XERISCAPE:

a garden or landscape created in a style that requires little or no irrigation or other maintenance,
used in arid regions.

What is Genius Loci?

It is defined as spirit of a place. In classical Roman religion a genius loci was the protective spirit
of a place. It was often depicted in religious iconography as a figure holding attributes such as
a cornucopia, patera (libation bowl) or snake. Many Roman altars found throughout the Western
Roman Empirewere dedicated to particular genius loci. The Roman imperial cults of the
Emperor and the imperial house developed in part in connections with the sacrifices made by
neighborhood associations (vici) to the local genius. These 265 local districts had their cult organised
around the Lares Compitales (guardian spirits or lares of the crossroads), which the
emperor Augustus transformed into Lares Augusti along with the Genius Augusti. The
Emperor's genius is then regarded as the genius loci of the Roman Empire as a whole.

Roman examples of these Genii can be found, for example, at the church of St. Giles, Tockenham,
Wiltshire where the genius loci is depicted as a relief in the wall of a Norman church built
of Roman material. This shows "a youthful and curly-haired Roman Genius worked in high relief,
holding a cornucopia in his left hand and a patera in his right', which previously has been
"erroneously identified as Asclepius"
Frederick Law Olmsted
Frederick Law Olmsted (April 26, 1822 August 28, 1903) was an American landscape architect,
journalist, social critic, and public administrator. He is popularly considered to be the father of
American landscape architecture, although many scholars have bestowed that title upon Andrew
Jackson Downing. Olmsted was famous for co-designing many well-known urban parks with his
senior partnerCalvert Vaux, including Central Park and Prospect Park in New York City, as well
as Elm Park (Worcester, Massachusetts), considered by many to be the first municipal park
in America.

OLMSTEDS DESIGN PRINCIPLES:

Drawing influences from English landscape and gardening, Olmsteds principles of design, generally
speaking, encourage the full utilization of the naturally occurring features of a given space, its
genius; the subordination of individual details to the whole so that decorative elements do not take
precedence, but rather the whole space; concealment of design, design that does not call attention
to itself; design which works on the unconscious to produce relaxation; and utility or purpose over
ornamentation. A bridge, a pathway, a tree, a pasture: any and all elements are brought together to
produce a particular effect.

Olmsted designed primarily in the pastoral and picturesque styles, each to achieve a particular
effect. The pastoral style featured vast expanses of green with small lakes, trees and groves and
produced a soothing, restorative effect on the viewer. The picturesque style covered rocky, broken
terrain with teeming shrubs and creepers and struck the viewer with a sense of natures richness.
The picturesque style played with light and shade to lend the landscape a sense of mystery.

Scenery was designed to enhance the sense of space: indistinct boundaries using plants, brush and
trees as opposed to sharp ones; interplay of light and shadow close up and blurred detail further
away. A vast expanse of greenery at the end of which lies a grove of yellow poplar; a path that winds
through a bit of landscape and intersects with others, dividing the terrain into triangular islands of
successive new views.

Subordination strives to use all objects and features in the service of the design and its intended
effect. It can be seen in the subtle use of naturally occurring plants throughout the park. Non-native
species planted for the sake of their own uniqueness defeat the purpose of design, as that very
uniqueness draws attention to itself where the intention is to enable relaxation: utility above all else.
Separation applies to areas designed in different styles and different uses enhancing safety and
reducing distraction. A key feature of Central Park is the use of sunken roadways which traverse the
park and are specifically dedicated to vehicles as opposed to winding paths designated specifically
for pedestrians.

A beautiful example of this mix of principles is seen in the Parks Mall in New York's Central Park, a
large promenade leading to the Bethesda Terrace and the single formal feature in Olmsted and
Vauxs original naturalistic design. The designers wrote that a "'grand promenade was an essential
feature of a metropolitan park. However, its formal symmetry, its style, though something of an
aberration, was designed so as to be subordinate to the natural view surrounding it. Wealthy
passengers were let from their carriages at its south end. The carriage would then drive around to
the Terrace, which overlooked the Lake and Ramble to pick them up, saving them the trouble of
needing to double back on foot. The Promenade was lined with slender elms and offered views of
Sheep Meadow. Affluent New Yorkers, who rarely walked through the park, mixed with the less well-
to-do, and all enjoyed an escape from the hustle and bustle of the surrounding city.

NEWYORK CITYS CENTRAL PARK:

Andrew Jackson Downing, the charismatic landscape architect from Newburgh, New York, was one
of the first who proposed the development of New York's Central Park in his role as publisher of The
Horticulturist magazine. A friend and mentor to Olmsted, Downing introduced him to the English-
born architect Calvert Vaux. Downing had brought Vaux from England as his architect collaborator.
After Downing died in July 1852, in a widely publicized steamboat explosion on the Hudson River,
Olmsted and Vaux entered the Central Park design competition together, against Egbert Ludovicus
Viele among others. Vaux had invited the less experienced Olmsted to participate in the design
competition with him, having been impressed with Olmsted's theories and political contacts. Prior to
this, in contrast with the more experienced Vaux, Olmsted had never actually designed and
executed a landscape design.

They were announced as winners in 1858. On his return from the South, Olmsted began executing
their plan almost immediately. Olmsted and Vaux continued their informal partnership to
design Prospect Park in Brooklyn from 1865 to 1873.[10] That was followed by other projects. Vaux
remained in the shadow of Olmsted's grand public personality and social connections.

The design of Central Park embodies Olmsted's social consciousness and commitment to egalitarian
ideals. Influenced by Downing and his own observations regarding social class in England, China,
and the American South, Olmsted believed that the common green space must always be equally
accessible to all citizens. This principle is now fundamental to the idea of a "public park", but was not
assumed as necessary then. Olmsted's tenure as park commissioner in New York was a long
struggle to preserve that idea.
Roberto Burle Marx
Roberto Burle Marx (August 4, 1909 June 4, 1994) was a Brazilian landscape architect (as well
as a painter, maker, ecologist, naturalist, artist and musician) whose designs
of parks and gardens made him world famous. He is accredited with having
introduced modernist landscape architecture to Brazil. He was known as a modern nature artist and
a public urban space designer. His work had a great influence on tropical garden design in the 20th
century. Water gardens were a popular theme in his work. He was deftly able to transfer traditional
artistic expressions such as graphic design, tapestry and folk art into his landscape designs. He also
designed fabrics, jewellery and stage sets.

Burle Marxs Design Principles:

Burle Marx's artistic style was avant-garde and modern. Much of his work has a sense of
timelessness and perfection. He explored an anti-mimitec and skeptical aesthetic developed
from modernism with a distinctly Brazilian style. His designs were also influenced
by cubismand abstractionism. Another strong influence was Brazilian folk art.

His aesthetics were often nature based, for example, never mixing flower colours, utilisation of big
groups of the same specimen, using native plants and making a rocky field into a relaxing garden.
He was very interested in each plant's character and what effect that has on the whole garden. He
sort a depth in his designs by understanding how animals interacted with plants and how they
bloomed, amongst other plan characteristics. Burle Marx had a great skill in utilising the sculptural
form of plants. Bulle Marx was mindful of the dynamic of walking through a garden. The sensation of
mobility is an important element of experiencing his landscapes.[6] He also made clever use of
enormous scale, lighting and reflection particularly in his use of water. Burle Marx was able to extend
the architecture of a building into the garden. He preferred to work on public spaces because, in his
words, they are able to provide dignity for the masses.

Marxs work can be summarized in four general design conceptsthe use of native tropical
vegetation as a structural element of design, the rupture of symmetrical patterns in the conception of
open spaces, the colorful treatment of pavements, and the use of free forms in water features
(Vaccarino 2000, p. 17). This approach is exemplified by the Copacabana Beach promenade, where
native sea breeze resistant trees and palms appear in groupings along Avenida Atlantica. These
groupings punctuate Portuguese stone mosaics which form a giant abstract painting where no
section along the promenade is the same. This painting is viewed from the balconies of hotels, and
offers an ever changing view for those driving along the beach. The mosaics continue the entire two
and a half mile distance of the beach. The water feature, in this case, is of course the ocean and
beach, which is bordered by a 30 foot wide continuous scallop patterned mosaic walk (Eliovson
1991; Montero 2001). Copacabana Beach is the most famous in Brazil
Roberto Burle Marx has received the following prizes, diplomas of merit and honorary memberships:
The landscape architecture prize at the 2nd International Exhibition of Architecture (1953), title of
Knight of the Order of the Crown from Belgium (1959), Diploma dHonneur in Paris (1959), the
Santos Dumont Medal of the Brazilian Government (1963), the Fine Arts Medal of The American
Institute of Architects in Washington (1965), doctor of the Royal College of Art, London (1982) and
an honorary doctorate from the Queen of Holland. The Missouri Botanical Garden awarded him the
Greensfelder Award and the Kentucky Botanic Garden proclaimed October 14, 1985 in his honor
(Eliovson 1991).

HIS WORKS:

Landscape design of some gardens in the public buildings of Braslia

Ministry of Army - water garden and excellent use of concrete forms.

Foreign Affairs Building
Ministry of Education
Itamaraty Palace - headquarters of the Ministry of External Relations

Copacabana promenade - Pavement landscape, large scale (4 km long) mosaic completed

in 1970 on famous Rio de Janeiro beach. (Influenced by Portuguese pavement)
Ibirapuera Park, So Paulo, 1954
Flamengo Park - large public park in Rio de Janeiro built on landfill
Venetian Palace - entrance, and extreme use of scale.
Parque del Este, Caracas, Venezuela
Pampulha
Cascade Garden, Longwood Gardens, Pennsylvania
Biscayne Boulevard, Miami, Florida (Completed posthumously)
Peru Square, Buenos Aires, Argentina (Demolished)
Kuala Lumpur City Centre (KLCC) Park, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Casa Forte Square (Praa de Casa Forte), Recife, Pernambuco-Brazil
Cascata Farm, Araras-Brazil
Ian McHarg
Ian L. McHarg (November 20, 1920 - March 5, 2001) was a Scottish landscape architect and a
renowned writer on regional planningusing natural systems. He was the founder of the department of
landscape architecture at the University of Pennsylvania in the United States. His 1969 book Design
with Nature pioneered the concept of ecological planning. It continues to be one of the most widely
celebrated books on landscape architecture and land-use planning. In this book, he set forth the
basic concepts that were to develop later in Geographic Information Systems.

His Design principles:

In 1969, he published Design with Nature, which was essentially a book of step-by-step instructions
on how to break down a region into its appropriate uses. McHarg also was interested in garden
design and believed that homes should be planned and designed with good private garden space.
He promoted an ecological view, in which the designer becomes very familiar with the area through
analysis of soil, climate, hydrology, etc. Design With Nature was the first work of its kind "to define
the problems of modern development and present a methodology or process prescribing compatible
solutions". The book also had an impact on a variety of fields and ideas. Frederick R. Steiner tells us
that "environmental impact assessment, new community development, coastal zone management,
brownfields restoration, zoo design, river corridor planning, and ideas about sustainability and
regenerative design all display the influence of Design with Nature".

Design with Nature had its roots in much earlier landscape architecture philosophies. It was sharply
critical of the French Baroque style of garden design, which McHarg saw as a subjugation of nature,
and full of praise for the English picturesque style of garden design. McHarg's focus, however, was
only partially on the visual and sensual qualities which had dominated the English picturesque
movement. Instead, he saw the earlier tradition as a precursor of his philosophy, which was rooted
less in aristocratic estate design or even garden design and more broadly in an ecological sensibility
that accepted the interwoven worlds of the human and the natural, and sought to more fully and
intelligently design human environments in concert with the conditions of setting, climate and
environment. Always a polemicist, McHarg set his thinking in radical opposition to what he argued
was the arrogant and destructive heritage of urban-industrial modernity, a style he described as
"Dominate and Destroy."

Following the publication of Design with Nature, Wallace McHarg Roberts & Todd (WMRT) worked
in major American cities - Minneapolis, Denver, Miami, New Orleans, and Washington (DC) - and
created environmentally-based master plans for Amelia Island Plantation and Sanibel Islands in
Florida.

His works:
It was not until after his term in the Parachute Regiment, serving in war-stricken Italy during World
War II, however, that he was able to explore the field of urban landscape architecture. After working
with the Royal Engineers during World War II, he travelled to America. He was admitted to the
school of architecture at Harvard University's Graduate School of Design where he received
professional degrees in both landscape architecture and city planning. After completing his
education he returned to his homeland, intending to help rebuild a country ravaged by war. In
Scotland he worked on housing and programs in "new towns", until he was contacted by Dean G.
Holmes Perkins from the University of Pennsylvania. Dean Perkins wanted McHarg to build a new
graduate program in landscape architecture at the University.

Soon thereafter, McHarg began teaching at the University of Pennsylvania, where he developed the
department of landscape architecture, and developed a popular new course, titled Man and
Environment in 1957.[2] The course featured leading scholars whom McHarg invited to his class to
discuss ethics and values, as well as other ideas ranging from entropy to plate tectonics. In 1960, he
hosted his own television show on CBS, The House We Live In, inviting prominent theologians and
scientists of the day to discuss the human place in the world, in a style similar to the one he honed
teaching "Man and Environment."

In 1963 Ian McHarg and David A. Wallace, his academic colleague from the University of
Pennsylvania, founded the firm of Wallace and McHarg Associates, later Wallace McHarg Roberts &
Todd (WMRT) which is known for its central role in the development of the American environmental
planning and urbanism movements. The seminal work of the firm includes the plan
for Baltimore's Inner Harbor, the Plan for the Valleys in Baltimore County, MD, and the Plan for
Lower Manhattan in New York City from 1963 through 1965.

As the first-wave American environmental movement swept across American college campuses in
the 1960s and early 1970s, McHarg became an important figure, linking a compelling personal
presence and a powerful rhetoric with a direct and persuasive proposal for a new integration of
human and natural environments. Through the 1960s and 1970s, his course was the most popular
on the Penn campus,[1] and he was often invited to speak on campuses throughout the country.
Geoffrey Jellicoe
Sir Geoffrey Jellicoe (8 October 1900 17 July 1996) was an English architect, town
planner, landscape architect, designer and author. His strongest interest was in landscape and
garden design.

His Life history, works & Design Principles:

Jellicoe was born in Chelsea, London. He studied at the Architectural Association in London in 1919
and won a British Prix de Rome for Architecture in 1923, which enabled him to research his first
book Italian Gardens of the Renaissance with John C. Shepherd. This pioneering study did much to
re-awaken interest in this great period of landscape design and through its copious photographic
illustrations publicized the then perilously decayed condition of many of the gardens.

In 1929 he was a founding member of the Landscape Institute and from 1939 to 1949 he was its
President. In 1948, he became the founding President of the International Federation of Landscape
Architects (IFLA). From 1954 to 1968 he was a member of Royal Fine Art Commission and from
1967 to 1974 a Trustee of Tate Gallery.

On 11 July 1936, he married Susan Pares (19071986), the daughter of Sir Bernard Pares KBE
(18671949), the historian and academic known for his work on Russia.

He died in 1996, the best-known English landscape architect of his generation.

His projects:

1934-36 Caveman Restaurant, Cheddar Gorge, Somerset.

1934-39 Ditchley Park, Oxfordshire
1935 Plan for Calverton Colliery, Calverton, Nottinghamshire
1936 The Great Mablethorpe Plan, Lincolnshire
1947 Plan for Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire
1956 Harvey's Store Roofgarden, Guildford, Surrey
1957-59 Water Gardens, Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire
1959 Cliveden Rose Garden, Taplow, Buckinghamshire
1964-65 Kennedy Memorial Garden, Runnymede, Surrey
1970-90 Shute House
1979-89 Hartwell House Garden, Buckinghamshire
1980-86 Sutton Place Garden, Surrey
1984 Moody Gardens, Galveston, Texas, USA
Pierre Charles L'Enfant
Pierre "Peter" Charles L'Enfant (August 9, 1754 June 14, 1825) was a French-born American
architect and civil engineer best known for designing the layout of the streets of Washington, D.C.,
the L'Enfant Plan.

LIFE HISTORY:
Born in Anet on August 9, 1754, L'Enfant was the third child and second son of Marie Charlotte
L'Enfant (aged 25 and the daughter of a minor marine official at court) and Pierre L'Enfant (1704
1787), a painter with a good reputation in the service of King. In 1758, his brother Pierre Joseph died
at the age of six, leaving him the eldest son. He studied at the Royal Academy in the Louvre before
enrolling to fight in the American Revolution. He also studied under his father at the Royal Academy
of Painting and Sculpture.

PLAN OF FEDERAL CAPITAL CITY:

The new Constitution of the United States, which took effect in 1789, gave Congress authority to
establish a federal district up to ten miles square in size. L'Enfant had already written to President
Washington, asking to be commissioned to plan the city, but a decision on the capital was put on
hold until July 1790 when the 1st Congress passed theResidence Act.] The legislation, which was
the result of a compromise brokered by Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson, specified the
new capital be situated on thePotomac River, at some location between the Eastern Branch
(the Anacostia River) and the Connogochegue, near Hagerstown, Maryland. The Residence Act
gave authority to President Washington to appoint three commissioners to oversee the survey of the
federal district and "according to such Plans, as the President shall approve," provide public
buildings to accommodate the Federal government in 1800.

President Washington appointed L'Enfant in 1791 to design the new capital city (later named the City
of Washington) under the supervision of three Commissioners, whom Washington had appointed to
oversee the planning and development of the federal territory that would later become the District of
Columbia. Thomas Jefferson, who worked alongside President Washington in overseeing the plans
for the capital, sent L'Enfant a letter outlining his task, which was to provide a drawing of suitable
sites for the federal city and the public buildings. Though Jefferson had modest ideas for the Capital,
L'Enfant saw the task as far more grandiose, believing he was not only locating the capital, but also
devising the city plan and designing the buildings.

L'Enfant arrived in Georgetown on March 9, 1791, and began his work, from Suter's Fountain
Inn.[16] Washington arrived on March 28, to meet with L'Enfant and the Commissioners for several
days.[17] On June 22, L'Enfant presented his first plan for the federal city to the President. On August
19, he appended a new map to a letter that he sent to the President.

President Washington retained one of L'Enfant's plans, showed it to Congress, and later gave it to
the three Commissioners.[22][23] The U.S. Library of Congress now holds both the plan that
Washington apparently gave to the Commissioners and an undated anonymous survey map that the
Library considers L'Enfant to have drawn before August 19, 1791. The survey map may be one that
L'Enfant appended to his August 19 letter to the President.

L'Enfant's "Plan of the city intended for the permanent seat of the government of the United States..."
encompassed an area bounded by the Potomac River, the Eastern Branch, the base of
the escarpment of the Atlantic Seaboard Fall Line, and Rock Creek. His plan specified locations for
the "Congress House" (the Capitol), which would be built on"Jenkins Hill" (later to be known as
"Capitol Hill"), and the "President's House" (later after 1817, the White House), which would be
situated on a ridge parallel to the Potomac River. L'Enfant envisioned the "President's House" to
have public gardens and monumental architecture. Reflecting his grandiose visions, he specified
that the "President's House" would be five times the size of the building that was actually
constructed.[15] Emphasizing the importance of the new Nation's Legislature, the "Congress House"
would be located on a longitude designated as 0:0

The plan specified that most streets would be laid out in a grid. To form the grid, some streets would
travel in an east-west direction, while others would travel in a north-south direction. Diagonal
avenues, later named after the states of the Union, crossed the grid. The diagonal avenues
intersected with the north-south and east-west streets atcircles and rectangular plazas that would
later honor notable Americans and provide open space.

L'Enfant laid out a 400 feet (122 m)-wide garden-lined "grand avenue", which he expected to travel
for about 1 mile (1.6 km) along an east-west axis in the center of an area that would later become
the National Mall. He also laid out a narrower avenue (Pennsylvania Avenue) which would connect
the "Congress House" with the "President's House". In time, Pennsylvania Avenue developed into
the capital city's present "grand avenue".

Andrew Ellicott's 1792 revision of L'Enfant's plan of 1791-1792 for the "Federal City" later Washington City, District of
Columbia

L'Enfant's plan additionally laid out a system of canals (later designated as the Washington City
Canal) that would pass the "Congress House" and the "President's House". One branch of the canal
would empty into the Potomac River south of the "President's House" at the mouth of old Tiber
Creek, which would be channelized and straightened.
L'Enfant secured the lease of quarries at Wigginton Island and along Aquia Creek off the
lower Potomac River in Virginia to supply Aquia Creek sandstone for the foundation and later for the
wall slabs and blocks of the "Congress House" in November 1791. However, his temperament and
his insistence that his city design be realized as a whole, brought him into conflict with the
Commissioners, who wanted to direct the limited funds available into construction of the Federal
buildings. In this, they had the support of Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson.

During a contentious period in February 1792, Andrew Ellicott, who had been conducting the original
boundary survey of the future District of Columbia (see: Boundary Stones (District of Columbia)) and
the survey of the "Federal City" under the direction of the Commissioners, informed the
Commissioners that L'Enfant had not been able to have the city plan engraved and had refused to
provide him with the original plan (of which L'Enfant had prepared several versions). Ellicott, with the
aid of his brother, Benjamin Ellicott, then revised the plan, despite L'Enfant's protests. Shortly
thereafter, having along with Secretary Jefferson grown increasingly frustrated by L'Enfant's
unresponsiveness and headstrong ways, President Washington dismissed the architect. After
L'Enfant departed, Andrew Ellicott continued the city survey in accordance with the revised plan,
several versions of which were engraved, published and distributed. As a result, Ellicott's revisions
subsequently became the basis for the Capital City's development.

L'Enfant was initially not paid for his work on his plan for the "Federal City". He fell into disgrace,
spending much of the rest of his life trying to persuade Congress to pay him the tens of thousands of
dollars that he claimed he was owed. After a number of years, Congress finally paid him a small
sum, nearly all of which went to his creditors.