Furniture Design Ideas

Both the need for wild and undisturbed nature and the need to design na­ture and the environment are deeply rooted in humans and both must be valued. As the writings from 1559 of the Italian humanist Bonfadio show, the idea of a synthesis, or a partnered relationship between humans and na­ture is nothing new: “The […]

Older still than the Romantic-era longing for untouched nature is the hu­man need to transform the environment according to our desires. The physical structures that have been left behind as clues in the landscape re­flect the values and principles of the societies from which they came. In the process of design, the designer intervenes in […]

Lucia Grosse-Bachle Institute of Open Space Development and Planning Related Sociology, University of Hannover Designing within the dynamics of vegetation ”Wild Woodlands in the City” is not only a topic for ecologists and land­scape planners. As a task involving design and communication, the theme challenges landscape architects to reflect on the aesthetic dimensions of the […]

Today in Japan, how to manage the landscape in this post-industrial age is also of public concern. One solution being considered is creating forests by planting trees on the brownfield sites where there once were industrial fac­tories (nature of the fourth kind; Kowarik 2005). It is important, however, that we respect the cultural context concerning […]

After World War II, Japan, as a defeated nation, was forced to reform its religious policy so as not to return to its former totalitarianism. The separa­tion of government and religion was carried out, and that also had influ­ences on the shrines or temples and their forests. In reality, all public parks that had been […]

After the middle of the 19th century, Japan abandoned its national isola­tion policy, and stepped drastically into the modern era under the strong in­fluence of the Western world’s advanced technologies. However, these were also times when nation states were being born in the West (Anderson 1983), and this influenced the many cultural or institutional conversions […]

From medieval times till the early modern times, the shrines or temples and their surrounding forests in the cities tended to become landmarks and core centres of the communities. The phenomenon was not unique to Ja­pan; religious buildings all over the world shared this tendency as well. What is remarkable, however, is that in Japan […]

It is believed that the major factor in the coexistence of forests and cities in Japan is the religious belief called Shinto (see e. g. Ono 1962; Pregill and Volkman 1999; Sonoda 2000). The distinctive feature of this Japanese primitive religious belief is nature worship. In ancient times, various natu­ral objects or places were regarded […]

Ryohei Ono Graduate School of Agricultural and Life Sciences, University of Tokyo Introduction As it has often been said, we need to consider the delicate balance between human activities and the natural environment for the sustainable develop­ment of our living world. What seems to be important here is that in dis­cussing this balance, we need […]

To avoid misunderstandings: this paper is not making the case for an un­controlled decay of industrial architecture. It is, rather, a plea that the de­velopment of nature in former industrial regions be interpreted not only as a sign of decline, but also as an integral component of the historic preser­vation value of historic industrial structures. […]