Photo Credit: © Can Stock Photo Inc. / tbarrat
In modern-day park design, the profession tends to think in terms of active and passive features, designing a landscape that appeals broadly to the public and also fills the perhaps political agendas of elected officials. However, parks also offer an opportunity to integrate experiences—a meshing of nature and culture with parks and preservation that seem to go hand in hand.
History demonstrates this meshing. For example, during the Revolutionary War, the Boston Commons served as a mobilization spot for troops and later became a location for cattle grazing, public meetings, and officially a park in 1859. Twenty-seven years later, New York City began acquiring land for Central Park in Manhattan, a park designed by landscape architect Frederick Law Olmstead. The Central Park Commission felt the park should serve as an educational and cultural epicenter, and included a zoo and museums on the fringes. The Great Depression brought a renovation of the zoo and other cultural amenities. Furthermore, in the mid-1800s, cemeteries as we know them today were derived as wide-open expanses, places where “nature and culture” can meet.[1] While parks were originally designed for a variety of purposes and in a diversity of styles, they foster a natural partnership with culture in the form of historic preservation.
Historic Preservation
The National Trust for Historic preservation states that preservation “enhances our sense of community and brings us closer together: saving the places where we take our children to school, buy our groceries, and stop for coffee—preserving the stories of ancient cultures found in landmarks and landscapes we visit—protecting the memories of people, places, and events honored in our national monuments.”[2]