Oehme, Van Sweden & Associates

Paloma Isabella Gonzalez

Introduction to Landscape

Prof. I. Fernandez and S. Hawks December.03.2013

Oehme, Van Sweden & Associates it is an iconic landscape architecture firm in the United States founded by the landscape architects Wolfgang Oehme and James Van Sweden based in Washington, DC. Since 1977 and having a wide array of projects varying in scale and function nationally and internationally. Consider one of the most significant landscape architecture firms in the United States and the place where its founders perfectioned a new conception of landscape design the New American Garden. This approach allowed them to develop a great extent of projects in a wide array of scales and for a diverse set of clients; a way of designing that emerged from their bold and respectful approach towards nature and which was widely embraced by a country that appreciated their European and American roots and the great richness of their backgrounds. On one hand the son of a builder James Van Sweden was born in 1935 and grew up amidst an important German community in the region of Grand Rapids, Michigan. Originally trained as an architect earning a bachelors degree in Architecture by the University of Mi chigan and later by his mentors advice went on to study landscape architecture at the Delft University of Technology in The Netherlands. While Wolfgang Oehme was born in the city of Chemnitz, Germany in 1930 where he developed an early love and respect for plants which years later translated into Oehmes training as a gardener at the Illge Nursery in Germany which led him into attending the Bitterfeld Horticultural School also in Germany and finally pursuing landscape architecture at the Advanced School of Garden Design, University of Berlin.

Oehme and Van Sweden would end up crossing paths around 1964 but before this Oehme would developed his skills and knowledge further in Europe working at an English nursery in London and later returning to his country where he worked as a planner for the Park Department and finally in 1957 he would move to the United States to the city of Baltimore, Maryland where he spent a year and a half working for Bruce Baetjer a landscape designer before he started working for the Baltimore County Department of Parks. During this period Oehme designed golf courses, playgrounds and parks for the county until 1965 and started practicing independently in the area from 1966 to 1974 where he designed primary residential and private commissions. All this years of theoretical learning and hands-on practice made him a plant genius that started planting at the early age of five and had the opportunity to develop a close relationship with nature and a hunger for natural processes through observation. Oehmes extensive training in horticulture allowed him to develop his great capacity to understand plants and natural processes aspect that captivated James Van Sweden who also share a huge respect and love for nature that turned into their collaborative work as firm partners and in 1977 with Oehmes funding they founded their firm in order to keep experimenting and which made possible for them to combine their great technical skills into an approach that was bold in execution, meticulous in planning and that always sought to have sustainability as the driven force of each one of their projects; whether public or private, grand or small for them gardening was enjoyable and pleasurable at all scales.

The New American Garden approach to landscape that Oehme and Van Sweden developed was at that time not fully understood and still in our modern days of the green era it is still not widely accepted as a form of aesthetics for the majority. Back then consider a bold and wild standard for aesthetics: landscape architecture was taken to a different level with the use of windblown lush ornamental grasses and the extensive use of massed perennials having as their muse the prairie landscapes where they both grew up in. Their approach sought after plants and trees that required littler water or fertilizer but that at the same time would look attractive in all seasons plus seeking to portray the variation and passage of time through the different stages of a plant in relation to time, light and season. On the other hand landscape architecture for Oehme and Van Sweden needed to become the mediator between the built form and the community. They envisioned landscapes that fused the multiple elements that conform the place but that most of the time would be separated by divisions instead of providing a source for unity and interaction. Texture and height were used to create flowing hierarchies and later would became one of the key signature elements in their design style; where as in color juxtaposition relied the dynamic that tried to be recreated seeking to provide the whole landscape with fluidity. Thus painting became a great influential element on the development of their approach to design through the abstractionism of artist such as the American painter Hellen Frankenthaler. Who focused on tonality to create hierarchies that do not overpower but that allow for communities of plants to interact and support each other and it seemed both landscape architects hoped that in the same way people would feel inspired to come together and interact.

James Van Sweden a great designer and writer and Oehme a worldwide plant genius and passionate horticulturist became founders of a bold approach in landscape architecture strongly influenced by their great appreciation and respect towards nature which fueled a constant search for the understanding of the natural processes which gave place to a set of mind that always looked for functionality and aesthetics to be intrinsic to each other by always designing in an ecologically sustainable way with a focus on an active reaction to the phenomena outside such light and wind which allowed for the transitory characteristic of plants to be not only brought forward but above all to be celebrated seeking to educate people visually about the magnificence of nature. All this elements we find in the firms first big public commission the Virginia Avenue garden or better known as the Federal Reservation Garden located in Washington, DC. A project that they realized was going to be their breakthrough project and which later allowed them to take their new sustainable landscape design approach into new levels at different scales and in different cultural, historical and physical context. One of the features of this garden it is that rests on the roof of an underground parking structure that has been turned into this alive symphony of grasses and perennials where the firms characteristic lush meadow would dance while dots of color would seem to float along the flowing created meadows amidst a congested city. This concept of the governmental building it is addressed plus the public context of it but it seeks as well to integrate both the community/ society and the public service by allowing for both extremes to come together through a landscape that does not divide but progresses along both through sweeps of perennials in

contrast with trees and ornamental grasses plus open spaces that function as sculpture gardens.

Wolfgang Oehme and James Van Sweden left a legacy that influenced greatly not only landscape architecture as a profession but challenged the relation between men and nature. Oehme and Van Sweden each one with their own expertise allowed their passion to be guided by their life and professional experiences but above allowed their childhood memories of closeness with nature to make possible for boldness and technicality to come together to make societal standards of landscape more respectful and considerate towards nature. In their practice Oehme and Van Sweden fused smartly both the high residential projects with the public and the mixed-use projects that made possible for their practice to become stronger through actual in situ experimentation and in their own backyards. Seeing in each one of their projects the potential for something new without limitation of context, function or even the type of clients. And it is this humble and inquisitive approach that through their passion for landscape architecture but above all because of their great love and respect for nature which allowed them to not only breakthrough many archaic conceptions about the relationship between man and nature but to inspire a new generation of nature lovers.

Bibliography: 1. Wolfgang Oehme and James Van Sweden, Gardening with Nature (Washington: DC, 2007) 2. Oehme and Van Sweden, Gardening with Nature, 5-10, 25-33.

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