ARC252 - Modernism

Gabriel Guevrekian

- celebrate inert (not living) materials by integrating them to be part of the overall design

- concrete in villa noilles, glass in garden of water and light

- one of the first modern landscapers

Thomas Church

- thought about how clients would use space and combine it with his design instincts

- didn't push a specific style

- used trees and veg with arch properties

- wood in modern way in Martin Beach House

- Modern pool with sculpture in Donnel Garden

Dan Kiley

- part of group of 3

- classical tools of landscape arch but in modern configurations

- mass planting, minimal and simple use of veg in Miller Garden

- 3 layers in Richardson dwelling (dwelling, entire site, social spaces)

- division between spaces, social vs private

J Austin Floyd

- simplicty of materials

- japaneses influence

- veg to frame spaces and appreciate their forms

- flow from inside to outside

- sensory experience

- manus residence, kavan residence, four seasons, centre for the blind

Luis Barragan

Modern arch in Mexico

- back to operating on ground plane

- also an arch

- preserve natural site and highlight elements in Jardines de Pedregal

- sculptural gateway, celebrate modernity and increasing population of Mexico, thinking about use of car in Torres de Satelite

Le Corbusier

- modern arch

- tower in the park

- city functions as a body with many organs

Modernism

-Response to cultural irrelevance of styles

-Landscapes strive for low maintenance, linking house and garden together

- organic forms, asymmetry, and new materials

- Inspiration from Japanese gardens and art movements

Christopher Tunnard

- form follows function

- asymmetry is best geometry

- only pure creation can lead to new style

- outdoor is extension of living

- landscape is plastic

- 3 approaches = functional, empathetic (oriental influence), artistic (modern art)

- st ann's hill

Fletcher Steele

Transition figure

- masonry

- both formal and informal

- no ecological interest

- landscape responds to arch, does not look natural

- famous blue stairs in Naumkeag, Stockbridge

James Rose

- part of big 3

- neither landscape or arch but both

- space is true form of landscape

- flow between inside and outside

- japanese influence

- wood in modern way

- amebic forms

- Rose residence, Yarbrough residence

Garret Eckbo

- part of group of 3

- had worked for Thomas Church

- aluminum in modern way in alcoa garden

- arch veg

- many housing projects using different types of veg to create sense of individuality and identity

- wrote landscape for the living

- big on theory

How did Toronto Parks committe change over time?

First it focus on the neoclassicism and the City Beautiful Movement

- Then it focus on health and wellbeing, importance of pavillions and ravines

- Currently it focuses on ecology and postmodernism

Dunning Grubb and Stensson

- South Humber Park

- created a landscape that beautified surrounding site and not trying to hide treatment plant

- Pavillion acted as modern and sculptural element and had a topgrahical relationship

Donald W Graham

Gardens of the Provinces

- open plaza

- used exposed aggrgate

- mass planting > ecological

- lots of geometry but no clear axis

Sasaki Strong and Associates

- Hideo Sasaki and Richard Strong

- Toronto CIty hall - not symmetrical axis, encourage people to gather, flexible space, use concrete arch to frame space

- Queen's Park complex = plants have arch qualities, Japanese influence, mass planting

York Uni = circulation, flow, no axial alignment, buildings in centre and parkign lots on edges

Importance of pocket park

- distance yourself from city

- noise and vegetation covers noise and sight of city

Lawrence Halprin

- all veg is sculptural

- fountains and waterfalls

- mounds are sculptural

Common Goals of Modern Playground

-Importance of how children learn through movement

-Through play children create a sense of meaning of their env

-Patterns of organization

-All classes could participate

-Many were inspired by abstract art

Aldo Van Eyk

- 700 playgrounds in amsterdam

- create connections in community

- junk playgrounds

Robert Royston

- brought modernism to playgrounds

- used modern forms

- areas for different ages

Paul Friedberg

Idea of linked/continuous play - choice of what to do next

-Creating experiences comparable to what a child might find elsewhere - mountain, tunnel, treehouse

-Connection between play, exploration and cognitive developmen

Richard Dattner

Central park playground

- commercialized playgroudn elements

Cornelia Hahn Oberlander - Playgrounds

- Expo 67 playgrounds

- splitting up ages

- logs as tunnels

- scaled down toys for children = create agency

- - emotional awareness, intellectual growth through spontaneity

Michael Hough

- promoted anything along Don RIver

- ecological process, natural habitats and how to restore them

- building can be symapthetic and contrast teh landscape

- city and nature as one

- Ontario Place, Scarborough college

- inspired by Ian McHarg

George Tanaka

RIverdale Hospital

- Japanese influence

- maximize patient integration with park

- connecting interior and exterior

Ron Thom

Massey College and Trent Uni

- modern buildings and materials

- flow of landscape

- art deco details

Don Vaughn

- focus on pedestrian

- ring road in Uni of Victoria

- using materials for inherent purposes (concrete used as concrete)

Arthur Erikson

- integrating building into the landscape

- sensitivity to pre-existing site

- flexible and flowing landscape

- Simon Fraser Uni and Uni of Lethbridge

Ontario Science Centre

Original Entrace - practical but also adds to experience (bus path around fountain)- windows display ravine -Every transition to one building brings u deeper into the ravine -Natural landscape is constant reminder that with science and tech, nature is still the basis of life

Peter Walker

Weyerhaeuser Campus

- skyscraper turn on side

- env concisous corporate buildings

- landscape grows onto building

Cornelia Hahn Oberlander - Arch

- worked with Arthur Erikson

- respecting indigenous art and landscape in UBC Museum of Anthro

- Stramps and bringing nature to city with Robson Square

John Rusking

- Artist, thinker, wrote about geology, botany, and economy

- Law of Evanscene

- If you understand reality through aesthetics, than you'll see reality properly

-Combining art and science, how design allows you to see the world and participate in it

-Parallel that city is an eroding process like rocks

-Constant parallel between natural construction and human construction

-Teaching of art is the teaching of all things

Patrick Geddes

- inspired by Geddes

- evolution and classification

- art was needed to stimulate the senses to create positive evolution

- The Valley Section and the Outlook Tower Camera Obscura

Frank Lloyd Wright

Broadacre city

- decentralize city

- each family gets 1 acre = more involved with land and have sense of ownership

Lewis Mumford

- inspired by Geddes

- critical of: trends, urban envs, urban sprawl, tech

- degradation of env impact on humans

- regions

Ian McHarg

- landscape is being left behind in modern arch movement

- we need to work with nature, not forget it

- ecological method = layering data to see healthy vs unhealthy areas

Problems of modern Toronto cities

- superblock = poor circulation = increased crime

- no sense of ownership to landscape = no commitment/maintenance

- no division between private and public space

Common characteristics of Modern Landscapes

- modern materials

- no axial alignment, but geometric forms

- celebrating inert materials

- japanese influence

- mass planting

- vegetation with arch qualitites > ecology

- landscape does not look natural

- modern art and sculptures

- function follow form

- flow from indoors to outdoors

What were modern toronto cities trying to accomplish?

- safety for the pedestrian especially kids

- mix income housing

- smaller commuter with adjacent industrial and commericial buildings

Macklin Hancock

DON MILLS

- mix income hosuing

- respect exisiting typograhy

- centre core

- encourage pedestrian traffic

- separating uses and activities

- create sense of identity for residents

- green space

- discontinuous roads

Reading - The Modern Landscape Arch of the Uni of Montreal landscape

Designed by La Haye - importance of open spaces - blending into pre-existing nature - the mountain and Mount Royal - use of modern materials - concrete, steel, etc. - flow and linking between spaces - importance of green spaces - blends in with the city

Reading: Sewell John - City Building Modern Style

- "destroy the old and build the new"

- emergance of new communites after WWII

- influences from City Beautiful and Garden City

- Lawrence Park = open spaces added to traditional grid

Reading: McHarglan - Metropolitan Region

To evaluate the components of a city - what makes up the city's identity, how can an landscape arch respond to nature and natural vegetation

- city is firsrt a form of geological and biological evolution, existing as a sum of natural processes adopted by man

Reading: Le Corbusier - Contemporary City

- city as body with many organs

- the tower in teh park

- level site

- garden cities

- reduced traffic

- central station

- tower as central core

Reading: Dan Kiley's Site Design for the Gateway Arch

Determined to be a rehibilitation treatment- Keep major ideas: alignment of walks and monoculture planting

- change those that are not part of the big part of the idea: benches and light fixtures

- It is difficult to preserve landscape arch over arch

- Landscape arch's ideas are often not fully executed

Reading: Making Toronto Modern

- turning building's into "assembly lines" using sub-systems and modularity to decrease constructions costs

- history of the open-plan school system

- how successes and failures of this system were implemented into the building's of the UofT campus (key arch Dubois)

Reading: Landscape Design - The Urban Env

Farmers were the first landscape archs

- humans need leisure, recreation, to be outside v- parks need to be accessible to every age, gender, interest(play lot, children's playground, district playfield, urban park, country park and green belts, special areas, parkways and freeways)

- qualitative and quantitative problem (better integration, flexibility and should have multiple uses)

- modern materials, equipment, and methods should be used

Reading: Herrington Susan - Play Space as Env

How more spatially complex experiences afforded by the idea of environment increasingly occupied Oberlander's and other landscape arch's thinking the 1960s and 1970s

- Basic landscape materiald, forms, and spaces could provide creative opportunities for play

- env as shaping human experience (movement of body through space > a line of movement)

- how do landscape archs draw upon subconscious in their work (like artists)

- equipment was open to interpretation and encouraged intense sensorial experiences

Reading: Kassler Elizabeth - Parks and Plazas

"Plazas need people for completion to ensure their free movement, restrictive paths defer to a large areas of pavement of such colour, texture, and pattern that it serves an antidote to the asphalt jungle rather than continuation. Water plays a major role."

Reading: Garrett Eckbo - Landscape for the Living

The octagon of landscape tradition- formal, informal romantic, plants, conservation, urban planning, modern, rural, folk- we shouldn't build anything without considering THEORY- both FORM and FUNCTION- both SOCIAL and NATURAL landscape

Reading: John Sewell - Don Mills

Hancock

- 5 concepts

1. neighbourhoods

2. discontinuous roads

3. green space

4. new house forms and lot configurations

5. separation of uses and activities

- create sense of identity for residents

- be accessible for a mix of incomes

Reading: Walker Peter - Beyond the American Dream

Eckbo, Royston, and Williams

- effected by Great Depression and WWII, wanted tranquility at home via garden

- design at scale of gardens and neighbourhoods- Eckbo = theorist and reformer

- Royston = social purpose (playgrounds and parks)

- Williams = manager, large scale planning

- more sculptural, artful, mix of formal and informal,

Reading: Ron Williams - National and Provincial Parks

history of national/provincial parks

- first made to attract tourists

- then push for ecological and natural preservation

- Ohmstead is father

- Canadian identity in landscape painting and art

Reading: Newton Norman - Parkways and their Offspring

-parkways are the most misinterpreted park area

- initially roads that wre wider and more richly furnished than ordinary streets

- got rid of billboards, increased market value- visually, the parkway was more and more just a natural part of the countryside

- made driving more safe and comfortable

- now not as useful: need more commerical vehicles, controlled access = freeways now use features from parkway (sights and sounds, not purely mechanical road)

Reading: Houge Martin - Campgrounds

History of Camping- not actually living in nature

- landscape is manipulated to make room for humans

- makes nature seem peaceful and non

-threatening, comfortable and visually inspiring

- campgrounds are not well taken care of by campers

- site becomes independent of natural surroundings

- cars and trailers = further degradation

- camping not about nature but about the camp's ammenities

Reading: Ethan Carr - Mission 66

Mission 66:

- multi-disciplinary

- large scale planning

- modern

- landscape archs less important, only 1 of many displinaries, more visitor centre planning = more need for arch

- modern arch theories, landscape and arch as 1

- contraversial: vegetation was not about environmentalism/conservation, didn't focus on preserving nature

Common qualities of modern uni campuses

- pedestrian friendly

- central core with parking on outer ring

- grouping like programs together

- opportunities to meet others in different programs

- flexible spaces, like stairs or squares

- enhancing natural landscape

Alfred Caldwell

- mentored by Jens Jenson

- Promoted natural style of landscape design and natural ecosystems

- influenced by prairie style landscape

- worked with Mies