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The Fair of Nature

Wild as a Norm of Beauty in Gardens
Silvia Maria Mundula

The wild garden is a result of the contemporary desire in western countries

to reconnect to nature. Architects often use the terms natural and wild to
confer authority on their projects, from an ecological perspective, often
twisting their meaning. As there is a widespread fascination about the
concept of wilderness, the aim of this paper is to shed light on this theme
and for it to be a starting point for architecture research perspectives. The
first part of this essay clarifies the difference between nature and wilderness
and it also seeks to reverse the popular dichotomy of nature-culture. It
goes on to explore the fascination for wilderness, as it evolved through
different historical periods, associating the current taste for it to a desire
for the authentic. The second part deals with the three key figures, who are
considered the main points of reference for wild garden design, because
they radically changed the role of plants in design. Despite the fact that
their theories and practical outcomes were different, they all overturned
existing trends through their great sensitivity and clear choices. The third
part provocatively underlines how the consolidation of the wild garden as
a style created the basis for the use of wilderness as an aesthetic quality. To
support this idea, this paragraph provides some examples of contemporary
western gardens. The conclusion leaves space for constructive reflection on
the image of wilderness.

The idea of nature and the fascination for wilderness

Architects often use the adjective natural when describing their designs if
they wish to suggest a sense of goodness. Nature, however, is not a single
phenomenon with a unique meaning, it contains a multiplicity of ideas,
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which are products of culture. As such, these products vary according to

context, period and discipline: while for farmers, engineers and architects,
nature is usually something to improve, for ecologists, it is something to
observe. It is common to think of nature as something in opposition to
culture. However, the dichotomy of nature-culture could be replaced by
the reminiscent of a unitary context dating from the era when culture was
not opposed to nature, as it was part of it (Venturi Ferriolo 2019, 14). In
particular, gardens make this concept clear, for their intrinsic relationship
between nature and culture. Gardens, indeed, reveal man’s ideas about
nature, which, in turn reflect human society.

When ecologists describe the “harmony” of nature and the succession of plant
“communities” from pioneer to stable climax forest, they are also describing
a model for human society. The idea of the Fall – of humanity expelled from
Paradise, a former state of grace within nature – has exerted a powerful influence
on the imagination in Western cultures. (Whiston Spirn 1997, 252)

As humans became more and more dependent on technology, and estranged

from the environment, nature became extraneous to them. In a world
divided into the city, the countryside, and the hermitage, the last one, which
is the most natural one, was idealised as a space for pleasure. As described
by Augustin Berque, ermitage is a synonym of holydays as it represents
the parenthesis of freedom from the usual obligations, during which we
are free to go wherever we want: “We are moving therefore, during this
time of release, towards spaces which are the opposite to those where the
obligations of our world hold sway; that is, in short, towards the hermitage,
the polar opposite of the city, since we are city dwellers” (Berque 2010, 3).
The term wilderness is also different. In the Oxford Dictionary, wilderness
refers to an uncultivated, uninhabited, and inhospitable region. The big
distinction, thus, is that while a natural place is usually hospitable to men,
a wild place is not. Nature encompasses humans and their culture, while
wilderness does not. Wilderness, at least in Western culture, is the opposite
of domesticity (Descola 2004, 20). Among the examples which clarify
the meaning of this word in the Oxford Dictionary, there are sentences
such as “the garden had become a wilderness of weeds and bushes,” which
apparently negates the possibility that wild gardens exist. However, it does
seem that the term wilderness has been applied to gardens, especially to
contemporary Western gardens. The contemporary attraction for wilderness
has its roots in the past and it evolved in parallel with changes in society. It
is common to look back to Romanticism when we search for these origins,
however, this practice is not necessarily correct. Looking back, one can find
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many examples where nature was already a seductive element, although this
fluctuated throughout different periods of history. Indeed, the relationship
of man with nature varied for many reasons, such as religion and natural
disasters, which often made nature appear to be the enemy in human eyes.
As Penelope Hill suggests, wild gardens also existed in the past, always with
a divine value:

Since the most remote times, there have always been two categories of gardens:
the first one wild and mythical and the other one domestic. For the Egyptians,
the Persians, the Greeks and the Ancient Romans, every clearing, forest or
valley had a spirit of their own, which they believed to be of divine origin. These
mythical gardens, which were similar to wild landscape, have become an integral
part of folklore. (Hill 2002, 49)

For the entire ancient world, the feeling for wilderness was influenced by
their religion. In Roman times, when cities started to become overcrowded,
the forest was a place to find peace and to reconnect to bucolic origins. Even
within the city, the presence of sacred trees recalled the myth of ancient
Arcadian Rome, when it was a village of shepherds (Grimal 1984, 169).
While pagan cults associated the animals and the plants of the forests with
the deities, Christianity modified this idea.
During the Middle Ages, men did not look at nature as a whole element
but rather as part of their daily life. Indeed, it is not easy to define what
nature meant to medieval man. Nature was used to represent the divine
but natural elements, such as fire, water, wind and earth, were not
venerated as autonomous entities, as they were by the pagan cults. Nature,
when beautiful, was the reflection of the splendor God: otherwise, it was
something to deny, as were all earthly things. The forest, for instance, was
a source of life, providing food, wood, and healing herbs but it was also a
dark and mysterious place, where witches carried out their rites. During
the Renaissance a new idea developed. Man was no longer seen as just part
of the universe but was at the center of it and plants and animals were
seen in an anthropomorphic manner. Wild nature was not really admired,
but it became interesting in the eyes of certain men, who started to study
it from an objective point of view. The scientific discoveries made in the
seventheenth century and the cataloguing of the natural world, which was
started in the eighteenth century, certainly brought new references to the
field of architecture. As domestic interiors evolved during the eighteenth
century, becoming less formal, so did gardens. This taste for informality, in
fact, coincides with an idealized passion for wild nature, which was the basis
of the angst of Romantics.
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Friedrich Schiller defines the tragic relationship of modern man with

nature by explaining the difference between Ancient art and Modern art
(Franzini 2003, 32): while the Ancients lived in harmony with nature, or in
fact completely immersed in nature, producing a spontaneous type of art,
the Moderns, who live disconnected from nature, suffer for this separation,
or wound, and try to heal it. Such tension produces a sentimental type of
art. The impossibility of healing the wound, as the reunification of man
and nature is indeed impossible, results in a frustration, which makes the
Moderns pine for the loss of that idealized natural world.
Also the idealization of wilderness around the myth of the Noble Sauvage,
was a fascination limited to a single point of view, that of bourgeois modern
culture. The privilege of becoming natives was a dream only for a select
few (Vidler 1986, 84), that is, a certain society made up of artists, writers,
and intellectuals. This distinction should also be kept in mind when we talk
about our era, because the contemporary feeling for wild nature is not shared
by all. It is influenced by two fundamental elements: the concern about
environmental issues and the current obsession of society with rediscovering
authentic places. While the first association is easily understood, the second
one can be defined through the non-lieu definition of Marc Augé (1992).
According to Augé, a place is characterized by three elements: identity,
relationships and history. Even if his idea of lieu relates to anthropological
places, such as monuments whose image depends on their cultural history,
it is possible to expand this discourse to other places that are not man-
made. Woodlands and prairies are spaces that are rich in natural history,
providing an endless variety of interactions among different species. They
reconnect humans to their roots. Both historical cities and wild places are
real and authentic to contemporary man. Many artists work on this theme,
such as Andreas Gursky, a photographer whose images prompt observers
to think critically about the relationship of man with landscape, through
digital effects that produce a sense of disquiet, which is similar in tone to the
restlessness of the Romantics. According to Pierluigi Nicolin, in the pictures
of Gursky, nature emerges as a charming and problematic element in a
landscape that is more and more affected by human presence (Nicolin 2017,
4). The most famous work of Gursky, Rhein II (1999), shows a pure vision
of a stretch of the river Rhein. The picture has been edited: manufactured
elements and human traces have been erased, so what remains is just grass,
water and sky, in an abstract enigmatic image. The enigma is created by the
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awareness that an image like that is impossible, as the reunification of man

with nature is unimaginable.
The wild garden in twentieth century Europe
The father of the term “wild garden” is William Robinson (1838-1935),
an Irish gardener and journalist who settled in England in 1861 and
introduced a fundamental revolution in gardening, through the use of wild
plants and naturalized exotics. According to the statement of Robinson, the
wild garden was a conventional definition that had nothing to do with the
real wilderness.

There has been some misunderstanding as to the term “Wild Garden.” (…)
It has nothing to do with the old idea of the “wilderness,” though it may be
carried out in connection with that. It does not necessarily mean the picturesque
garden, for a garden may be highly picturesque, and yet in every part the result
of ceaseless care. What it does mean is best explained by the winter Aconite
flowering under a grove of naked trees in February; by the Snowflake growing
abundantly in meadows by the Thames side; by the perennial Lupine dyeing an
islet with its purple in a Scotch river; and by the Apennine Anemone staining an
English wood blue before the blooming of our blue bells. (Robinson 1883, vii)

Robinson saw nature as a possible refuge from the modern city, promising
that wild gardens were both easy to look after and beautiful. His contribution
was not only the introduction of a new method of gardening but also a
different aesthetic sensitivity for gardens. The hardy flowers selected by
Robinson were reminiscent of the old English garden: they were “old-
fashioned flowers dating back to the time of Shakespeare, such as pansies,
marigolds, wild roses, foxgloves and columbine” (Helmreich 1997, 88). From
a theoretical point of view, Robinson lacked precision, failing to distinguish
between wild and native plants. His theory about naturalizing exotics was,
indeed, despised by many, such as William Morris, who thought that exotics
had a grotesque appearance as they came from the jungle (Helmreich 1997).
Another key figure in the history of the wild garden is Jacobus Pieter
Thijsse (1865-1945), known as the father of the ecological movement in the
Netherlands. It should be noted that the Netherlands was a mostly agrarian
country until 1860, when it quickly changed to becoming an industrialized
nation. In Amsterdam, Thijsse could observe the deteriorating quality of
working class life due to overcrowding, as well as the disappearance of
natural resources.

The drying out of the dunes through drinking water extraction or drainage
for agriculture, disappearance through new infrastructure, bringing heathlands
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under cultivation, division of country estates for housing, the forestation of

heathlands, drainage of swamps, and pollution of rivers and streams. (Woudstra
1997, 156)

His aim was to provide a healthier environment for all, protecting nature
and educating the public. At that time, nobody was concerned about nature.
Wild nature was looked at as something dangerous and unattractive, and
they thought that wild areas should be brought under cultivation. So, in
1870, the last native forest was destroyed in silence. The publication of
Thijsse of the first illustrated flora of the Netherlands was fundamental for
the “biological réveil,” which encouraged a new interest in biology. Thijsse
thought that everybody should experience nature, so he created some
educational nature parks, as a way to introduce children to the countryside.
He also believed that every town should have parks in all areas, according
to the idea of Howard of garden city. As member of the Bosch Commissie, he
travelled to Europe to find examples of parks integrating nature conservation
with recreation, to use as references in his country.
The Netherlands, indeed, did not have a national architecture style. Jan
Thijs Pieter Bijhouwer (1898-1974), who at that time was the chairman of
the Society of Garden and Landscape Architects, traced a parallel between
architecture and gardens. According to Bijhouwer, there were two styles of
architecture in the Netherlands: the landscape style and the monumental
style, but neither of them could solve the problems of the modern city. He
observed that Dutch architecture had no direction, “with monumental
symmetrical designs ill-matched to the modern asymmetrical-monumental
architecture” (Woudstra 1997, 165).The same applied to gardens, which were
lacking in identity and often imitated English gardens, using Anglo-Saxon
elements instead of Dutch flora and rocks. Bijhouwer, thus, encouraged
designers to find references in native art forms and nature, with the slogan:
“Back to nature and native art!” (Woudstra 1997, 165). This was a political
issue for progressive Amsterdam: English style and Baroque axiality were
both rejected, the first one for its relationship with the Ancien Règime and
the second one as it was the style adopted by the owners of the landscape,
to the detriment of its users.
The introduction of native plants into gardens gave rise to arguments between
the two schools of natural design. While the traditional school accepted the
compromise between nature and art, as nature could not easily be imitated,
and included exotics, the school of the more radical nature style rejected
traditional methods of making the garden appear natural and promoted
the natural growth of plants. According to this school, “a garden would be
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planted prior to laying out the walks” (Woudstra 1997, 169). In this period,
in the Netherlands, the debate about garden style became more and more
based on science with the introduction of some new techniques such as the
phytogeographical plant grouping, that is, planting which respects the way
plants naturally grow and spread, in their countries of origin.
The aim of Thijsse of protecting nature, however, was interpreted by the
new landscape architects as a way to protect local flora and fauna, so
the introduction of foreign plants was considered incorrect in natural
environments, such as woods and meadows, but it was accepted in gardens,
especially those plants whose habit was adaptable and those plants which
would enhance the ecosystem of the garden. In Gartengestaltung der Neuzeit
(1907), Willy Lange (1864-1941) suggested a parallel with the liberal
attitude toward foreigners in the Netherlands. While in Germany the use of
native plants has been associated with nationalistic tendencies, the choices
of Thijsse were never political but always ecological, as his main concern was
the conservation of the Dutch dunes and their plants and wildlife.
Many years later, toward the end of the century, Gilles Clément, who
is a French gardener but also an engineer, a botanist, and an architect,
introduced a new objective for wild gardens, that is, the movement of the
plants. He started working on this theme, developing the first example of
movement in his garden at La Vallée, Creuse in the 1977. This term was
already present in the art of gardening and used to denote the succession of
views and scenarios along a route caused by the displacement of the visitor.
On the other hand, the movement described by Clément in Le Jardin en
movement (1991), was related to a different subject, that is, the life of plants,
which spread spontaneously through natural dissemination. Ignoring this
movement means in effect that plants are considered as objects, while they
are, in fact, living entities.
This new idea changed the role of the gardener, which became even more
demanding, as he now had to face arduous choices. For instance, flowers
might appear in the middle of a path, obliging the gardener to decide
whether to modify the design of that path and how to do this. Usually,
Clément preferred autochthonous plants in his gardens, but defining which
plants are native is difficult in a globalized world. For him, indeed, it is not
a matter of plants being either native or foreign but of plants spontaneous.
The protagonist of his gardens is the biological variety that provides for
the preservation of all the species. This idea, in fact, does not encompass
any nationalistic ideals. On the contrary, it promotes the idea of tolerance
and the peaceful coexistence of different species. The gardens designed by
Clément are not really wild, as they are not left uncultivated. Indeed, they
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require the constant effort of careful gardeners, who are able to work with
nature and not against it.

I have already indicated that design can change in terms of changing the planting.
The role of the gardener in this is more important than ever. He maintains the
garden but he also decides on the form the garden takes and as a consequence
of this work he is designing directly on the land. The designer, who is supposed
to be the big architect, is therefore redundant. One needs to think and interact
with plants in situ. (Clément 1997, 162)

The first example of a public garden in movement was created within the
André Citröen park in Paris between 1986 and 1992. This project was
criticized by some members of the public as the park was so unusual. The
idea was to make it possible for citizens to help design the park through
their movements, interfering with the natural movements of the plants. This
concept confused some of the visitors, who, at first glance, perceived the
garden as abandoned; whereas, in fact the project required many years of
work to recreate the friche, that is, the vegetation of wasteland. Between
2009 and 2011 Clément created a garden with this theme: Les Jardins du
Tiers-Paysage is a roof garden above the submarine base of Saint-Nazaire
(France), which contains indigenous plants from the estuary and other
species compatible with the local climate and the concrete soil.
Finally, the Parisian garden designed for the museum Quai Branly in
2005 is a clear metaphor for Le Jardin Planétaire, that is, a political project
which calls for the respectful coexistence of plants, animals and humans.
One can see, in fact, a political agenda in the gardens of Clément. In his
books, Clément always remarks upon the fact that plants are living beings:
“I wanted to improve the understanding of the mechanisms of life, and to
give the feeling that we must respect all living beings” (Clément 1997, 165).

Wild is beautiful: The fashion for wilderness in contemporary gardens

William Robinson and Jacobus Pieter Thijsse were pioneers in that they
considered plants to be elements which influence the design of the garden
and Gilles Clément took this theme even further. They raised issues about
ecology, which are very popular today. After the wild garden was accepted as
a style, however, its deeper meaning has often been forgotten, as wilderness
has become a fashionable element in design today. Weeds are chosen by
designers because they are attractive, contemporary and elegant, however,
there are also practical reasons for this choice. The lower cost of such plants
and the smaller commitment required for maintaining these wild gardens
have made them popular.
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Piet Oudolf started to study the behavior of plants in 1982, conducting

experiments in Hummelo, in The Netherlands. The aim of his research was
to find plants that look beautiful throughout the year, cohabit easily with
different species and attract butterflies. In his nursery-lab he invented new,
which were created to embody the ideal characteristics of color, resistance
and strength. His new idea was that plants are beautiful not only when
they flower, but also in other seasons. The project that made him famous
is the Lurie Garden in the Chicago Millennium Park, completed in 2004
together with Gustafson Guthrie Nichol Ltd and Robert Israel. The main
emphasis here is on native plants, as they brought a piece of wild prairie in
a very urban setting, such as Chicago. This created a contrast between the
constantly evolving perennials and the fixed nature of the skyscrapers.
Another project that contributed to the world fame of Oudolf is the planting
of the High Line in New York, a park created on the old elevated railway
line, which had been abandoned in the 80s. This was a place of enormous
biological wealth, as the pioneer vegetation had gradually colonized it.
Oudolf was able to preserve the existing atmosphere, notwithstanding the
difficulties related to a shallow soil layer. As it was impossible to replant the
same species, he selected plants – all native to continental North America
– which easily adapted to the hard soil, and were able to survive in extreme
weather conditions, such as droughts and frost. As the work of Oudolf is
very much admired by architects, in 2010, he was called to participate in the
12th Architecture Biennale in Venice, where he received a special mention
for his Giardino delle Vergini.
The following year, he collaborated with Peter Zumthor on the creation
of the Serpentine pavilion in London. The pavilion was a hortus conclusus,
so, the garden designed by Oudolf was like a secret garden inside the park,
with dark high walls enclosing it. The contrast between the walls, which
provided a sense of isolation but also protection, and the wild plants, which
recalled images of meadows, was impressive. The Hauser & Wirth Gallery
also asked Oudolf to create a secret garden at their branch in Somerset,
which could only be seen from the gallery and not from outside. The brief
given to Oudolf for this project was similar to those given to their artists:
absolute freedom. The garden, which was completed in 2014, looks like a
beautiful abstract painting, with a variety of colorful plants, which rotate
through the year. Although the plan of the garden is reminiscent of classical
gardens with small paths and flower beds, the wild nature of the plants and
the variation in their height and color, mitigate its formality.
Besides Piet Oudolf, many other gardeners are inspired by nature and
ecology. Noel Kingsbury, a British garden designer and writer, who
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collaborated many times with Oudolf, says that in the field of landscape
design, it is possible to talk about a movement which takes nature as an
aesthetic ideal and looks at planting design in relation to ecology.

No artists, and certainly no scientist, works in isolation. We are both conscious

of belonging to a movement, one which sees the future of planting design as
being very much concerned with ecology, both as a science and as an aesthetic
ideal. Nature for us remains the most fundamental inspiration. It is an important
part of the current Zeitgeist that gardening is based on a sympathy with nature
and an understanding of natural processes – which has not always been the case.
(Oudolf and Kingsbury 2005, 16)

Among the brilliant designers inspired by this movement, there are, for
instance, Oehme-van Sweden Associates, an American studio founded by
an architect, Wolfgang Oehme, and a horticulturalist, James van Sweden.
They started using ornamental grasses and perennials as an alternative to the
sterile lawn and clipped shrubs typical of the American landscape to create
“a quilted look” (Oudolf and Kingsbury 2005, 28) and they subsequently
improved their technique, incorporating planting design. In the Native
Plant Garden of New York Botanical Garden which opened in 2013,
they introduced four hundred species native to the Northeast of America,
creating a garden that was a place of interaction between plants and insects.
Some aquatic plants filter the irrigation system and the promenade running
along the edge of the water feature is made of black locust hardwood.
Wilderness also became a tendency in private gardens, as in those
designed by Dan Pearson in Britain. Pearson is a well-known designer and
horticulturalist but also a prolific writer. According to Noel Kingsbury, he
“developed a distinct naturalistic style based on using plants which evoke
the looseness and romance of wild places. His work successfully combines
a natural look with the strong visual appeal that is often lacking when
only native species are used” (Oudolf and Kingsbury 2005, 28). In 2015,
Pearson was commissioned to design the courtyard garden of the Garden
Museum in London, the first museum in the world dedicated to the history
of gardening, which was created in 1977 in the deconsecrated Church of
St Mary-at-Lambeth. The garden is situated between the café and the
street and boasts woodland planting that catches the eye of the passers-by
and provides a refuge from the frantic life of the city. Here, wilderness has
nothing to do with the use of native plants promoted by planting design but
it emerges, however, in the image of the woodland.
Again in London, Nigel Dunnett is a designer and a professor of Planting
Design and Urban Horticulture in the Department of Landscape
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Architecture at the University of Sheffield. In 2013, he designed the

new planting schemes for podium landscapes at the Barbican Centre.
The previous roof gardens contained flowerbeds that required a lot of
maintenance and continual irrigation. Dunnet introduced a new planting
scheme, made up of three plant communities positioned around the site
according to the different microclimates. These planting groups contain
a mixture of ecologically compatible plants, which create real wild plant
ecosystems. It can be said that all these figures belong to the movement of
“planting design”, which distinguishes itself primarily through the use of
wild plants.
There are wild gardens designed by architects, however, which do not
deal with planting design but have wilderness as their aesthetic ideal. The
courtyard of the BNF in Paris, designed by Dominique Perrault in the 90s,
is a sensational example that was ahead of its time. The idea was to cut a
piece from the landscape of the Île-de-France and to paste it in the heart
of the library. There was nothing spontaneous in this process, as enormous
trees such as oaks, wild pines and birches were brought directly from the
forest and replanted in the courtyard, but the result is impressive. As the
library revolves around the courtyard, the forest, which can only be seen
from the inside, has become an image to contemplate. So, in this project,
wild forest is the ideal untouchable protagonist placed in the heart of a great
building, which is at the center of Paris.
More recently, also at the center of Paris but in a different arrondissement,
Atelier le balto designed the Jardin Sauvage next to the Palais du Tokyo. The
garden is a sort of urban jungle installed in the interstitial space between
the building and the street. It can be seen from the level of the street or
it can be crossed on a wooden path. The contrast between the old urban
context with bricks arches and seemingly wild nature, recalls the charming
images mentioned by John Ruskin, where nature stands out by taking over
architecture abandoned to itself.
It has become common to see wild gardens also at architecture exhibitions.
Repair, the Australian pavilion of the sixteenth Architecture Biennale in
Venice, was an installation of thousands of endangered native plants, created
by the artist Linda Tegg. At the basis of her work there is an awareness
of the Australian ecosystem, which is in danger of disappearing. Australia,
indeed, be incredibly rich from a biological point of view but in the last
three centuries, 99% of Australian prairies have been replaced by agriculture
and urbanism. The remaining 1% survives as tiers paysage, at the edges of the
streets and in the abandoned areas. The stars of the pavilion, thus, are the
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plants of the grasslands, the Grassland Repair.

In addition, another two installations occupy the space: Skylight, a series of
LEDs hung on the ceiling which allow the plants to stay alive, and Ground,
a collection of videos showing fifteen exemplars of Australian projects
where architecture aims to repair. The dialogue between architecture and
nature, thus, must be addressed to repair the environmental damage, which
man has caused to his habitat and to himself, through recycling and the
promotion of indigenous culture. One could argue that, in addition to
ethical connotations, the image of wilderness has been applied to many
projects also because it reflects contemporary taste. What is wild, indeed,
is contemporary and beautiful. Sometimes it is not wild at all, but it looks
wild. This is not a disparaging statement about false wild projects. It is true,
in fact, that representing wilderness, even if superficially, can be useful to
awaken the conscience of the public. Transforming the meaning of the word
wild so that it carries positive connotations is a step towards reversing the
trends which have come close to destroying our planet. Gardens started this
process.

These assumptions open us up to the philosophy of the garden as an antidote

to the poisons of our time, and support an ethical future in which to cultivate
a transformed world where man is again joined to Nature, his mother. A world
free of its obsession with development, whether it is sustainable or not, a cosmos
free from beauty, exonerated from all dogmatic Cartesian rigidity, to be lived in
poetically with the respect of ancient times. (Venturi Ferriolo 2019, 5-6)

The examples given, thus, even if they do not contribute directly to the
protection of the environment, do play an important role: they improve
the taste of man for nature, where nature is understood as being the plant
world, and give citizens a sense of responsibility for their environment. This
admiration for a different order (in gardens), that is, an admiration for the
harmony of the plant world and the acceptance of different kinds of plants,
even those which are usually considered as weeds to be grubbed, should be
reflected in design but also in a tolerant attitude in everyday life. Indeed,
love for the environment means respect for the rhythms of nature and
tolerance of what is different.
As stated by Clément “tolerance cannot emerge unless there is real
knowledge” (Clément 1997, 169). When something is known, then it seems
familiar to our eyes, and what is familiar is more easily accepted. Therefore, to
love the environment we should first get to know it. According to Clément,
in order to tolerate plants better, one should know their names, their origins
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and the way in which they behave. Wild gardens promote this attitude:
some ensuring biodiversity through the conservation of natural habitats,
others becoming sophisticated aesthetic references for designers and users.

References

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Clément, Gilles. 1991. Jardin en movement. Paris: Pandora.
———. 1997. “Jardins en mouvement, friche surbaines et mécanismes de la vie.”
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Descola, Philippe. 2004. “Le sauvage et le domestique.” Communications (76): 17-39.
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