Garden Festivals are more than temporary horticultural expositions. Complex and phased, these projects have additional significance as planning stratagems, reclamation projects, public art venues, and precursors of new urban parks. Nevertheless, their impact on the urban landscape has been understated or overlooked. Their scope extends well beyond that implied by the term ‘garden festival’. Typically exceeding 50 hectares, they stimulate development and steer site design through a unique merger of domestic garden culture with a large-scale urban project.
A general discussion of the origins, formative elements and chronology of the generic event followed by cross-cultural reviews and analyses of numerous recent festivals and their site legacies form the core of this first comprehensive book on the subject.
Although not an historical treatment, this study builds on historical knowledge. Since their inception with the 1951 Hannover Bundesgartenschau festivals progressed from traditional concepts of exhibition and park design to amplify impulses of the wider culture. Recent installations have been responsive to the ascendance of open space as a critical planning element while forthcoming events now develop in the midst of a trend towards the holistic initiatives of urban landscape planning, giving them a renewed relevance for urban design.
The author explored over fifteen festival sites and documents this study using government reports, interview transcripts, thematic maps, master plans, and other primary source material. The text is richly supplemented with over 140 images and tables. This should prove a useful reference for students, professionals and educators, or indeed anyone, with an interest in the urban public realm.
Grounds for Review: The Garden Festival in Urban Planning and Design
