3. Subject, objects, tasks and methods of landscape architecture and landscape design

The subject of landscape architecture are the principles (regularities) of the formation of a holistic architectural and landscape environment, the spatial organization of the human living environment, taking into account the protection and rational transformation of nature, neutralizing the effects of urbanization.

The theoretical and methodological basis for the development of ideas about the tasks, objects and methods of modern architectural and landscape creativity is a systematic approach, the principle of the integrity of the architectural and landscape environment as an object of architecture.

In general, the tasks of landscape architecture are as follows:

- functional-spatial organization of the human environment under the open sky;

- transformation of landscapes while protecting their natural features;

- creation of detailed aesthetic external accomplishment.

To identify the objects and specify the tasks of architectural landscape design, both differentiation and integration of knowledge are necessary.

The expansion of the tasks of landscape architecture is due to the development of, for example, ecology (from the special natural science of interrelations and interactions of living organisms and the environment to social ecology, which explores the problems of interaction between society and the environment).

To concretize the objects and tasks of landscape architecture, it is important to clarify also the interdependence of the architectural-landscape and environmental activities, the relationship of the issues of rational transformation and protection of landscapes. In this respect, three groups of tasks are clearly distinguished in landscape architecture: protection, transformation (formation), and restoration (recultivation) of landscapes.

In terms of conservation in the theory of landscape architecture, the development of the fundamentals of environmental transformation management is particularly relevant.

The society is tasked with protecting not only unique monuments of nature and landscape art. Environmental principles should underlie the formation of each architectural and landscape object. They consist in protecting and improving the initial natural data when designing landscapes, improving the architectural-landscape object in the course of functioning according to a given program, as well as taking into account the possibilities of the dynamics of direct and inverse “object-environment” relations and changes over time in the general natural-anthropogenic situation.

Thus, the main goal is to find a compromise between the need to use, transform natural landscapes and preserve them as much as possible. This is easily confirmed by the example of the development of tourist and recreational activities. For example, it was the recreational boom that demanded in 70-80. A new assessment of natural resources and methods of designing places for country rest in order to protect the landscape from excessive loads. In the 90s, the problem of protecting the most valuable landscapes in the immediate vicinity of cities arose in connection with cottage-dacha construction.

In order to systematize the architectural and landscape tasks, to identify their hierarchy, hierarchy, and then to determine the principles and methods for solving these problems, it is important to have a scientifically based typology of objects.

Typology is not only a classification of any objects, elements, but also a method of scientific knowledge, studying the patterns of development of objects, the emergence of new types of them.

Separating individual elements of the spatial architectural landscape-organized environment, we can talk about the architecture of buildings and structures, cities and villages, recreation areas, parks, etc. However, whatever object of architecture is considered, it cannot be isolated from the natural prerequisites of creation and functioning (direct or mediated through socio-economic factors).

New in the landscape typology was the idea of ​​the landscape environment as a holistic object of architecture - a system of man-made and little transformed natural landscapes.

As a result, in typology we do not proceed from what objects we need (parks, forest parks, etc.), but from the concept of the integrity of the system of open spaces that are objects of landscape architecture and landscape design.

From modern system-ecological positions, none of the elements of the environment should not fall out of the field of view of the professional activities of the architect, including those that at a certain point are not objects of landscape architecture. But they can become such and therefore should be taken into account in the interaction of the system as a whole.

Although, at first glance, a continuous architectural-landscape territorial zoning is taken as the basis of the typology, in practice it is not the leading one. So, one and the same territory (for example, the territory of the republic) can be an object of complex district planning, where architectural and landscape issues are related to economic, urban planning, composition, and many others, and at the same time - an object of special architectural and landscape design, if a scheme of specially protected landscapes of the republic or a republican scheme of recreation and tourism is being developed.

We can say the same about the city, the most complex socio-spatial and landscape system, by extracting a certain subsystem from it, for example, a water-green one, we study it more closely and design it as an independent object.

For the typology of objects and the systematization of architectural and landscape tasks, it is necessary to identify two levels of classification:

1) groups of objects of architecture, urban planning, where landscape issues are in common with economic, social, planning and many others, and where the landscape architect is only a coauthor;

2) the groups of objects in which landscape aspects prevail, and the landscape architect in the team of specialists acts as the leader, defining the program and methods for solving this object.

The first group of objects - elements of the environment - includes the territory of the country, the republic, the district for which integrated and sectoral schemes and projects of regional planning are being developed, and populated areas, civil and industrial urban planning complexes for which general plans are being developed, detailed planning projects, etc.

Architectural and landscape issues that are part of the complex urban planning tasks for the second group of objects can be formulated as follows:

- solving the problem of interaction between the national economic complex and the landscape environment;

- determination of the relationship of the environment to the placement of various objects in function

- detailed landscape assessment and zoning;

- the forecast of landscape changes as a result of the planned activity and the corresponding transformations;

- architectural and landscape organization of space based on the requirements of ecology, protection and improvement of hygienic and aesthetic qualities of the environment; harmonious relationship of building and landscape.

The objects of the actual architectural and landscape activities have a more developed typology (tab. 1).

The landscape tasks of the formation of the objects listed in Table 1 are subdivided both by their types and by the stages of working with them (program development, pre-project studies, design, project implementation, maintenance during operation). However, they are not called here, since they will be revealed to varying degrees by groups of objects in subsequent lectures.

One of the leading methods in landscape architecture is a system-landscape approach, which is also effective for architectural work in general.

The essence of this method lies in the design, construction and maintenance during the operation of not isolated objects, but fragments (subsystems) of the architectural and landscape environment, which is constantly changing according to the laws of nature and as a result of human activity.

At the level of regions and large town-planning formations, the system-landscape method is already objectively used. However, when creating building complexes, especially individual structures, sometimes even garden-park objects, its significance is not yet sufficiently realized.

The ecological method of landscape design also acts as the definition of stable relationships between the components of the landscape — relief, water bodies, watercourses, plants, etc., and the design of fragments of the living environment in accordance with the dynamics of natural processes.

Architects, organizing open spaces, operate with natural material, which is constantly changing. The harmony of man and landscape can be achieved, if the architect is not formal, but relying on diverse knowledge, proceeds in his creative search from the landscape situation, identifying and emphasizing its best qualities.

Thus, on the one hand, modern landscape architecture is a special form of organization of nationwide space aimed at preserving and developing ethnogenesis and traditional culture, saving depleting reserves of natural wealth, and on the other hand, it is a means of designing a specific human environment at the level of a microdistrict, quarter, town item.

It should be assumed, based on modern trends in the development of architectural creativity, that in the 21st century we will witness a new stage in the development of landscape architecture, landscape art and environmental design, similar to the one that took place in the 17th – 18th centuries in European states, and in the XVIII-XIX centuries in the Russian Empire. In those historical periods, the main "customer" and then the owner of the unique monuments of landscape art were the reigning houses.

In modern conditions, the “customer” and the owner of garden and park ensembles should be municipalities, legal entities and individuals. Accordingly, the number of works of architectural landscape should increase significantly. Exquisite and artistically subtle architectural landscape should be one of the most common "commodities".

We can confidently predict that the 21st century will be the “golden” century in the development of landscape gardening in the world.

Table 1 - Typology of objects of architectural and landscape activities

Questions for the lecture 1

1. Expand the concept of "landscape architecture"

2. The main purpose of landscape architecture

3. The social significance of landscape architecture

4. When did the concept of landscape architecture emerge?

5. With what natural and artificial objects does the landscape designer work?

6. On what sciences does a landscape painter rely on solving practical problems?

7. What is the subject of landscape architecture as a branch of knowledge?

8. Formulate the tasks of landscape architecture.

9. Characterize the typology of objects of landscape architecture.

10. Landscape design methods