In the next 20 years, his accumulated experience and skills played a positive role in the later establishment of landscape architecture specialty. He worked in a cloth shop in new york and traveled for a year because of his trade with China. During 1848- 1855, he studied surveying and engineering, chemistry and scientific farming, and managed a farm on Staten Island. 1850, he and two friends spent six months hiking in Europe and the British Isles, from which they not only enjoyed the rural landscape, but also visited many parks and private estates. 1852, he published his first book, Walking and Talking of All American Farmers in England.
In 65438+February of the same year, as a journalist in The New York Times, he began to travel in the south which was still ruled by slavery. This is the first of his two trips to the south. During the period of 1856- 1860, he published three books on travel notes and social analysis of the south. During this period, he used his pen to oppose the westward advancement of slavery and strive for the abolition of slavery in southern States. During the period of 1855- 1857, he was a shareholder of a publishing company and the editor-in-chief of Putnam Monthly, a leading magazine in literature and political criticism. During this period, he lived in London for six months and traveled many times in the European continent, during which he visited many public parks.
When he started to take landscape design as his career, olmsted had formed a series of social and political values, which pointed out the goal for his design work. From his outstanding legacy in New England, he formed a belief in the importance of community and public organizations such as culture and education. His trip to the south and his friendship with the revolutionaries exiled in 1848 because of the failure of the German revolution convinced him that it was necessary for the United States to prove the superiority of the Republican government and labor freedom. He received a series of influences, first from his father. In addition, in terms of landscape art, he read the works of British writers, such as Uwedale Price, Humphrey Repton, William gilpin, William Shen Si Tong and john ruskin. These influences made him believe that art is to transform American society from an almost barbaric state.
/kloc-in the autumn of 0/857, due to his influence in the field of literature, olmsted won the position of director of new york Central Park. In March of the following year, he and calvert Vauxs won the design competition of the park. In the next seven years, I was mainly responsible for some important planning projects: at first (1859- 186 1), I was the chief designer of the central park and was responsible for the park construction; Later (186 1 ~ 1863) served as the chairman of the American Health Committee, responsible for reviewing the health of all federal army volunteers and the environmental sanitation of the army, and formulated the national medical security system of the army; Finally (1863 ~ 1865) is the manager of Mariposa Estate, a large gold mining enterprise in California.
1865, olmsted returned to new york, finished their work in Central Park with vauxhall, and designed the Hope Park in Brooklyn. In the next 30 years, until 1895 retired, olmsted created many design paradigms, which proved that the profession of landscape architecture (first used by him and Walker) could improve the quality of life in the United States. These include: large-scale urban parks, mainly for scenic spots to experience and alleviate the artificial feeling of the city and the pressure of urban life; Park Road, a wide urban greenway, has several different modes of transportation (the most important of which is the flat motor vehicle pavement reserved for private transportation), which connects the park and further exerts the advantages of the whole urban public green space; The park system provides all residents of the city with various public entertainment facilities and scenic reserves, which protect particularly beautiful scenery from destruction and commercial development; Suburban residential areas separate work from residence, creating a community atmosphere and an environment for family life; The courtyard of private residence, where gardening can develop residents' aesthetic consciousness and personality, also includes a large number of attractive open-air rooms, so that family activities can be transferred to the outdoors; For institutions with dormitory areas, the family scale built here will provide a training place for civilized lifestyles, and the functions of gardens and buildings of government buildings will be more efficient, and their solemn appearance will be enhanced through careful planning. In each of the above fields, olmsted has created a unique design method, which shows the comprehensiveness of his vision and puts forward a unique concept for each project. He can exert his extraordinary imagination when dealing with even the smallest details. His view of landscape architecture is deeply influenced by English pastoral scenery and pastoral scenery. Two elements of British landscape architecture-pastoral style and picturesque style-have been used by him. The former became the basic model of his park design, and the latter was used by him to enhance the mystery and richness of nature.
Olmsted principle
1. Protect the natural landscape. In some cases, it is necessary to restore or further emphasize the natural landscape (adjust measures to local conditions and respect the status quo).
2. Try to avoid rules (natural rules) except in a very limited range.
3. Keep the lawn or grass in the central area of the park.
Step 4 Choose local trees and shrubs
5. The planned roads and paths should be smooth curves, and all roads are annular systems.
6. The whole park is divided into different areas by main roads. Sted believes that touching people's feelings is the goal of his work. This is particularly evident in his park design. He created a landscape passage so that tourists can blend in and experience the cultivation of the landscape. Olmsted called this process unconsciousness. In order to achieve this goal, his only goal in landscape architecture is to make the landscape experience more profound, and all design elements should serve this. Olmsted always pursues the taste and fashion beyond reality, and his design is based on the basic principles of human psychology. In particular, he refined and sublimated the analysis of early British naturalistic landscape theorists and their emphasis on the quality of pastoral and picturesque landscapes. Britain's Deer Garden is a microcosm of the rural landscape, with a sense of space expansion, beautiful courtyards trimmed and neatly mowed lawns. He found this style a good way to reduce the bad influence of city life. He used picturesque style in steep and broken terrain and cultivated a large number of surface vegetation, shrubs, vines and climbing plants, thus obtaining rich, extensive and mysterious effects. His own strongest experience of this effect was when he went to California through the Panama Strait in 1863. Both styles are uncertain and lack pertinence in actual operation. In Homs Ted's view, the word "landscape" does not refer to a clearly defined visible area. It must include an important combination of low beam and shadow, or the coverage of high beam details. These qualities are necessary in the process of the unconscious influence of scenery on the spirit. In addition, as the basis of cultivating aesthetic sensitivity, they are also the key elements of design. Exquisite quality includes diversity and complexity, as well as the fineness of texture, color and tone, which is the basis of olmsted's artistic and civilized goals. He taught that the ultimate test to test the degree of civilization is this exquisiteness, which is reflected in people's willingness to invest in research and labor on small differences in form and color processing.
Although olmsted's favorite scenery needs a lot of precipitation to get the effect, he also realized that the climate conditions in most parts of the United States are different. Therefore, he set out to develop an independent and rare landscape style for the south, and in the semi-dry and early west, he noticed the need to establish a new water-saving regional style. In six projects in the San Francisco Bay Area and Colorado, he laid the foundation of this technology, especially on the campus of Stanford University.
Msted carefully trained several outstanding young people to inherit his design concept, but only his stepson John C. olmsted * inherited the role. Two of his students and later partners, Henry S. Codman and Charles Eliot, both died before him.
Olmsted and his company undertook about 500 projects in their lifetime. These include 65,438+000 parks and casinos, 200 private estates, 50 residential quarters and communities, and campus design of 40 universities. Although olmsted encountered many difficulties in expressing his ideas in words. He is still a prolific writer. During his most professional design career, he kept 600 letters and reports written by himself, involving 300 design projects. He published many important reports at his own expense. The complete catalogue of his works includes more than 300 letters describing his trip to the south and various documents published by the American Health Commission.