Details
A Landscape Inventory is a richly illustrated and elegantly designed manifesto on landscape experimentation, the work of the internationally renowned architect, Michel Desvigne. As an “anti-monograph,” this publication is not comprehensive and projects are not discussed in depth. Instead, it features a composite view of elements such as tree pattern and density across scales, from diminutive urban courtyard to territory, to reveal the weight of planting and material choices in shaping landscapes, irrespective of design language. Highly idiosyncratic, A Landscape Inventory offers a broader reflection on how to present and represent landscapes, organized in two parts – equally casual and purposeful. The first discusses Desvigne’s trajectory, influences, and design method; the second is an inventory of elements, a contact sheet of details to be assembled and reconfigured without prescribed order. Both focused and panoramic, Desvigne’s antipathy for “recognizable design” is revealed with his ambition to resist political shifts and master planning with a panoply of landscape strategies such as pilot, demonstration garden, and prototype. Intended to be of great interest to those concerned with the shaping of the environment, this publication can be used as a thesaurus of landscape components – a quick reference to trigger the design imagination of students and other curious individuals.A Landscape Inventory is a richly illustrated and elegantly designed manifesto on landscape experimentation, the work of the internationally renowned architect, Michel Desvigne. As an “anti-monograph,” this publication is not comprehensive and projects are not discussed in depth. Instead, it features a composite view of elements such as tree pattern and density across scales, from diminutive urban courtyard to territory, to reveal the weight of planting and material choices in shaping landscapes, irrespective of design language. Highly idiosyncratic, A Landscape Inventory offers a broader reflection on how to present and represent landscapes, organized in two parts – equally casual and purposeful. The first discusses Desvigne’s trajectory, influences, and design method; the second is an inventory of elements, a contact sheet of details to be assembled and reconfigured without prescribed order. Both focused and panoramic, Desvigne’s antipathy for “recognizable design” is revealed with his ambition to resist political shifts and master planning with a panoply of landscape strategies such as pilot, demonstration garden, and prototype. Intended to be of great interest to those concerned with the shaping of the environment, this publication can be used as a thesaurus of landscape components – a quick reference to trigger the design imagination of students and other curious individuals.
Contributor Bio(s)
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Dorothée Imbert is a landscape scholar and designer and heads the landscape architecture programs at The Ohio State University and has taught at Harvard and Washington University in St. Louis. Imbert's expertise in landscape modernism has led to the publication of several books. She continues to engage in research and design practice and recently completed the Square (with Andrew Cruse), a landscape on structure for the Novartis campus in Basel, Switzerland.
Michel Desvigne is a French landscape architect with an international practice. Over the past thirty years he has designed a wide range of projects from Russia to Qatar, demonstrating an affinity for research and a thorough understanding of the landscape medium. He has collaborated with renowned architects such as Renzo Piano, Herzog and De Meuron, Foster+Partners, Jean Nouvel, and Rem Koolhaas, and was awarded the Grand Prix de l'urbanisme in 2011.
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