An exploration of the diagram and its uses

In the spirit of all things practical and not very creative but never-the-less very useful, I have been endeavouring to master the process of conveying information diagrammatically. After recording a jumble of intense information from an interview I did for this semester's report, I then extracted the statistics that would most benefit from being presented diagrammatically. The next step was to decide which form of diagram would best convey the information. Then once this was done a careful editing process allowed for a simple but effective diagram, explicitly illustrating key points.

Free of the national power grid? : A critique

An entirely new concept to me, I heard of this at the recent LI Conference. Apparently, there are a rapidly increasing number of people, who in an effort to better their environment and act in a truly responsible manner, are disconnecting their homes from the state power supply. This is either manifesting itself in, the conversion of an already enstated building, or a new build. Interestingly, the latter include a small minority, who are not only building new houses, but also without planning permission and in secret on virgin soil. The argument they give is that, whenever an application is made, the borough refuses it. So it is better to build first, start living green and then after a certain length of time has passed, if they remain undiscovered then they have a right to remain. They obviously feel strongly enough about this to do it despite the law, however, I cant help but wonder how sustainable this really is, to leave your home, rather than converting it and then to build a new home on a green field site often in green belt land, (as it is here that they can most easily hide). Surely the more sustainable option, is a conversion, not just sustainable in terms of the environment but also in terms of social responsibility. A great idea to live off the grid, but what better way to do it, than by proving to your average homeowner that it is both possible and worth while. Hiding away in the country sets no such example to the public, but rather exemplifies green living as an unnatainable myth.

http://www.off-grid.net/ http://www.blogger.com/www.offthegrid.com http://www.wikipedia.com/

LI Conference report, day 2 of 2

A second riveting day has now drawn to a close, and it was in many ways more informative than the first. But particularly because there were less figure's and jargon being bandied about and more simply understood information, giving us a true depiction of our role as Landscape Architects. I guess then, that the best use of this blog, is to finish what I started yesterday and complete the recording of the most impactive comments from today's meeting.

"Landscape = habitat + man"

"The growing season in Scotland, has increased by 33 days this year."

"Hot stuffy cities are going to depend more and more on the cooling and relaxing effects of Britan's coasts."

"If we could increase the planting in cities/towns/housing estates, etc, then we could hold surface heat levels, halting the furthering heating effect, and cooling our cities."

"The sea ice in the Arctic during the last year has shrunk by an unprecedented 1 million kilometeres."

"We cannot be sluggish in our response, we only have 10 years to avoid a dangerous level of change."

"The lighting of one lightbulb absorbs the energy (through poor connections) of thirty effective lightbulbs at the source."

"After today there are no more chances."

"It's so easy to become paralized like rabbits in headlights."

"The very thing that is causing our epidemic is the thing that soothes our conscience concerning it: shopping."

"After the final 'no' there comes a 'yes'. And on that 'yes' the world depends."

"Information like 'if we all used low energy lightbulbs we could shut down two of our country's power stations' will give people a sense of indivdual hope that they CAN make a difference."

"Consumerism has been used as an opiate of the people, feeding our deepest desires and turning us into mass, irresponsible consumers."

"Owning a car has become a rite of passage, and relinquishing this can initially be hurtful, making us feel depleted. But the eventual effect is empowering, as we become more aligned with our ideals and values."

"Let's change the colour of our money."

"What is the wealth of our community?"

"How can we call ourselves successful, when we spend 9.6 years of our lives watching television and living other peoples lives?"

"If you think you can't change, you're always right, as the people who are crazy enough to think that they can change the world, are the ones that do it."

"Be the change that you want to see in the world."

"What you say is 1/10 of the total absorbed meaning. The rest is who you portray. If you find that people aren't willing to listen to you, it's because you haven't earned the right to be listened to yet. Living what you are preaching gives empowering and motivating conviction that people will listen to."

"'Return of investment' is a terrible measure. We don't apply the same question to a new car which costs thousands a year in depricieation, so why apply it to something that fulfils an ideal?"

All of these and more, are the cumulative thoughts of Englands Landscape community, and it really does appear to me that without this collaboration, we are going nowhere. There are still too many practices acting in a competitive nature and as rivals. This will never facillitate the kind of multidisciplinary compimentary work that we must have in order to fulfill both what the public require of us and the land. One of our primary goals must be that every peice of work that we do, carries a brazen message of hope, that educates the public as to who we are, what our role is in their lives and where we can lead them. Their confidence must be lead to rest in us, in order for us to make the scale of changes that are needed long term. how can the Landscape and Architecture communities possibly survive if we allow selfish motives to seperate us from eachother and from truthfull pleasure in our work. If all projects are born of the selfish concept of "I must have that project, and I will do what I need (including sacrificing moral and ethical standards), to have it," then all project outcomes are going to be fundamentaly flawed, as they cannot possibly have the full spectrum of opportunity and motive that the world increasingly needs. I feel motivated to strategise my approach to practice and project, and hope that I do justice to the true needs of my fellow citizens during my career. What a FANTASTIC and worthwhile conferance!

LI Conference report, day 1 of 2

Wow! What a day! Information overload. The first day was fantastic and so informative, not just in terms of understanding the multidisciplinary nature of Landscape Architecture and the partnerships and alliances we form, but also what exactly the issues are that we hear continually alluded to without clear definition, and then of course: what we can do about them. On returning home tonight, I had a fascinating conversation with my mother-in-law, outlining her feelings that not all the issues are being honestly portrayed and that the opposite argument is not even being permitted a voice in this country. My response in the light of all of the information, that we have heard today, was that, well yes, that may be the case, but not because people don't care, or are in the game for ulterior motives, as these issues have been born out of genuine concern. Not only this, but even if the opposite argument was proven true, the issues that have been brought to light by the current movement towards greener thinking, are of huge significance anyway, enabling us to better our living condition globally, and why wait for that?! The other thought I had is that for those of us currently in the profession, we now have scope for a form of landscape design that would not have been available to us even thirty years ago. Now we can be more creative, we can be more environmentally and socially environmental, and we actually have funding and support to do it, and the clients want it! COULD IT BE BETTER?!! Similarly one of the quotes from the day was given by Kim Wilkie, when he said that his answer to anyone stating that "the earth is just going through a routine cycle and not to worry about it", is that "well that may be so but if you were told after having a heart attack, that you shouldn't worry, you're just genetically prone to them, you wouldn't say "oh well never mind then", you would do something about it!"

Other memorable quotes from the day:

"Landscapes in limbo" (Landscapes that either don't have the current funding or expressed need for improvement and so remain a void, effectively fulfilling no purpose)

"Leading farmers (who control the vast majority of British land) towards new socially collaborative ways of thinking, is key to progress in land use"

"The first question that should be asked at the beginning of every project, is: What is the true primary need for this land to perform, environmentally, socially, locally and regionally"

"The social function of the designer is not exploited nearly enough"

Paraphrased: "In order to breed hope, people must be organised. Every project must tell the public a needfully responsive and responsible message."

"We need to move from value for money, to values for money"

"Cheap food should not be an indicator of progress, this attitude just shifts responsibility on to others. Unlock this chain, buy good local organic food."

"We need a change in information given to the public. They don't need, or want a complicated and at times contradictory message, what they need is small easy to understand rewarding steps that make up the bigger picture."

Landscape Institute Climate Change Conference Page

The science of prediction

I attended an afternoon lecture by Future Lab on Tuesday, which was lead by an extremely enthusiastic speaker, who spoke in a convincing manner and told us exactly who we were, what we want in life, what our fears are and what the contents of our fridges reveal about us! (On average!) He did, however, also have a lot to say about how the consumer's tendancies are being addressed by the providers and what their motivation is, which whilst not being wholy Landscape specific, did give us some valuable insight into our roles for the future and how they are likely to be developing. It was also interesting to know that the predictions are an increase in the consumer wanting not just to experience what you are offering, but also who you are, so that there confidance is no longer based just on what they see, but also what they know of its background, and your motivations. People, apparently, want to put there trust in us! What a responsibility. That means it#s no longer about just making sure that someone isn't going to trip on your hardpaving, but also that when they trip, they're not going to land on imported sandstone hewn from rockfaces by Indian children, and discover that they were transported here in the boot of a guzzling old Transit. Instead they (the public) want to found their belief of correct attitude and decency in the DESIGNER, who created this wonderful thing and must therefore know what's best! FASCINATING!

Model Module

As the first half of this November's focus week, I have chosen to concentrate on something that I haven't attempted since first year and the advent of my learning photoshop: Model making.

The last time I made a model, I found it to be an extremely laborious task, and although the results were good, not worth the time taken should I ever be working to a schedule. However, this time round I was in for a pleasant surprise, as I found that much of the hard work can be cancelled out by purchasing ready made items, such as trees. Then combining this with photoshop skills, and some good photography (all round creative thinking), it's not too hard to get some outstanding results. So here is the first of a series of model/photoshop creations for my current project: Shrubs Wood Barrow, a Neolithic oval barrow in Kent AONB woodland.

Capturing The Light

I realised during a recent early morning drive to work, that each type of tree is unique. Not necessarily a great revelation in itself, but what I was particularly interested by was the unique manner in which each tree allowed light to fall through its boughs and the pattern and intensity with which it then caressed the surface beneath. I realised that this could be used to affect landscape and to bring certain lighting to the subject. This realisation helped me to appreciate one of the finer points of planting that I had not previously understood and one which has, it seems, often been overlooked by our profession.

More behind the gateway than meets the eye!

The word "gateway" is so loose, so undefinable. A gateway is not necessarily any of the things you first think of; there are so many possibilities tied up in the name. It is not merely an entrance, or even an opening. It may not even have a visible point at which you may pass through to what lies beyond. For example, there are a number of elemental barriers through which the human form may pass without any aperture: fog - in some places a real pea-souper can descend on you in moments, without warning encasing you, uncertain, shifting, glowing, cold; water - allows the diver to slip through the waves and create his own gate, only lasting for the moment of impact; smells - at the entrance to London Victoria station a specialist cosmetics company (no endorsement here!) has recently opened, creating a barrier of unseen but potent scent that every weary commuter must pass through two times a day; warmth - my first experience of Florida was leaving the air conditioned airport and being hit by incredible levels of humidity, causing my clothes to cling to me instantly. In its very simplest form a gateway can record or mimic the movement of the person entering by it, as the gate is left swinging in testimony. A gateway can even be a means of transportation: "the trains are the gateway to the city"

All of these interpretations and possibilities are what we are trying to understand in our first project welcoming in the new educational year. It amazes me that something so simple as a gateway can easily go unquestioned in our minds, leaving it as a meaningless entry to a house or such. There is just so much to even the simplest aspect of landscape architecture that can be utilised as a resource and it's our choice how far we delve in! This has to be one of the aspects that I love best about our profession.

Image from Flickr.com under search: wall of fog

Somerset Dreams

After savouring the flavour of America's deep south, the next taste would be from our own fair shores in and around Somerset. We spent a few days there driving and walking through the countryside, visiting ancient monuments, and the like. I was surprised to find that in Salisbury Plain I could see further afield than when looking across the wheat fields of Illinois. The fields were also much more structured, and separated from each other by hedgerows in patterns of brown, gold, red and green. This could be seen clearly from the summit of Glastonbury Tor, a place that I have always wanted to visit and finally did. It was worth it - WHAT a place! WHAT a view!

Another great asset of the English country, is the manner in which the houses have been built. Every village has been constructed from local materials, meaning that as you drive through them you see the colours subtly changing, through reds (iron rich sandstone), dusky yellows (loamy clays) and mottled greys (slate and rough hewn granite). This lends a wonderful sense of identity and individualism to every new location, something that has been lost in the mass production and distribution of building materials such as brick that can now be bought for a new build in any colour desired ("Staffordshire Blue" etc.) Now, to build in local materials is being encouraged as an eco friendly approach to new build and as a result, the cost of these materials has rocketed making it prohibitive to attempt in some places. Sad.

American landscape.is... meaningful.

Well, I just got back from a week's vacation in the states, and it gave me so much to think about. Rather than going to a holiday resort or anything particularly commercial, we drove from Chicago to Nashville, Tennessee (sticking to the country roads) and then we drove east of the city into the mountains, where we hired a beautiful big cabin looking out on its own 150ft waterfall. From here we based our activities and went canoeing down a river for four miles and spent a day walking through the mountains on a trail named the Fiery Gizzard, where legend holds that Davy Crockett burnt his tongue on the gizzard of a lizard he was cooking! This was all marvellously beautiful, wild and rugged, but in terms of an understanding of landscape it was the four days spent driving, that really opened my eyes. The country through which we drove was mainly agricultural, with small run down townships and the occasional small city. But what was interesting, was how much one place could change from another just down the road. Two petrol stations next door to each other show differences of half a dollar per gallon in price; a successful city shares none of its prosperity with a small town just five miles away; the farming communities who grow their produce sell it all to the food giants; and rather than cooking at home, whole communities eat every meal they have at the local restaurants. While this all seems very negative, there are a number of positives that can be drawn from it: Because farmers sell all their produce to large companies, there is no local competition and no angst between them. Because their produce is largely crops, there is a set time for everything and apart from weather, this form of work allows for a gentle slower pace of life and lower stress levels. Because people eat all their meals at local restaurants they all know each other well and there is a real sense of community spirit, with generations of people living in the same town because that's where their friends are. And all of this community spirit spills over into how they situate their houses: In the cities everyone has a fence up and all boundaries are clearly marked, but here in the country, the property deeds are the only thing that shows where one garden ends and another begins and neighbours share each other's porches watching the sun go down over fields of golden corn at the end of every day. Seeing all of this and experiencing it, touched my heart deeply. If only things were kept this simple and meaningful in England, if only our society was this tightly knitted.

New stuff!

As per my Uni tutor's advice, and the purchasing of CS3 (which comes with a nifty DVD tutorial series), I have been learning some Illustrator skills this summer. Whilst at first there appeared to be an insurmountable difference between Photoshop and Illustrator, I discovered that apart from basic commands these programs were never, in fact, supposed to be the same. Their similarity lies more in their vast adaptability and user freindly interface. This is an enjoyable program to be using for all sorts of work. For instance: the image above is a logo I designed for a camping trip this summer. I feel confident that Illustrator is going to be of great use to me in the coming year and onwards.

Process makes perfect?

It's a wonderful thing to see, something you've designed coming into being. After so much speculative work at university, this is the icing on the cake, it's the closure that's been missing. Initially what I felt was that this was a great thing and instinctively it made me think of the project as having come to a close, but I soon realised that, in fact, it's never that simple. There are just so many things that can yet go wrong and surprisingly, it's the small jobs that you'd think were the easiest, that in fact stand the greatest risk of going drastically wrong. This appears to be because larger jobs have more money in the balance and so a greater investment is made into their running. A role that deals with the running of the projects is the Clerk of Works, something I came across this year which basically means the person who acts as the Landscape Architect's eyes and ears on site, maintaining a high level of work and reporting back to the office, thereby ensuring an efficient process. This is a great role for a student to have, as it enables them to better appreciate the practicalities of their own designs and the difficulties that can ensue from them.

Down-sizing Landscape's Carbon Footprint

What with all of the recent pressure being placed on companies, to offset their carbon footprint or to make it smaller, there has also been a radical shift in the manner in which landscape architecture firms are approaching their projects. For instance, I was recently looking for some wood benches to make a feature in a restoration project, and in doing so, I found that a lot of companies that create furniture, though they may be based in the UK, are outsourcing to all over the world for the wood. Not only this, but they are often very reluctant and defensive about giving you this information! As a result I had to greatly refine my search in order to come up with a small number of conscientious suppliers who are sourcing local and sustainable timber for their products. One of the best is this artist and tree surgeon based in Pontypridd Wales, whose work I saw last year in a park in the Brecon Beacons.

www.gno-sis.co.uk

Identity crisis

Whilst working in conjunction with one of the nefarious borough councils, I was recently asked to create an arboricultural and ecological survey. This is a role usually fullfilled by a professional, subcontracted either by our company, or directly by the council. However, on this occasion the council wanted to skip a few corners and so I was given the task. Already having a good working knowledge of trees, I found this part of the task simple enough, but attempting to identify and document a field full of wild flowers has proven a little more challenging to say the least. It was, though, enjoyable and has taught me a lot - not least that a landscape architects role can be widely and surprisingly varied.

Inspirational surroundings

The company i've just started working for have relocated to a new office in the Ashdown Forest right by A.A.Milne's Pooh Corner (Hartfield). we're now in a converted stable block with great scenery quiet surroundings and no mobile signal. But it's really great to work here as, for me its inducive to creativity.

Gorgeous isn't it?

One of two beautiful sister churches in East Sussex in the heart of Ashdown Forest where I work. This one is being considered to be made redundant, and in true Grand Designs style, I can't help but dream of a home conversion. What a fabulous house this would make and great garden space for me to play with too. Ah well, we dream!

Materiality

I recently spent the day in the fair town of Lewes, that well known medieval humdrum on a hill. Here I was able to delight my heart in documenting key elements of one of my favourite areas: the South Downs. This area is soon to become a national park that is proposed to include Lewes as one of its key towns, exhibiting the past faces of this hill country in a very picturesque manner (http://www.lewes.gov.uk/environment/3548.htm). What I spent my time doing was putting together a material and colour pallete that is typical of this area of the South Downs at its best. I really loved spending my time this way - not only was I able to learn more about hard landscaping detail, but I was able to see how the detailing has changed over time and the patterns that these changes have made.

The tides of change

This summer I have begun working for a new company, EXCITING STUFF! On starting, I was immediatley thrown into a scintillating project that was still in its early stages. My job was primarily research but this quickly progressed into extensive survey and mapping work. This has really been a challenge as it involved translating information from a series of 300-400 year old maps among other tasks. One of the most fascinating elements of this work is the apparent degradation in the art of map making since then. It is a privelege to work with the beauty of a large hand drawn map which is quite literally a peice of someone's artwork. Contrast this to the 'High Quality' of an OS map from today... well, see the difference for yourself...

Living Project

During the summer I was priveleged enough to be working with a practice involved in designing a new library landscape. And though many changes have been made since that stage, this profesional model expresses the finished landscape as initially designed by myself. The model and the images are the property of the architectural practice Penoyre and Prasad, who are the designers of the new library.

www.penoyre-prasad.net

Question Time...

Is there an underlying question in design, lying just beneath the surface of realisation. A subversive tension. The two great schools of design from which all others are born are Architecture: that which shelters us from our environ, and Landscape Architecture: that which celebrates our environ, forging new connections with the natural.

Watching "The Lake House" and listening to its celebrative dialogue of Architecture in Chicago, I suddenly realised the human scale. What is Architecture? It is unique, it is one of very few things that stands entirely alien in state. But this has not always been so, it has stemmed, grown, from the deep earthen notes of dwelling as a part of our surroundings. Only now does it stand completely seperate and yet there is a constant movement to returning to its roots and not forget its beginnings. So, should the Architect continue to seek what is entirely unique or return? Should the Landscape Architect free himself from the soil and roots and seek the radical, the unknown and the utterly fresh, with no connection to his past and the earth he walks on? Should he attempt to create an Architectural/Alien landscape, previously unimagined and certainly never created? Or should he just bow to the master artisan and seek for ways to further man's understanding of what he does not see already surrounding him, thereby becoming mankinds visionary expertise?

These are questions that every Landscape/Architect must discover and resolve within themselves potentially changing for site or year. The key I believe is not to design without principle, not to design without conviction, to staunchly rise above conformity and design in the freedom of choice limited only by context. To make your choice and stand by it as principle, after all, what is wrong or right?

I'VE SEEN THE LIGHT AND BEEN SET FREE!

If you find yourself in a room so dark that you cannot see the boundaries of the space you inhabit, it is quite easy to be fooled into thinking that the space is in-fact one of vast proportions.
If that same room then becomes lit, but only ever so dimly and is revealed as the eye strains to make it out, to be a very small space, then it begins to feel cramped and unforgivably restrictive.
If you then light that space again with a large quantity of natural light it will begin to feel much larger and to express some of the infinite values of true darkness.
Strangely, natural light, like the darkness, reveals hidden qualities in a space that play with our means of perception, depth of field, even emotion. Light brings new qualities to even very small spaces, which enable them to become more connected with their surroundings and in turn more free of them, in fact freed by them!...
...but interestingly only natural light allows these qualities to take place!

Portland Island was a surprise to me. I drove onto it purely by accident, but once there found it to be a pretty sort of place with four lighthouses within 500m of each other and a very quiet nature to it.Tthe surprise came when I parked on a tiny entance to a dirt track and walked down to some cliffs I thought I had seen at the bottom. Here I found the most astoundingly beautiful views I could imagine, with scenes that conjoured up images of places such as Motopos in Zimbabwe, and the cliff top amphitheatres of Athens, Greece. This island is the home of Portland Stone, the well known building material famous since its wide spread use over the past two to three hundred years (although it was used locally for far longer). Here on these clifftops the remnants of quarrying and huge basic machinery designed to lower vast blocks of freshly squared stone onto ships waiting far below still remain, and the region's rugged nature is only complimented by man's hand shaping of its ancient rock faces.

Lullworth Cove: a continuation of the World Heritage Coast, this utterly beautiful inlet of the sea has at least three crystal clear, fresh water streams tumbling down over its smoothed pebbles to terminate in its gentle clear waves. Surrounding the water on all sides are an incredible array of cliffs with all of their strata clearly visible like the layers in a giant onion, seemingly scrunched up in ridges where their collosal movement was recorded centuries ago.

On Monday the 26th I left at 5.30am for Weymouth Dorset, where a large scale conservation project has recently been completed. Chesil Beach was my primary target and although spectacular when viewed from the right place I was astonished to find that its beauty contributed only a very small amount to the overall majesty of this untamed coastal region. Below are some images including panoramics from my visit, click on the image to go full screen (Strongly Advised!)

Taken on a walk round the lake of my local park in Crawley, this image goes a long way to remind me of the infinate quantity of inspiration ready to be drawn from the smallest aspect of such an untapped resource as creation really is (Creativley speaking)

Seasonal Variations

Isnt it amazing the way new seasons reveal new qualities in a site, not even necessarily the same as the year before, but you look away for a moment and if you dont take that second look you miss the picture of itself that the site really wants to show you. the old 'dont judge a book by its cover', wait and see whats really inside those seemingly familiar pages, you might be surprised!

The unconveyable FLASH

In the spirit of continuing interest where all forms of expression via computer media are concerned, the last few days of this; my university focus week, have seen me attempting to learn animation free- trial-Flash-package style. While this has been fun it has certainly presented its own brand of challenge, something i was warned of by the laughter of my flash fluent freind, when i informed him of my intentions for the week. I have however been reasonably succesful and have graduated from an early stage animation of a bouncing ball to a photographic animation of my son playing with me. However attempting to attach it to this post on my blog, has been to run into a brick wall, but i have not given up trying and hopefully it should soon be viewable by all. WATCH THIS SPACE!

p.s
In the meantime here is a link to a website that sells examples of the kind of thing i am trying to achieve: www.bigshotmedia.com