This practical handbook bridges the gap between those scientists who study landscapes and the planners and conservationists who must then decide how best to preserve and build environmentally-sound habitats. Until now, only a small portion of the relevant science has influenced the decision-making arenas where the future of our landscapes is debated and decided. The authors explain specific tools and concepts to measure a landscape’s structure, form, and change over time. Metrics studied include patch richness, class area proportion, patch number and density, mean patch size, shape, radius of gyration, contagion, edge contrast, nearest neighbor distance, and proximity. These measures will help planners and conservationists make better land use decisions for the future.
Radical Landscapes: Reinventing Outdoor Space
For many years landscape design was an often disregarded component of the building it surrounded. Today, however, the highly professional practice of landscape architecture is one of the most active and revolutionary areas of design. Drawing on a broad palette of ideas and concepts, landscape designers are reshaping man-made surroundings, from small-scale private gardens to large public spaces. Radical Landscapes presents entirely new ways of seeing and designing outdoor space. Innovative, sometimes synthetic materials, unusual plants, and unexpected forms offer alternative solutions to standard approaches to gardens and yards. To help the reader unlock the potential hidden in any landscape, the book is organized according to the most important issues and techniques of the moment: light and color, movement, order and objects, interaction, new contexts, urban interventions, and narrative. Each chapter is illustrated with works by internationally known designers and architects such as Fernando Caruncho, Adriaan Geuze, Kathryn Gustafson, Walter Hood, Maya Lin, Reiser & Umemoto, and Peter Walker. Meticulously researched and written in an engaging and accessible style by practicing landscape architect Jane Amidon, the texts are packed with information and ideas, a boundless source for professional and enthusiast alike. 433 illustrations, 313 in color.
Asphalt to Ecosystems: Design Ideas for Schoolyard Transformation
Asphalt to Ecosystems is a compelling color guidebook for designing and building natural schoolyard environments that enhance childhood learning and play experiences while providing connection with the natural world.
With this book, Danks broadens our notion of what a well-designed schoolyard should be, taking readers on a journey from traditional, ordinary grassy fields and asphalt, to explore the vibrant and growing movement to “green” school grounds in the United States and around the world. This book documents exciting green schoolyard examples from almost 150 schools in 11 countries, illustrating that a great many things are possible on school grounds when they are envisioned as outdoor classrooms for hands-on learning and play. The book’s 500 vivid, color photographs showcase some of the world’s most innovative green schoolyards including: edible gardens with fruit trees, vegetables, chickens, honey bees, and outdoor cooking facilities; wildlife habitats with prairie grasses and ponds, or forest and desert ecosystems; schoolyard watershed models, rainwater catchment systems and waste-water treatment wetlands; renewable energy systems that power landscape features, or the whole school; waste-as-a-resource projects that give new life to old materials in beautiful ways; K-12 curriculum connections for a wide range of disciplines from science and math to art and social studies; creative play opportunities that diversify school ground recreational options and encourage children to run, hop, skip, jump, balance, slide, and twirl, as well as explore the natural world first hand. The book grounds these examples in a practical framework that illustrates simple landscape design choices that all schools can use to make their schoolyards more comfortable, enjoyable and beautiful, and describes a participatory design process that schools can use to engage their school communities in transforming their own asphalt into ecosystems.
Asphalt to Ecosystems: Design Ideas for Schoolyard Transformation