beginning of lengthening days in mid-January in some parts of India. It is a colorful festival, during which participants paint quixotic patterns on the earth, spontaneously crafted; the notion is that these designs of the heart ‘attract harmony’, and harmony is known to bring good fortune, at least to the Hindu mind. These intricate, beautiful patterns are wholly self-contained. They have no relationship with surroundings, save sufficient space to contain them. They are white paint on packed soil. The geometry is later filled with colored sand in fanciful, appealing detail. Ladies, too, decorate themselves in fantastically creative ways: the art of senna painting leaves one breathless in all of India, but here reaches new heights.
Hindus indeed live in the ultimate universe of design, one in which the gods have cunningly organized the cycles of life. This is a universe living as an example of design, and yet at the core demonstrates keen ambiguity. The Hindu universe is worthy of deeper thought in our context: for in Hindu theology, the universe is but the dreams of Brahma. When a ‘Brahma century’– of unknown, but very long length– Brahma awakens, dissolving all, starting again. We are but dreams of the gods in this universe. Equally, though, Hindu priests and thinkers wonder this: is the universe the dream of the gods, or are the gods the dreams of…us? This isn’t sacrilegious, either. Hindus are nothing if not questioning.
The Hindu creation story serves to organize, and arrange, our world according to something we know in our hearts but, except for the most special amongst us, neither express or understand. Brahma handily gives us, through harmony, a way to graduate our world.
We are rife with symbols, we humans. A simple mixture of rice and milk becomes symbolic of the harvest during Pongal. Too, the symbolic Pongal ground painting makes visible somehow the contrived relationship that we have with the gods. And they with us. It is a measure of our experiences in the Brahma universe. And lest we forget the western, Christian experience, there is this: amongst Catholics, and a few others, the sacraments are a visible ‘sign’ of something not seen to us in this universe.
Some years ago, I asked my colleagues for a definition of ‘sustainability’. After all, ‘sustainability’ is certainly the catch phrase these days. Is it even possible, I wondered, to define this notion in a simple way?
The concept has attached itself to an ever-growing universe: your kitchen, your garden, home, city, country, planet– all must be sustainable. Why is this a good thing?
For one thing, it feels right, doesn’t it? The notion that we are all wearing moccasins, all Native Americans treading so lightly on the soil that Mother Earth hardly notices? (Yes, I know, many of the stereotypical ideas about Native Americans and innate sensitivity are well-denied, but still, it’s a viviifed meme still useful). A sustainable experience is an emotional experience, at least to some, while, alas, others remain forever sleepy.
A useful definition of ‘sustainable’ never appeared, although the discussion was lengthy and passionate and crammed with ideas. Why is a definition so elusive? I do not know. Perhaps because the notion has very wide arms, or because the idea is new. In the end, sustainable is an idea not so much defined as it is described. This is a distinction less important to us as practitioners, particularly amongst ourselves, but it is hugely important to those who hire us and to our competitors.
And yet, this is the universe of landscape architecture. We live with ‘sustainable’, and ‘vision’, and ‘design’ more as full-brained self-defining and self-evident ideas. It is preposterous in our world to deny the goodness of these ideas.
And that is fundamentally the reason that communicating our vision is so difficult. We cannot define what we do, nor can we easily explain what we do without reaching for a list and a series of commas, during which times audience eyes turn uniformly foggy. As with sustainability, design: what exactly are we doing when we ‘design’? Perspicuity? Calibration? Interpretation?
We can’t even distinguish planting design from landscaping.
I got some skeletons in my closet and I don't know if no one knows it, so before they thrown me inside my coffin and close it, i'ma expose it
With apologies to Eminem for assigning an entirely different meaning from a terrific song: do you have a messy closet? Who ya gonna call? California Closets! Ask them what they do: “We organize closets”.
This thick stew has barely begun to cook.
It’s not possible to speak about design without speaking about art. Is design a subset of art? Is it a vehicle for art? Is artistic inspiration necessary for a designer? Does this relationship, whatever it is, help us to understand design? Is design a ‘craft’, while art is the real deal? No. Yes. Maybe.
Art is the medium of emotional expression; this is what makes some design an emotional experience. Without that emotion, the design simply fails. An edgy position, but there is it. Design is the search for form; it is a mechanical exercise, crafted through application of a conceptual touchstone: this is how design is properly taught in our schools and graduate schools. Design and art are not two sides of a coin; neither are they equal ‘opposites in any way at all. They are lovers, deeply dependent and supportive, inseparable.
What is wanted is a simple yet descriptive way of defining design. In the same way that art is the medium of emotional expression, design is the medium for functional expression. Is it not?
Isn’t the search for form through the use of conceptual touchstones the heart of our design process? I admit that this definition is largely a failure. It’s not clear, it’s not vivid, and most importantly it’s not descriptive enough for the uninitiated to conjure our work product. Does this term move the ball forward? Time will tell.
As professional designers we do have some sense of what it is that we do for a living. As I began a six week class in design, I wondered if we can define design in an elevator speech, or in 25 words or less. So far, I have failed. Does this demean what we do in any way? No. Architects design buildings. Civil Engineers design subdivisions and bridges. Both do far more, yes, but these definitions are clearly adequate. In this world, Landscape Architects have a self-inflicted wound.
We also have a huge advantage. We harness natural elements, and although they are cultivated and tamed by us, made to bend in support of an hypothesis, they are quite capable, to the untrained mind and the insensitive heart, of carrying forward a wholly inadequate design. This is an often abused crutch.
Landscape Architects design-what? Certainly not gardens anymore, although that is a different riff for a future post.
I turned to a mailing list populated by professional Landscape Architects from all over the world. I’ve been part of the discussion for many years, although the list predates my own involvement.
I simply posted this:
Colleagues: I'm teaching an AdultEd course here in Naples called 'Garden Design'… for the first class I am planning to lead a discussion on 'What is Design?" The main purpose of this discussion is to get students thinking beyond combining plants. in advance of a lecture on art principles and the like.
I wonder how my colleagues would frame an answer to this question? There are lots of long-winded explanation about site/ program analysis and lots of other technicalities that really overstate the issue in this context… Any thoughts?
Safei-Eldin Hamed quotes one of my former employers, John Simonds:
“With time, this lesson of insight seems increasingly clear. One designs not places, or spaces or things--one designs experiences. The places,spaces, and things take their form from the planned experience.”
In this way, Mr. Simonds brings us very clearly full circle, back to the notion that design is about calibrating our experiences in the world we find ourselves inhabiting.
No commas need apply.
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(The complete answers by all who responded are appended below).
Patrick Miller wants us to understand that design is something of a dichotomy. He would be comfortable, I think, painting on the ground with the Hindus:
Good design is more than problem solving, but a good designer must be able to solve problems.
Patrick quotes Luis Barragan:
In the creation of a garden, the architect invites the partnership of the Kingdom of Nature. In a beautiful garden the majesty of nature is ever present, but it is nature reduced to human proportions and thus transformed into the most efficient haven against the aggressiveness of contemporary life.
And my friend Gary Veasy gives us a classically-trained response:
Design is a problem solving exercise that takes the goals of the client (the problem/program) and molds them into a rationale solution that is functional and aesthetically pleasing.
From my colleague Richard Tindell, who has walked in these shoes much longer than I have:
You might want to consider a theatrical analogy of building a set or a stage for some happening. I have found in the past but one of the biggest obstacles is to overcome the tyranny of the plant.
Dana Worthington takes Mr. Tindell’s point:
Perhaps it could be described as the means to the end...with "the end" being the creation of an outdoor experience or "room" or use.
Mark Francis is a landscape architect with a more poetic approach although he doesn’t find usefulness in the answer because it is based on personal experience:
Design is understanding what is and imagining what isn't.
And then he quotes Anne Spirn as she spins her magic:
Design is a way of imagining and telling new stories and reviving old ones, a process of spinning out visions of landscapes, alternatives from which to choose, describing the shape of a possible future. The products of design - gardens, homes, road and water systems, neighborhoods, and cities - are settings for living that convey meaning, express a society's values. We extend these meanings through processes of construction and cultivation, use and neglect, as we dwell in what began as dreams.
Jack Varga lives in a world of black and white:
I'm not sure there is truth in trying to define what design is
And then proceeds to give us a quite lengthy, university answer.
In philosophy, the abstract noun "design" refers to a pattern with a purpose. Design is thus contrasted with purposelessness, randomness, or lack of complexity.
Sue Grant is, (sorry!) addicted to commas and parentheses as she, too, struggles, and ends wondering about the tree falling in the forest:
…design is the 'conscious' attempt at creating something. In the landscape, that might include 'the look' and 'the feel' of space - overall, subspace, large or small. Also, the attempt to control and direct views, circulation (connecting points or space creation), textures, color, maintenance, function, services, access, use, longevity, style, scale, etc..... And, if desired, responding to outside (and inside) influences (weather, soil, etc.). I'd like to think that all of this is towards creating something good. But that might not be someone else's intent - or talent - or opinion. Any way it is design I suppose. Is it the 'conscious' which makes it design? Or is it still design even if the intent is to not do it consciously?
Russ Adsit jumps right in:
If design is the search for form, what happens when you find form, have you achieved design? (This in response to my own partial definition–ms)Design is an active participation in the arrangement, collection or rearrangement of substance. Is bad design still design? What makes it good design? By what measure?
Safei-Eldin Hamed quotes one of my own former employers, John Simonds:
“With time, this lesson of insight seems increasingly clear. One designs not places, or spaces or things--one designs experiences. The places,spaces, and things take their form from the planned experience.”
By this criteria, a highway is not best designed as a strip of pavement. A highway is properly conceived as an experience of movement. The best community or city, by this test, is that which provides for its citizens *the best environment for the experience of living*."
In this way, Mr. Simonds brings us very clearly full circle, back to the notion that design is about calibrating our experiences in the world we find ourselves inhabiting.
No commas need apply.
