1 comments about The Practice of Sustainable Development.

1. This book should be titled, "The Practice of Ignoring Market Demand." It is little more than an promotion for dense urban development and the elimination of the automobile, which is a sustainable concept for only a small portion of our society.
   
   If "smart growth" is so smart, why has it been around for over 35 years, but only a small portion of our society has bought into it? Generally speaking, it ignores market demand and attempts to shape the market in a way that it refuses to be shaped. THAT is an unsustainable practice.
   
   Dense urban development can be sustainable - or it can be unsustainable. Suburban development can be sustainable - or it can be unsustainable.
   
   The unanswered question (in this book) is: What specific DEVELOPMENT practices contribute to the sustainability we want to achieve?
   
   The presumption in this book is that ALL development is unsustainable, so we need to pack people as close together as possible, so we can do as little of it as possible, and everyone can walk to work and shop.
   
   Today's automobiles represent an unsustainable practice, but developers aren't in the automobile manufacturing business, nor can they sustainably control market demand for their use. Attempting to manipulate the market's demand for privacy and space is a recipe for financial disaster. Hardly sustainable.
   
   I found very little useful information in this book.

No comments about China and Gardens of Europe of the Eighteenth Century (Dumbarton Oaks Reprints in Landscape Architechture).

1 comments about The Garden As Architecture: Form and Spirit in the Gardens of Japan, China, and Korea.

1. The highest compliment which I can pay to a book is to say that it has a place in my "Desert Island" library - that is to say that if I were to find myself stranded on an island and could only have a few books on a given subject, this would be one of them. The Garden as Architecture is such a book; it is fascinating, well-written and profusely illustrated, and is lucid enough to be enjoyable the first time but sufficiently rich and complex in it's material that it continues to yield additional insights after repeated re-readings. It consists of a cross-cultural comparison of the relationships between architecture and the adjacent outdoor spaces, in the traditional cultures of Japan, China and Korea. I use the term "outdoor space" rather than "garden" because the author makes the point that these 3 cultures differ significantly in the use and meaning which they give to these spaces, which use of the word garden for all 3 does not adequately convey. The section on Japanese gardens and architecture is somewhat longer than the Chinese and Korean sections; it alone is worth the price of the book. The author describes the evolution of residential and temple architecture (starting with Heian-period Shinden style estates and proceeding thru the Shoin and Sukiya styles of the medieval and Edo periods) as well as the changes which occurred in the adjacent gardens. He shows that architecture and the gardens appear to have changed together as part of a mutually-dependant co-evolution, rather than having evolved independently of one another. For example, he describes how as a result of changes in the design of the shutters (shitomido), doors (mairado), and shoji screens used to screen the exterior from the interior of the building, the views of the garden were dramatically altered over time, which influenced the design of the garden. Elsewhere he argues that the south dry-landscape gardens of the Zen temples and the pond-and-hill gardens of warrior residences both evolved from the same prototypical Heian-period Shinden south garden by a process in which certain elements of the latter were emphasized (while others were condensed or retained only by implication rather than explicitly), with the later gardens differing from each other by what was chosen for emphasis. This is a fascinating idea because it is very similar to the process of idealization and abbreviation which many authors have used to describe the relationship between the Japanese garden and the larger natural landscape. The sections on Chinese and Korean gardens are more concerned with the influence of geographic/climatic and social factors than they are with their evolution over time. I'm not sufficiently versed in these subjects to comment on them except to note that the material in these sections is equally interesting, and concerns a subject about which little has been published in English compared with the volume of material on the Japanese garden & architecture. Since the Chinese and Japanese gardens were strongly influenced by Taoism and Zen respectively, the differences between them provide a degree of insight into the contrasting philosophies of these two religions. I have only one minor complaint concerning this book. The numbering of the illustrations is complex and at times confusing, and they are widely separated from the text which discuses them with distressing frequency - expect to be flipping the pages a lot. On a final note, you will get the most out of this book if you already have some familiarity (from more introductory sources) with the subjects covered. The illustrations are all in black & white, so a good large format color book (e.g. by Marc Keane or Teiji Itoh) on Japanese gardens would make an excellent companion, while the visual and spatial arguments in this book can be appreciated more deeply after having worked thru David Slawson's "Secret Teachings in the Art of Japanese Gardens" (which is also in my "Desert Island" library).

1 comments about Pests of Landscape Trees and Shrubs: An Integrated Pest Management Guide (University of California Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources, Pu).

1. Do you have questions? This book has the answers. If you are a serious gardener or a weekend putterer this book is for you. 'Pests of Landscape Trees and Shrubs' focuses on IPM as a safer more environmentally responsible method of pest and disease combat. It is a wonderful diagnostic tool with hundredes of color photos and tables to ID your plant problems. It can also be used as a teaching text with full explanation of how and why these methods work from highly trusted University of California sources. This book is an amazing value for it's size and content. It has replaced no fewer than five pest/disease books in my library at a cost that was less than half of some of the others that claimed to know it all. I don't know how I gardened so long without it.

2 comments about Designs for Garden Paths: 150 Designs for Walkways, Terraces and Steps (Schiffer Design Book).

1. The beautiful photographs in this book will provide much inspiration for those looking to design a path or walkway, but don't look for a "how to" set of instructions. The author provides some general guidelines and points to consider, but seems to believe that one should leave paving to the professionals.



2. This book is about the role of paving in adding beauty and functionality to the garden. The multitude of materials and patterns presented should yield something easily adaptable to each reader's own situation.

   Many of the examples shown are in large formal gardens, but the ideas are viable on a smaller scale as well. There are also a number of projects for smaller patios and walkways.

   Materials used include stone, concrete, brick, terracotta, wood and loose aggregates. Design, installation and the construction of steps are covered.

   This book is a visual delight for the color photos of beautiful gardens incorporating paved features on every page. These are an inspiration to any gardener.

1 comments about Colour in the Flower Garden (Royal Horticultural Society Classic Garden Writers).

1. Gertrude Jekyll influences the great gardeners that influence the rest of us. Her book on color is apparently among her best writings. This book is valuable to anyone who is interested in gardening history. Her principles are also at the heart of modern English garden design. Her core belief was that gardening is more art than craft, and she borrows color principles from painters.

No comments about Le Corbusier: The machine and the grand design (Planning and cities).

No comments about Isamu Noguchi: A Sculpture for Sculpture (Museum of Fine Arts).

No comments about The Garden Art of Japan (The Heibonsha Survey of Japanese Art ; no. 28).

No comments about Dante's Commedia: Elements of Structure.