Sonstiges Vergabeverfahren | 10/2011
Internationales Gutachterverfahren zum Neubau des "Englischen Gartens" in den Gärten der Welt Berlin-Marzahn
3. Preis
Landschaftsarchitektur
Bruun & Möllers GmbH & Co. KG
Landschaftsarchitektur
Erläuterungstext
A SKETCH OF EDEN – competition for an english garden
What started out as a humble dwelling for the lower classes soon became the emblematic expression of the English way of life. The cottage surrounded by a garden - modest by size but well kept and often representing the idea of an earthly ‚Paradise’.
But what is it that converts a very simple house with some land into the owner’s paradise? The love for the garden, the expertise in horticulture, and the level of craftsmanship can turn a piece of land into something way more than a garden. Intimacy and representation, inside and outside, agriculture and horticulture, landscape and garden, flowers and vegetables, vistas and enclosures are not in opposition to each other but in harmony. Nothing happens by chance! This actually doesn’t apply only for the inside but also for the outside - not only for the garden but also for the surrounding landscape. The English garden is a composition in itself and a composition within the landscape, no matter if it is a cottage or a manor.
How can these ideas be translated to Berlin Marzahn without feeling out of place?
The Garden:
Embedding the garden into a landscape, not a park, is the first step. Meadows with grazing sheep, groups of trees and soft topography create the right context for the cottage garden without breaking with the overall park design. This way the visitor, standing at the new entrance, is slightly surprised to get a first glance at the garden, seeing the tip of the cottage roof peaking through a lush planting of willows beyond the wide open grassland. Like a painting the landscape with the sheltered garden invites the people to take a closer look.
Walking downwards along the edge of meadow and woodlands one reaches an intersection where the visitor is wooed onto a country lane bordered by whitethorn (Crataegus monogyna) hedge rows. After a slight curve reveals a first view into a flowering orchard with thousands of blooming daffodils in spring, but the path continues until a wooden gate (locked during opening hours of the theme garden and open when the theme garden is closed) blocks the way and marks the entrance to the topiary garden on the right hand side, a formal yew (Taxus) garden cut into the lush willow planting, and the central cottage garden to the left.
Entering the cottage garden through a gate cut into the well pruned hornbeam hedge, one is immediately overwhelmed by the beauty of English perennial gardens. The harmony of the formal structure of this representative garden contrasting the simple but lush, diversified planting is appealing and gives ideas for your own private garden.
After a cup of tea with buttered scones, one continues to explore the vegetable garden and the orchard that was already visually introduced. Bulbs and apple blossom certainly make this place special in spring but ramblers, climbing the trees create an ever blooming garden. Following the path an opening in a hornbeam hedge marks the next step on the way through the garden. It encloses a circular water garden with benches to rest and a reflecting pool sprinkled with tiny water lilies (N. pygmaea 'Alba'). This quiet retreat with the reflection of the sky in the water surface marks the end of the theme garden. A wooden gate opens the way into the landscape, staged by a perfectly maintained lawn plateau and framed by clipped hedges. A ha-ha, hiding the border between garden and grazing sheep, completes this perfect impression of an English landscape.
Beyond this generous space, the path leads through a slender passage where hedges like clouds of green prepare the visitor to exit the garden. Leaving the hedge garden behind, a creek with a waterfall leads towards a small, natural pond. The wind in the willows and the purl of the creek say a gentle good bye to the visitor.
The Cottage:
A simple building with only a ground floor, small openings for windows and doors and a double pitched roof, interrupted by a single or a number of chimneys is being carefully embedded within the landscape. This cottage is a modern interpretation that respects the historic aspects as well in design as in the choice of materials. It is organised as two adjacent buildings, one guest-unit and one service-unit. As often in historic precedents they are symmetrical and communicate with their front yard, each with a grand main area inside (guest room and kitchen) and their servicing rooms on either end of the building. In the center there is a fireplace that can be accessed from both sides as if two of seperate units had been combined.
As in historic precedents stone is used for the walls and wooden shingles for the roof cladding. On the inside the rooms allow views into an open wooden truss.
What started out as a humble dwelling for the lower classes soon became the emblematic expression of the English way of life. The cottage surrounded by a garden - modest by size but well kept and often representing the idea of an earthly ‚Paradise’.
But what is it that converts a very simple house with some land into the owner’s paradise? The love for the garden, the expertise in horticulture, and the level of craftsmanship can turn a piece of land into something way more than a garden. Intimacy and representation, inside and outside, agriculture and horticulture, landscape and garden, flowers and vegetables, vistas and enclosures are not in opposition to each other but in harmony. Nothing happens by chance! This actually doesn’t apply only for the inside but also for the outside - not only for the garden but also for the surrounding landscape. The English garden is a composition in itself and a composition within the landscape, no matter if it is a cottage or a manor.
How can these ideas be translated to Berlin Marzahn without feeling out of place?
The Garden:
Embedding the garden into a landscape, not a park, is the first step. Meadows with grazing sheep, groups of trees and soft topography create the right context for the cottage garden without breaking with the overall park design. This way the visitor, standing at the new entrance, is slightly surprised to get a first glance at the garden, seeing the tip of the cottage roof peaking through a lush planting of willows beyond the wide open grassland. Like a painting the landscape with the sheltered garden invites the people to take a closer look.
Walking downwards along the edge of meadow and woodlands one reaches an intersection where the visitor is wooed onto a country lane bordered by whitethorn (Crataegus monogyna) hedge rows. After a slight curve reveals a first view into a flowering orchard with thousands of blooming daffodils in spring, but the path continues until a wooden gate (locked during opening hours of the theme garden and open when the theme garden is closed) blocks the way and marks the entrance to the topiary garden on the right hand side, a formal yew (Taxus) garden cut into the lush willow planting, and the central cottage garden to the left.
Entering the cottage garden through a gate cut into the well pruned hornbeam hedge, one is immediately overwhelmed by the beauty of English perennial gardens. The harmony of the formal structure of this representative garden contrasting the simple but lush, diversified planting is appealing and gives ideas for your own private garden.
After a cup of tea with buttered scones, one continues to explore the vegetable garden and the orchard that was already visually introduced. Bulbs and apple blossom certainly make this place special in spring but ramblers, climbing the trees create an ever blooming garden. Following the path an opening in a hornbeam hedge marks the next step on the way through the garden. It encloses a circular water garden with benches to rest and a reflecting pool sprinkled with tiny water lilies (N. pygmaea 'Alba'). This quiet retreat with the reflection of the sky in the water surface marks the end of the theme garden. A wooden gate opens the way into the landscape, staged by a perfectly maintained lawn plateau and framed by clipped hedges. A ha-ha, hiding the border between garden and grazing sheep, completes this perfect impression of an English landscape.
Beyond this generous space, the path leads through a slender passage where hedges like clouds of green prepare the visitor to exit the garden. Leaving the hedge garden behind, a creek with a waterfall leads towards a small, natural pond. The wind in the willows and the purl of the creek say a gentle good bye to the visitor.
The Cottage:
A simple building with only a ground floor, small openings for windows and doors and a double pitched roof, interrupted by a single or a number of chimneys is being carefully embedded within the landscape. This cottage is a modern interpretation that respects the historic aspects as well in design as in the choice of materials. It is organised as two adjacent buildings, one guest-unit and one service-unit. As often in historic precedents they are symmetrical and communicate with their front yard, each with a grand main area inside (guest room and kitchen) and their servicing rooms on either end of the building. In the center there is a fireplace that can be accessed from both sides as if two of seperate units had been combined.
As in historic precedents stone is used for the walls and wooden shingles for the roof cladding. On the inside the rooms allow views into an open wooden truss.