Garden Designer - Methods

Methods

A wide range of design methods have been used by garden designers, depending partly on the historical period in which they worked and partly on the professional discipline with which they have the closest relationship. One can, for example, speak of an "architect's garden", "artist's garden" or a "plantsman's garden". Treating the subject historically, one can say that ancient gardens were likely to have been "drawn" directly on the ground, that Renaissance gardens were drawn on paper and that modern gardens are drawn on a computer. The design process always has an influence on the design product.

There tends to be a distinction between those designers who start with the plant palette and its needs, called garden design; and those designers who begin with consideration of the space and place-making to create architectural spaces and circulation routes with plants and other elements, called landscape design. Many famous gardens which contain many interesting plants can be incompletely planned as a whole and integrated composition. Also, many gardens which are well planned in overall design can lack the interests from planting detail. Some keen gardeners who are very knowledgeable about plants can be resistant to conceptualizing design. Some very competent designers and landscape architects have a meager amount of diverse botanical and horticultural knowledge and experience. A competent and talented garden designer can synthesize both needs to design sand create beautiful and sustainable landscapes and gardens.