This is a custom paisley teardrop fire pit we built for a client in Boulder, Colorado. Below are the bare bones of our latest rendition of this fire pit design. We now are cutting, bending and welding shut the steel pipe we use to create our coveted Crossfire Burning Systems (in this particular case anyway). We use linear pipe for the majority of our burners, but we have the ability to bend, cut and weld to your design specs.

Here is the burner as it is drying after being painted with high temperature paint.

Here are a few examples of the burner in action

For more examples of custom burning systems, fire pit kits, fire pit frames, hearths and more, please visit us online or call today. 1-877-556-5255.

11.1 Deconstructing the Constructive Professions
Contents list

In cities, there is a concealed power struggle between the partisans of transport, social justice, gracious housing, religion, commerce, fine building,
spacious parks and a healthy environment. Wishing to attain all these ends, society employs a range of experts to bring them about: engineers, lawyers,
architects, priests, teachers, industrialists, environmentalists and others. Each professional group dedicates itself to constructing a specialized aspect
of the public welfare, which contributes to its private welfare. Like the objectives they serve, these experts find themselves in conflict. Each
comes to believe, fervently, in its "own department of the public welfare. Doctors, claiming that nothing matters if one lacks health, suggest that more
money should be spent on hospital beds. Gardeners want the money spent on flower beds. Highway engineers want it spent on roads, architects on better buildings,
religious leaders on churches, park managers on parks. To obtain resources, it becomes necessary to gain power and influence.

When the professions distort the truth, society suffers. Experts develop specialized discourse comprising words, metaphors, a narrative, work practices,
visual images, artefacts and, where possible, laws. Specialized discourse becomes a means to power, just as man-centred discourse was a means to male dominance
in past millennia. A discourse constructs a version of reality that emphasizes particular social structures. Teachers, for example, think and speak as
though compulsory education were a necessary precondition for health, wealth and justice. Furthermore, they argue that "qualified teachers alone can provide
education. Doctors argue that only doctors should be allowed to prescribe drugs. Structural engineers wish every structure to be certified before it is
constructed. Architects incline to a law that permits only qualified architects to design buildings.

The group of professionals that specializes in the built environment finds itself in a unique position to build the versions of reality that were first
constructed in professional discourse. They use language to survey, analyse and control the built form of cities. Abstruse measures of accessibility, legibility
and spatial structure become preludes to expensive proposals. Alternative theories emphasize wide streets and narrow streets; some prefer defensible cul-de-sacs,
others see them as anathema. On different occasions, both policies can improve cities. Yet urban designers have very little influence on road design. Vis-à-vis
engineers, their position has always been one of institutionalized inequality. The discourse of engineering, emphasizing health, safety and economic growth
has, in most "modern countries, secured the enactment of laws that give highway designers control over human settlements. Power generates form.

11.2 Deconstructing Maps
Contents list

Fig 11.1 The 1830 plan of Dunbar tells much of the Earl of Lauderdale’s place in society. He lived in the great house at the north of the high street and
controlled much of the town’s life.

Reading the built form of ancient cities, one can discover which groups of experts have held power in past periods. The church and the military have inscribed
their glorious subtexts on many towns, with the military having been notably prolific. Every general wants more men, weapons, city walls, roads -- and
maps. Their interest in maps is especially interesting. A 1992 book on Writing Worlds, by a group of geographers, considers the relationship between maps
and power (Barnes et al., 1992). The view is advanced that "representations of landscape - the city, the countryside or wilderness - are not mimetic, but
rather a product of the nature of the discourse in which they are written. Medieval maps say as much about "the contours of feudalism and "the shape
of a religious hierarchy as they do about topography. If a map of Dunbar was the only surviving record of the town in 1830 (Figure 11.1), we could read
much about the Earl of Lauderdales power and influence. Maps cost money and reveal social structures. They are instruments in the struggle for urban power.
Instinctively, designers and planners know this, but because of the high value placed on objectivity in the twentieth century, we try not to see the maps
subjectivity.

Reading maps of modern cities, or the cities themselves, tells us about the power relationships between experts. Journalists and others quip that planners
caused more damage to British cities in the 1960s than did military action during the 1940s. Here is an account of what happened to a small village in
Scotland:

The second half of the 20th century has not been as kind to Ardrishaig as it was to its most famous son, John Smith. The architects of a planned society
began to drag Ardrishaig into the modern age in 1960. They started with the demolition and reconstruction of most of the houses on the landward side of
Chalmers Street. The village began to grow, almost unnaturally, up the brae beyond the school with Swedish-style wood-fronted council houses. The blows
to the old-established structure of village life were deep and irreversible. The planners moved in on the south, seaward side of the street, knocking down
the decrepit but charming Fisher Row and then the entire street except the church hall. There were plans for a pedestrian precinct that came to nothing.
(Sunday Times Scotland, 1994)

This obituary for John Smith, a Labour Party leader, is also an obituary for the village. What caused the damage to Ardrishaig? Judging from the above account,
the trouble resulted from:
a plan marking old dwellings as slums requiring clearance [this idea probably originated from Ministry of Health thinking in the 1920s];
a plan for non-contextual Swedish-style houses [this idea is likely to have come from architects who admired Scandinavian style in the 1950s];
a plan that zoned the hillside, or brae, for housing [this idea could well have come from the Ministry of Agriculture, which aimed to protect farmland from
development];
a plan for a pedestrian precinct, which was not implemented [this idea will have come from an engineers report on Traffic in Towns (Ministry of Transport,
1963)].

The theories that inspired the policies, guessed at in brackets, come from various professions and government departments, not from planners or planning
theory. Planners may have tried to conduct the orchestra, but they did not compose the music or select the tunes. Attribution of blame to "the architects
of a planned society is deserved only to the extent that changes to Ardrishaig were shown on plans before being built. In rural areas, the plans probably
indicated towns as black, and thus important, while agricultural land was left white, to show its unimportance. Mapping policy influences planning policy,
surreptitiously and insidiously.

Government agencies produce maps and plans -- to reinforce their interests. Departments of Agriculture map agricultural quality -- because they wish to
protect farmers. Departments of Nature Conservation map ecological value -- to protect habitats. Hydrologists map aquifers -- to protect water resources
from pollution. An aspect of the environment matters only if a government department, or profession, has a responsibility. This puts town and country planners
in a curious position. Is their job, acting as mere bureaucrats, to implement other peoples policies, as happened in Ardrishaig? Or is it to develop a
meta-discourse in which conflicts between subsidiary experts can be resolved? Some theories of planning have been mainly about power: "You give us power;
we will give you good cities has been the implicit offer. Systems planning, in the 1960s, was like this. Planners saw themselves as "conductors of the
orchestra. Politicians, who peddle a similar brew, were not very susceptible to this line of argument. They preferred specific urban design proposals,
such as "slum clearance, "more sewers, "more roads, "more pedestrianization or "more parks. When persuaded, they employed designers to implement their
projects, as happened at Ardrishaig.

Designers, unlike cartographers, have always known that plans are drawn to influence events. That is their raison dêtre. With Karl Marx, they see that
"the point is not to understand the world, the point is to change it. Plan-makers remuneration used to come from private individuals. This made it easy
to discover what sorts of changes should be made: you asked your client. For architecture, Wotton described the conditions as "commodity, firmness and
delight (Wotton, 1624). The clientele he had in mind were Noble Men and Noble Minds (Figure 11.2). They were the people who commissioned architects. When
public agencies and public companies came to the fore as clients, things became difficult. Geddes asserted that the aim of planning is to make "good places.
It was an admirable idea, but, in this life, a place cannot be good from every point of view. Lynch defined seven clusters of performance dimensions criteria
for good cities: Vitality, Sense, Fit, Access, Control, Efficiency and Justice (Lynch, 1981). Others have ducked the problem and stated, reasonably, that
it is the job of democratic bodies to take decisions. As Mrs Thatcher put it, advisers advise and ministers decide. Although this principle is easily accepted,
ministers decisions have to be based on "facts, which are constituted by the technical vocabularies and maps that advisers have drawn up for particular
purposes. When agricultural land was mapped, but not nature reserves, politicians protected agricultural land, but not nature reserves.

11.3 Deconstructing Planning Theory
Contents list

  
  
  

How then does one judge a planning theory and decide what action to take? If you say the world is round, and I say it is flat, there are ways of settling
our dispute. Likewise, if we differ on the dimensions of a brick pier to support a concrete beam, both can be built and we can discover whose design theory
withstands the load. Planning theories are more problematical. Cities take generations to build and have many clients who judge their surroundings in different
ways at different points in history, at different stages of their lives, and in different ways when engaged in different activities (work, leisure, shopping
etc.).

Any one approach to planning is doomed to failure. Single-topic theories cannot deal with multi-everything cities. This failure is illustrated by the history
of British housing layout from 1840 to 1990 (Turner, 1987a). The story forms a sequence of "problems followed by "panaceas. Each panacea was based on
a planning theory. Each became a "problem in its turn (Figure 3). Warren Housing, reviled by Engles, was succeeded by Byelaw Housing. Unwin and his friends
attacked Byelaw Housing, arguing the case for Housing on Garden City Lines. Reformers, from Clough Williams Ellis to Ian Nairn, slammed the sprawling uniformity
of suburbia and sub-topia. Corbusian planners argued for the superficially attractive solution of stacking the dwellings and allowing the "landscape to
flow underneath. Mixed Development was the next solution, to be followed by Design Guide Housing. Each theory had value but each caused a new problem,
because it was overemphasized.

A shocking feature of the progression is the fervour with which each group of reformers, seeking new powers and new uniformities, decried the work of its
predecessors. When we look back, each of the panaceas has real merit and continues to suit certain social groups. Warren housing, where it survives in
old villages, is treasured. Garden suburbs have always been loved by residents. Stefan Muthesius, Oscar Newman, and many young couples, have sung the praises
of the English terraced house. Others love the cell-like isolation and superb views from tower blocks. The most serious criticism of the theories that
generated these schemes is that each has been too dominant, and has ruled exclusively in those dreaded ghettos: the housing estate and residential tract.
Despite Jane Jacobs, estates continue to be single-purpose places. If any one theory had reigned for the 150-year period, our towns would be immeasurably
poorer. Town planning is not like building brick piers.

11.4 Deconstructing Urban Design Theory
Contents list

Fig 11.4 Frederick Gibberd wrote a book on Town Design and thought towns could be designed much like buildings with rooms (‘neighbourhoods’) and corridors
(‘roads’). This is his plan for Harlow New Town, where he lived and worked.

The advent of "urban design signifies a welcome retreat from unitarism, which could discourage people from thinking of "planning as a unitary professional
discipline. When Frederick Gibberd wrote a book on "town design, it was pretty clear what he meant: architecture writ large (Gibberd, 1967). Just as architects
planned rooms and corridors, so, it appeared to Gibberds generation, they could plan land uses and roads (Figure 11.4). Architect means "head technician,
and architect-planners aimed to control all the subsidiary specialists. In "urban design, the substitution of the adjective "urban for the adjectival
noun "town implies a less-than-holistic activity, just as "aerodynamic design and "structural design" describe aspects of aircraft or building design.
But many popular theories of urban design still tend to unitarism. The theories of Bacon, Hillier and McHarg can illustrate the point.

11.5 Bacon believed that great cities have a
design structure

Edmund Bacon wrote an exhilarating book on the Design of Cities (Bacon, 1967). The illustrations, especially, lead one to believe that a great city requires
a "design structure linked to a "movement system, like the corridors in a building (Figure 5). Though it is easy to be swept along by the historical
analysis, the argument and the drawings, one should grip the handrail. Not all good urban open space has been, should be, or can be designed in this way.
Bacons approach focuses on urban set-pieces, of the kind loved by priests, kings and generals. Democratic societies, having deposed their former masters,
should think twice before giving similar powers to municipal planning departments. Bacon proposes "shafts of space, which are in danger of becoming processional
routes without processions. Dictators plan avenues, put a presidential palace at the head of the avenue and then organize processions to celebrate their
glory. It is an approach that privileges abstract visual space over useful social space. It does not produce spaces with other qualities for other activities:
recreation space, entertainment space, ecological space, healthy space, sheltered space, market space, spiritual space or defensible space.

Fig 11.6 The ‘space syntax’ theory predicts use intensity from spatial geometry. In this example, the darker lines are predicted to be the most used – because
they are the most central.

The theory of Space Syntax, as propounded by Hillier and Hanson, is also based on geometry (Hillier et al., 1984). The main idea is that central spaces,
with good links and good views, will receive more use than peripheral spaces without good linkage. Centrality is computed from a range of geometrical measures,
including relative asymmetry, convexity and axiality. Relative asymmetry is a measure of the depth of a place within the circulation system. Central places
have low relative asymmetry. It is claimed that when these values are right, the spaces will be more central and more used (Figure 6). One can hardly dispute
the fact that the centre of a network will be more intensively used than the periphery, but is intensive use always good? Oscar Newman, in a book on Defensible
Space, argues that if strangers are always walking past your door, the space will not be defensible and crime rates will be high (Newman, 1973). The two
theories met head on in the cul-de-sac. Space Syntax theorists are against them, because they discourage pedestrian access. Defensible space theorists
are in favour of them, because they discourage pedestrian access. Both theories are correct, but err in striving for unitarism.

Ecologists and environmentalists tend to another type of unitarism, which seeks to privilege the natural environment over the human environment. Ian McHarg,
in Design with Nature (McHarg, 1971), used a set of drawings (Figure 11.7) that are quite as seductive as Bacons to argue that planning should begin from
a consideration of natural environment characteristics (earth, water, air, vegetation, wildlife). As a counterweight to normal practice, it was an excellent
book. But there is a serious contradiction in the meaning of "nature in this context. If man is part of nature, as just another animal, then the theories
have no meaning. If man is a separate force, accused of damaging nature in his own interest, then these theories are opposed to human life and can hardly
be expected to help in creating a home for man.

11.7 McHarg argued that we should design with nature

A feature common to most theories of urban design, which explains their unitarism, is their genesis in the constructive professions. As discussed above,
engineers, architects and landscape designers are trained and paid to recommend particular courses of action for particular purposes. Their habit is deeply
ingrained, and there are hierarchical relationships between the professions. Planners, at least in planning theory, are the "conductors of the orchestra.
Road engineers take precedence over architects. This has been a deadly constraint on housing layout. Architects hold sway over landscape designers. This
has been a deadly constraint on "the space outside buildings. Landscape designers aim to rule over horticulturalists, which has led to drearily uniform
planting.

11.5 Deconstructing the Construction Professions
Contents list

In the urban environment, deconstruction has the potential to be a great force for good or ill. It could be the critical generator of a new approach to
urbanism, or it could be a new Parisian terror. The latter prospect is raised before us by the deconstructionist slogan Il ny a pas de hors-texte. The
architectural cousin of this obscure principle, phrased in English to make horror plain, would be: "There is nothing outside the building or "The context
does not exist. In architecture, deconstructionist ideas are being misused as an excuse for the design of buildings in isolation, divorced alike from
internal planning and external context.

In origin, deconstruction was a way of reading philosophical texts, not a design or planning theory. But new ways of thinking and seeing inevitably lead
to new ways of designing, as did Renaissance perspective. Jacques Derrida started from the Lévi-Strauss argument that, in language as in geology, deep
structures lie beneath surface structures. He then challenged, or deconstructed, the relationship between structural elements. Feminists have taken a special
interest in deconstruction because it offers a way of examining, and then upsetting, the traditional relationship of dominance in the Man:Woman structural
pair. A deconstructive reading of the environment can be deployed, with parallel intent, to examine and upset the hierarchical relationships between land
use activities and between the constructive professions. This may require, as in Bernard Tschumis project at
Parc de la Villette,
deconstruction of the tradition by which the form of a building is subordinated to the function. Despite the modernist design theory that forms should be
derived from functions, there are a great many successful buildings where the present function came long after the present form. Georgian houses have become
offices and Victorian warehouses have become residential lofts. Geoffrey Broadbent maintains that 70% of building functions can be housed in 70% of building
forms (Broadbent, 1988). If true, this is an excellent reason for deconstructing the traditional relationship between form and function. As a contrary
policy, one could design buildings according to environmental criteria and worry about functions later on.

In the built environment, deep structures and their hierarchical relationships have been brought to the surface, as a crude artificial language. Instead
of the easy transitions that characterize the natural environment, we have demarcated the most ridiculous strips and parcels of land for Road, River, Housing,
Open Space, Industry, Shopping, Recreation, Forestry, Nature Reserve. In the following structural pairs, the first member is normally dominant:

Road
:
Housing
River
:
Housing
Housing
:
Open Space
Industry
:
Marsh
Recreation
:
Nature Reserve
Forestry
;
Recreation

Technical, legal and linguistic devices are used to subjugate the second party. Everywhere one looks, there are supposed deep structures that have been
raised to the surface and translated into a crude artificial language, more suited to computers than humans. Land uses are put into parcels. Everything
must be A or not-A, B or not-B. Boundaries are made into binary divides. The fantastic workings of the living organism are severed by the butchers knife,
as in Tunnards montage (Figure 11.8). Smooth transitions are forced into culturally imposed formal structures. Happy is the river that is not a property
line and not an engineers "watercourse. Sad is the river that becomes a municipal boundary, neglected by adjoining authorities. Tragic is the river that
is
buried by the constructive discourse of engineering .

Fig 11.8 Landscapes should not be severed with the butchers knife (from Tunnards Gardens in the Modern Landscape)

The constructive professions must be fluent speakers in the languages of the environment. An ability to say "road or "river in a dozen ways is good, but
it is not enough. Professionals must be able to use languages, comprising words, drawings and numbers, which can embrace roads, rivers, forests and buildings
in a myriad of ways, according to contexts and according to clients. They must have views on what to say and how to say it. Traditional planning moves
down the hierarchy from engineering to architecture to planting design. Deconstructed approaches to urban design proceed in different ways. One could move
from ecology to forestry to river design to architecture to highway engineering. Or one could move in another sequence, starting with the hydrological
cycle. It is not a question of asserting new hierarchies. Women should not have the legal or moral right to dominate men, but they should enjoy equality
of opportunity. Control should not be taken from engineers or planners merely to place farmers, ecologists or architects at the top of a new professional
hierarchy. Instead, different hierarchies should be allowed to achieve different objectives in different places. Traditional relationships should be deconstructed.
Those imagined deep structures, which currently disfigure the built environment, are human constructs.

Planners and designers should encourage as much diversity in human habitats as they find in animal habitats. It is not possible to resolve all conflicts
or to gain all ends. Choices have to be made. Different aspects of the public good should be stressed in different places. To achieve variety in land use
patterns, there should also be a variety of relationships between the professions, not an institutionalized decision-making tree. Relationships between
the constructive professions should, therefore, be deconstructed.

There are all types of Landscaping and one is Desert Landscaping. People love it because it is something different and because the Desert Plants used are so efficient. The Desert garden idea is a very popular one these days and there are lots of Plants to enjoy if you want to create your very own Desert garden. Whether you are aiming to complete the Desert Landscaping on your own or get professional help, there are a few tips to remember.

One of the most important tips to remember in Desert Landscaping is that these Plants do not require a lot of water. If you water them as much you water the other Plants in your designs you are likely to end up killing them. You actually have to be very careful then with how often you are watering because you do not want to kill the Plants. Different Desert Plants are native to certain landscapes so choose the ones that are going to strive in your location.
There is also another benefit to using Desert Landscaping Plants and that is that they do not require such expensive fertilizers and other products as other Plants you are probably used to growing. Remember, these are Plants that are used to basically growing on their own in the middle of a Desert and so they have adapted and do not need much to survive on. Desert soil is not nutrient rich so there is no worry of having to spend a ton of money on fertilizers and nutrients to have your Plants strive. Make sure you are efficient when using Desert Plants in Landscaping.

This is probably one of the most important tips of all because there are really easy things you can do to make the most of your Desert Landscaping and help the Plants to stay healthy and look beautiful. You can group certain Plants together as this will help them to feed off each other. Then group another set of Plants together that need the most water. Remember that if you are ever having any trouble you can always call in a professional Landscaping company to help.

This way you have the advice of a professional and can get some other ideas. You can probably handle it on your own but you can also get help by hiring a professional Landscaping design to help you out. This way you will have a group of professionals you can work with and who are going to be able to offer their own opinions for your Desert Landscaping design. You can work together and create the best design.

If you are looking for an alternative to a customary fire pit for your outdoor living space or patio, you may want to consider a steel fire basket. These are nice because they are portable and you can move them around your patio or garden provided you have a natural gas or propane source handy.

We recently sold one, see video below, to a customer and he is very pleased with it. Here is a little video we made for you to see the basket in all its glory. The logs within are custom oak steel gas logs we hand made and welded right here on site at our headquarters in Denver, Colorado.

If you are ever in the market for a custom fire pit or outdoor burning system, thats what we do, so please visit us online or contact us today. 1-877-556-5255.

Custom Landscape Design

Would you like to landscape your garden and need home and garden software? You will find lots of software to landscape your garden, design your home, for home security, and hobbies, such as scrapbooking on the Internet.

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Using a photo of your own home or one of the home models, you can create full colour, printable images using the computer application software. With hundreds of product images, you can experiment and see your home in a different landscape design.

Extended search will help you to find the best plants for your yard and learn how to prevent and treat diseases. You can have a look at your garden in different seasons and see it change over the years. You can also design and build bridges, patios, arbors and fences. Develop your landscaping ideas and watch them being realized.

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Home and garden software

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Caroline_Becht

Ever wonder how to maximize and maintain heat while enjoying your patio? Well, I came across an article that provides some helpful tips on how to retain the most heat you can so that you stay warm while relaxing in your outdoor living space.



1) Absorb and retain heat naturally. Utilize stone wherever possible, especially at the ground level because heat rises. Throughout the day stone, brick and masonry absorb and retain heat from the sun and will help keep your patio warm at night after the sun dips below the horizon and the temperature follows. Another advantage to laying stone as a patio base is that once its in place, you wont have to pay the stone to absorb heat; the sun is a free natural resource, and will save you money.



2) Wind. Block it out. And not by putting up a sheet or tarp. If you are going to enjoy you patio to the fullest, then really block the wind. Utilize box planters with thick shrubbery that will withstand and negate wind flow. Install glass or plexiglass panels with seams that completely block out the wind. Think about planting bushy thick small trees like Evergreen, Pine or Douglas Fir that will add a nice aroma while blocking those chilly breezes. Not only will you be blocking wind out, but you will be keeping privacy within as well.



3) Furniture. Wood stays relatively neutral in the heat absorption game, but will definitely retain more heat than metal chairs or tables which release the heat about as fast as it absorbs it. So once the sun sets, those metal chairs, benches and tables will be ice cold when you go to sit down. If you are outdoors for supper, metal table will cool off that hot meal in an instant, so again, utilize wooden seating and tables if stone benches arent an option. Also, fabric umbrellas are a great way to retain heat as well.



4) Heating units vs. Fire Pits. Outdoor heat can be produced several ways if you are willing to install a unit that best suits your patio needs. Portable heat lamps are available but tend to generate heat higher than the level you are seated at and need the most heat. They also tend to heat up the top of your head rather than radiate heat throughout the entire patio area leaving your guests and their body parts, cold. A better solution is a fire pit or hearth where the heat is radiated throughout the patio area and you can pull your chairs around it to engage in conversation. Sitting around a fire pit is a great way to enjoy company as well since because everyone is facing one another and everyone is involved. You dont have to shout across people like you would trying to talk to a friend who is at the end of a bar. Another nice thing about fire pits, are that they can create a complete feeling on a patio, where portable heaters feel like just that, portable, temporary, they dont blend in with decor and dont act like a "part" of the entire patio experience. Fire pits are a natural gathering spot for entertaining and conversation and can complete a patio.



5) Finally, utilize water. By creating a water storage unit on a rooftop or location above the ground, you can heat the water by day, then transfer the water to a pool or faux pond by night either manually or by a filtration system. Warm water will radiate heat in your patio and also adds another nice natural element to you patio experience.

If you have questions on how to complete your outdoor living room or patio, then please contact us and well be happy to help you with any questions you may have.

Tropical resorts in the Islands represent some of the most popular vacation destinations in the world. Every year millions of busy, over-stressed people choose to spend their precious vacation time unwinding at tropical locales. Why? What makes these places so irresistible? Could it be the lifestyle ideal they represent, a setting where the pressures of everyday life can just be forgotten, replaced by an attitude of contentment, tranquility, and overall well-being. This slower, more laidback attitude is fueled in no small part by the natural beauty that surrounds you at tropical Island locations.

If something has such a positive effect on your attitude and outlook, why should you settle for experiencing it only once a year during vacation? What if it were possible to create a little piece of that Island allure in your everyday life?
Landscaping is a very rewarding job that is often overlooked by people. In spite of this, many other individuals want to learn home Landscape Design in order to fulfill their wish to be able to create beautiful yards. Learning about home Landscape Design is actually not a full course in which you have to spend several years to perfect. Some people have this instinctive eye for great Design ideas in spite not having taken any home Landscape Design courses.

Aspects of Home Landscape Design

Home Landscape Design actually has several aspects under it. These aspects include backyard Design, pocket garden Design, formal landscaping, informal landscaping and others. Even the front yard or front lawn is sometimes included in home Landscape Design. There are several differences with the Designs mentioned earlier and these have something to do with how the homeowners expect their areas to look like.

Home Landscape Design often falls into two very loose categories which are formal and informal landscaping. As the terms mention, the rigidity of a formal Landscape is vastly different from the informal one. Formal gardens usually have geometric Design with which the plants are of uniform variety as well as uniform sizes. Trimming and pruning are religiously followed to maintain the balance of a formal Landscape.

On the other hand, an informal garden is something that looks very naturally cultivated. In spite of the natural look, informal gardens still need some maintenance work done to achieve the natural look. Home Landscape Design courses will teach individuals interested in landscaping what to give their clients as well as what to recommend.

Using Software to Create Home Landscape Designs

Landscape Design software is very handy to use when Designing Landscapes. These kinds of software have features that allow Landscape architects and engineers to maneuver plants, structures and other aspects of a home Landscape Design to see if the Design is feasible or not. The use computers in Designing Landscape has made the job of the architects and engineers of landscaping easier as well as gives the clients a view of what they should expect their yards to turn out to be.

Home Landscape Design is one of the things that make a home more welcoming to guests as well as its owners. Owners who have beautifully Landscaped areas tend to be more relaxed and satisfied with their homes, thus spending as much time in it as possible. This is one of the aims of a Landscape architect.
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2.1 Design and planning methods
Contents list

Design results from methods of working. A sculpture of welded steel differs from one chipped from granite or modelled with clay. Rodin was a modeller, Brancusi
a carver, Picasso a constructor. Look at their work: different methods produce different results. A modern planned town is not like an organic town. A
garden that is made by using a drawing to fix every detail before starting work will differ, markedly, from one that is made by choosing the plants and
stones one at a time, year after year. Means influence ends.

Clean hands design

Dirty hands design

Rough hands and smooth hands can both produce good design. The rough-hands method is practised in workshops and out of doors. It is the craftsmans way,
the peasants way, the ancient way. The smooth-hands method is to sit in an office working at measured drawings for implementation by others at remote
sites. This is the modern way: the way of the engineer, the architect, the town planner and the landscape architect. Both methods have their strengths.
In medieval times, the rough-hands method was universal. Today, it is the other way about. The change took place as part of a broad cultural trend, with
the rise of modernism a significant factor. Planners can learn from designers.

2.2 Pre-modern design methods
Contents list

Cart wheels

Apprenticeship is a system of great antiquity. The Code of Hammurabi, a Babylonian king, required skilled craftsmen to teach the young. Books were not available,
and technical knowledge was of great value. Those who possessed knowledge wished to keep it to themselves. In ancient Rome, most craftsmen were slaves.
This was an effective means of retaining the ownership of knowledge. In the Middle Ages, craft guilds emerged in Western Europe, controlled by independent
master craftsmen. Articles of apprenticeship bound trainees to their masters, often for seven years, to work for little or no pay. Some masons went on
to become designers. This was the only way to become an "architect. The knowledge gained in apprenticeship was practical, not theoretical. In the great
cathedrals, full-size drawings and large sets of dividers were used to set out masonry. Shapes and forms developed gradually in the minds of master craftsmen.
Small-scale drawings came into use at a later date.

Under the master and apprentice system, design decisions were taken on traditionalist grounds. Things were done in special ways because they had always
been done in such ways. "If twere right for Old Bill, twill be right for me. Changes came about very gradually, if at all. John Christopher Jones, who
published an extensive study of Design methods (Jones, 1980), was greatly impressed by this aspect of craft evolution, and especially by George Sturts
book on The Wheelwrights Shop. He quotes Sturts account of the waggon-builders approach to what we call design:

The truth is, farm-waggons had been adapted, through ages, so very closely to their own environment that, to understanding eyes, they really looked almost
like living organisms. They were so exact. Just as a biologist may see, in any limpet, signs of the rocky shore, the smashing breakers, so the provincial
wheelwright could hardly help reading, from the waggon-lines, tales of haymaking and upland fields, of hilly roads and lonely woods and noble horses, and
so on... Was it to suit the horses or the ruts, the loading or the turning, that the front wheels had to have a diameter of about four feet?

...

I never met a man who professed any other than an empirical acquaintance with the waggon-builders lore. My own case was typical. I knew that the hind-wheels
had to be five feet two inches high and the fore-wheels four feet two; that the "sides must be cut from the best four-inch heart of oak, and so on. This
sort of thing I knew, and in vast detail in course of time; but I seldom knew why. And that is how most other men knew. (Sturt, 1923)

Most design was done in this way, in most countries in most historical periods. It was used for carts, buildings, ships, cars, towns, gardens and every
other thing. Admiration for the products of traditional design methods continues to grow.

Fig 2.2 Evolutionary craft design - from George Sturt

2.3 Modern design methods
Contents list

The master and apprentice system declined in the later stages of the Industrial Revolution. Machines caused a separation between skilled designers and unskilled
workers. Craftsmen continued to make machines, but their hands became smoother as their need for theoretical knowledge increased. James Watt, the inventor
of several steam engines, studied at university. Though he could, in his own words, "work as well most journeymen, he was refused admission to a trade
guild. Eventually, the universities themselves introduced technical training, leading to masters degrees. When governments began to subsidize this type
of education, the master and apprentice system declined further. So did the contribution of rough hands to design.

The modern approach, of design with smooth hands, has grown by degrees. It began in ancient times and resumed its advance with the Renaissance.
Vitruvius
wrote that the architect should be "skilful with the pencil, instructed in geometry (Vitruvius, 1914 edn). Since the translation of Euclids Elements into
Latin, in 1482, the activity of making new places and products has become steadily re-entangled with the process of drawing. To de-sign is to make signs,
originally on paper, increasingly on computer screens. To plan is to make a projection on a flat surface. The early advantages of design-by-drawing were
both technical and aesthetic. In shipbuilding, technical considerations were dominant. Drawings made possible calculations relating to structure and function
(Figure 2.3). Orders could be sent to the forests, and tradesmen could proceed with the simultaneous fabrication of separate parts. In architecture, the
early benefit was mainly aesthetic. But, as construction became more sophisticated, drawings were also required for structural calculations.

Smooth-handed designers use more abstract reason, and more self-importance, than their rough-handed counterparts. To represent a place or a thing on paper,
abstract thought is required. "Abstract, as a verb, means to draw out. The draughtsmans tools - geometry and arithmetic - are rational procedures, useful
for drawing out. Book learning necessitates the use of reason. The whole procedure is one of simplification and of concentration on fundamental elements.
In societies that believed reason to be the grand avenue to human progress, it was natural that rational design should supplant craft evolution. Town plans
and building plans came to be founded on survey drawings.

During the nineteenth century, the technical and aesthetic reasons for producing drawings grew apart, as did the architectural and engineering professions.
The architect became a gentleman-artist, reliant on experienced craftsmen and engineers to make buildings stand up and resist the elements. In the twentieth
century, architects sought to gain control of the whole building process through their drawing skill. So much knowledge was available in books that it
became feasible to produce drawings and specifications for every aspect of the building process. When waggon building was replaced by car building, a similar
change afflicted vehicle production. Men in smart suits subjugated men in boiler suits.

During the early years of automobile manufacture, vehicles continued to be designed and built by craft methods. Components were machined, one at a time.
Each part was honed to slightly different dimensions and often embodied minor design improvements. It was a very expensive way of making cars. With his
Model T, Henry Ford applied the techniques of mass production to automobiles. Each part was standardized. A gauging system was introduced. Parts were made
in standard sizes to be attached in the simplest possible ways. Assemblers were given specialized tools and made to adopt a single task. Henry the First
became king of the whole process. All design decisions were taken before the production line was started. Workers became operatives, not craftsmen (Figure
2.4). Uneducated immigrants to the New World could learn the job in a day. Each had responsibility for one tiny step in the production process and for
an endlessly repeated operation, as satirized by Charlie Chaplin in Modern Times. Fordist production methods created the modern world. Not since the invention
of gunpowder had smooth hands won such dominion over rough hands. Bronze defeated the peasant; the longbow defeated the knight; gunpowder defeated the
castle; Fordism defeated the worker, temporarily.

Fordist mass production

2.4 Fordist mass production - in a UK Ford factory

2.4 Post-Fordist design
Contents list

By 1980, the Ford Motor Company itself was losing huge sums of money and market share, especially to Japanese competitors. Selected Ford managers were sent
to Japan with sharp pencils and notebooks. They bought a stake in Mazda and discovered that the Fordist system of mass production, named after their founder,
had been overtaken by a new system, which came to be known as lean production. Compared with mass production, it required 40% less effort and resulted
in products of superior quality. The Ford Motor Company adopted as many lean production principles as it could. Since then, people have been talking about
post-Fordism in the same breath as postmodernism. Reflecting on how the company changed between 1980 and 1990, Fords director of strategy observed that:

We had to stop designing cars we liked and start designing cars the customers liked. The Japanese had teamwork. We had macho designers who found it difficult
to sublimate their own ideas to the new realities. (Sunday Times, 1994)

The design teams brought rough and smooth hands together.

Between 1960 and 1980, Japans share of world automobile production rose from 3% to 30%. Initially, Western companies attributed the growth to low wages
and hard work. No doubt these factors played their part but, eventually, it became apparent that the main factor was their new approach to planning, design
and manufacture. Lean production is lean in the use of energy, time and materials. Parts are delivered Just-in-Time, instead of being stockpiled. Manufacturing
faults are identified at once and the cause is traced. Operational faults are reported to the factory and the cause is traced. Production workers, salesmen
and consumers all participate in the ongoing task of product improvement and design. Thought, by everyone involved, takes the place of waste.

The MIT study of car manufacture, on which the above account is based, also looked at the design and planning process (Womack, 1990). The following differences
were found between the two systems.

Design for mass production:
The design team starts small and expands (as staff are brought in to solve problems).
Design team membership varies from week to week.
Master plans are completed before component designs.
Component manufacturers work to drawings and specifications issued by the design team.
Planners and designers lack production line experience.
Customer feedback comes from market research studies.
The team leader is a powerless coordinator, seeking the agreement of all parties.

Design for lean production:
The design team starts large and contracts (as problems are solved).
The design team is dedicated and tightly knit.
Master plans are developed in parallel with component designs.
Component manufacturers are full members of the design team.
All planners and designers have experience on the production line.
Customer feedback comes from car salesmen and car users.
The team leader is a powerful boss, seeking the agreement of all parties.

Lean design and planning are more knowledge-intensive, less hierarchical and less demarcated. Everyones experience and judgement is brought into the planning
and design process. This includes customers, garage workers, production workers with experience of decision-making and decision-makers with experience
on the production line. Despite the profusion of knowledge in books, lack of knowledge is the greatest drawback to the smooth-hands approach. You can learn
much about the behaviour of steel, timber, brick and stone from books, but there is a great deal more that can be learned only by touching and using materials.
You can also learn much about indoor and outdoor space in books, but there is a great deal more that can be learned only by knowing and using real places.
Edwin Lutyens ability to make good gardens was limited by his lack of interest in using gardens. First-hand knowledge comes from living in a place, driving
a car or making a car.

In a lean production company, the MIT team asked to meet one of the directors, at the Honda plant in Ohio. "He was unavailable, we were told: he had just
joined the company and was busy assembling cars (Womack, 1990). In a mass production company, the MIT investigators found an engineer who had spent his
whole career designing doorlocks without ever learning how to make a doorlock. Even knowing how to make doorlocks was the job of another engineer - not
a craftsman. The large initial size of the lean design team signifies the assembly of knowledge, both practical and theoretical. The small initial size
of the mass production design team signifies the focus on abstract knowledge.

The leadership role is crucial. In lean planning and design:

The shusa is simply the boss, the leader of the team whose job it is to design and engineer a new product and get it fully into production. In the best
Japanese companies the position of shusa carries great power and is, perhaps, the most coveted in the company. True, employees may seek the position as
a stepping-stone to the top. However, for those who truly love to make things, the job brings extraordinary satisfaction. In fact, its the best position
in the modern world from which to orchestrate all the skills needed to make a wonderfully complex manufactured product, such as the automobile, come into
being. One might even say that the shusa is the new supercraftsman, directing a process that now requires far too many skills for any one person to master...
in an era when the skills involved are not so much technical as social and organizational. (Womack, 1990)

Lean design has similarities to the way in which medieval cathedrals were made. A powerful master-craftsman controlled the whole project, while specialists
had power to decide upon and regulate their own work. This is one of the things that
Ruskin
and
Morris
admired about medieval architecture. They hated industrialization, but as factories become more automated, the whole production process may become more
like cathedral building. When the ultimate black-box factory is built, the lights will be switched off, the machinery switched on and the plant left to
churn out products so long as they are wanted.

Ford bought a stake in Mazda

2.5 Fordism and the built environment
Contents list

Current design and planning practice in the built environment professions retains a disastrous similarity to Fordist production arrangements. The knowledge
employed is abstract knowledge, gained in colleges. Professionals are "advisers, not managers. The public are "consultees, not planners. The design process
begins with a big idea, traditionally scribbled on the back of an envelope. It is then passed down the design team, with more and more junior people checking
the final details. At the "coalface, on construction sites, workers are treated as indifferent automatons. They must obey written specifications, drawings
and regulations, often drafted by people without practical experience of doing the job. Management contracting, and design-and-build, are bringing about
changes, but component designers and clients still have little prospect of becoming involved.

Nor do users of places and buildings have anything but a marginal role in the design process, even if they are the owners, which is never the case for bridges,
public parks, mass housing, or speculative office developments. As with design for mass production, design teams for built environment projects tend to
start small and expand. Once formulated, the plans are submitted to municipal authorities, modified and agreed. When such plans are implemented, they often
run into stiff opposition. "Why werent we consulted? everyone wants to know. The technically correct reply, that "You elected the people who hired the
people who took the decisions, gives little comfort. It is Fordist autocracy. Henry took all the decisions himself. Lean design thrusts as many decisions
as possible onto the shoulders of the workforce and the users. It deconstructs the Fordist hierarchy. It is knowledge-intensive instead of resource-intensive.

Back-of-envelope design

The back of an enveolpe was the classic place to start a 20th century design project

2.6 Knowledge-intensive planning
Contents list

Planners have responded to the public outcry against road building and other plans with offers of "public participation in planning. The idea is excellent.
The practice is usually deficient. At worst, planners give an impression of treating the public according to the disdainful motto: "They say. What do they
say? Let them say. At best, planners have shown skill in drawing fresh ideas from the public and putting them to work. Public participation can operate
in several ways: advisory committees, written comment, public debate and design workshops. Each has value. Each can be criticized.

Advisory committees can work in parallel with public committees, as in Germany and Holland. Authorities generally have subsidiary committees, of elected
members, dealing with planning, parks, housing etc. Each is paralleled with an advisory committee. It is a good way of expanding the knowledge base for
decision making. The difficulty lies in choosing the advisors. If they are professionally qualified in the subject, they will be an interest group. If
they are volunteers, they will be unrepresentative. If they are elected, they will come under the sway of political parties. Normally, they will lack knowledge,
and the decision-making process can become very lengthy.

Written comments can be invited on draft plans. A leaflet can be circulated or an exhibition mounted. The public can be invited to write letters and complete
questionnaires. Sometimes, they receive written answers. Letters produce a good opportunity for individuals to let off steam but, generally, do not lead
to constructive improvements. Too often, the minorities oppose one another. This leaves planners with the satisfying delusion that they have "conducted
the orchestra and reached a balanced compromise.

Public debate can take place after the planners have given an account of their proposals. This allows people who are happier talking than writing to make
a contribution, but the results are similar to exercises in written consultation. It too often seems that planners listen to what is said, as a formality,
and then do what they intended in the first place. This is not necessarily the planners intention, but it is the impression received by the public.

Design workshops can be enjoyable and productive (Figure 2.5). Public meetings are held. The planners come with open minds, large-scale models, white paper
and fat pens. Members of the public put forward ideas, which are drawn on paper and then countered with other ideas. Such sessions can be very creative
yet unrealistic. With idealism in the air, it is too easy to ignore economic realities and entrenched interests.

So what should be done? Use all the methods? Reject all the methods? Devise new methods? Each solution is workable, provided it brings together those with
both rough and smooth hands: clients, owners, builders, component-makers, designers, planners and maintenance workers. For architecture, Hassan Fathy wrote
of re-establishing "the Trinity:

Client, architect; and craftsman, each in his province, must make decisions, and if any one of them abdicates his responsibility, the design will suffer
and the role of architecture in the cultural growth and development of the whole people will be diminished. (Fathy, 1973)

But for the environment, who is "the client? This is a central problem. For a private house, the client is the building owner. For speculative housing,
shops and offices, the client is hydra-headed: financiers, insurance companies, property managers and, at the far end of a long list, those who merely
spend their lives using the places. For transport schemes, too, there are many clients with divergent interests. When cycling, I want a vastly better provision
of segregated cycle tracks. When driving, I can be heard muttering "Bloody cyclists. When walking, I feel threatened by cyclists on footpaths, and hostile
to smug car drivers in comfortable seats pumping noxious fumes into my face. So what happens during public participation in planning? I am torn in three
directions and have little to contribute.

2.5 A community planning exercise

2.7 Designing a resort in Hawaii
Contents list

A resort development can be used to illustrate Fordist and knowledge-intensive approaches to planning and design (Landscape Institute, 1990). The Hyatt
Waikoloa is a typical American resort development, in Hawaii. It cost $350 million and has 1200 rooms. The project was designed in California. The Hawaii
coastline was reshaped. Different transport systems were made to offer "ways to your room via monorail, grand canal boats, coronation carriages pulled
by Clydesdale horses, or a moving sidewalk which offers the visitor a trip through Polynesian history. It was a Fordist project.
Hyatt Waikoloa
went bust in 1993.

Also in Hawaii, a Japanese company was planning to develop a post-Fordist resort. Two years were spent on community participation before design work began.
A further year was spent preparing and modifying design concepts. In consequence of this effort, the resort was planned to revitalize a depressed economy,
to support local agriculture, to build affordable new housing, to improve local healthcare facilities, to improve public access to the environment, to
conserve the local heritage, to establish forest preserves, to develop local industry. The resort itself was developed as a series of small buildings in
a style that was inspired by "the traditional regional style of Kohale characterized by courtyards, verandas, open rooms with gracious overhangs. I have
not been to Hawaii, but I know which resort I would book into.

Effective public participation depends upon recognizing that there are many clients and many problems. Instead of a plan, we need many plans. This is the
planning equivalent of lean production. Each specialist planning team should be for a component system. Each should have a shusa, charged with integrating
all the financial, technical and aesthetic considerations. Assuredly, such plans will reflect the diverse economic and social character of different buildings,
resorts, towns and regions.

When specialist plans have been prepared, it would be possible to go back to work on general plans. But what areas of land should they cover? Places are
not automobiles. Specialist interests have their own geographies (Figure 2.6). Few coincide with municipal boundaries, and few are represented within municipal
committee structures. To cater for my personal transport needs, there needs to be a pedestrian plan, drawn up by pedestrians, a cycling plan, drawn up
by cyclists, and a road plan, drawn up by drivers. Divergent interests cannot be fully resolved, but compromises are possible, if and when the component
plans exist. Should there be only one plan, it will excessively favour one group, usually the group with the big bucks. Instead of an agreed city plan,
societies require sets of "landscape plans, each produced for a special region from a special perspective.

Fig 2.6 (below) Specialist interests have their own geographies – and they do not co-incide with municipal boundaries

Hawaii beach

Hawaii beach

2.8 Planning Londons river landscape
Contents list

The Effra, one of Londons lost rivers joins the River Thames at this point.

2.7 The River Thames has lots its small boats, traders, animals and ferries - through planning.

Canalettos painting of boats on the Thames at Greenwich (excerpt)

Take the case of Londons rivers. Neither town planners nor river engineers have sufficient knowledge, sufficient power or sufficient wisdom to produce
the necessary plans. Most rivers have therefore been culverted, channelized and degraded into open sewers by those with the big budgets (Figure 7). Watercourses
now need massive reclamation programmes, to bring them back to the dignity of rivers. Some work is being done on making them into nature reserves, which
is not enough. River planning requires cooperation between many bureaucracies and voluntary bodies. Britains National Rivers Authority cannot do its job
without the help of community groups and planners. A time must come when Bartons heart-rending book, The Lost Rivers of London (Barton, 1962) will be
followed by its necessary sequel: How we won the rivers back. The River Thames must be rejuvenated. As in days of yore, and Canaletto, it should be crowded
with animals, small boats, traders, floating restaurants, flowerships and ferries (Figure 2.7). There should be beaches and habitats on the banks. This
requires multi-purpose planning and non-statutory planning, extending well beyond the margins of the river. The Pool of London, once the greatest port
in the world, now almost dead, should be declared a waterpark and nature reserve. Open spaces need not be dry.

Specialist planning and design teams can be led by artists, planners, businessmen, architects, poets, landscape architects, politicians and surveyors. Alternative
planning and design methods should be employed, according to circumstances. Extensive community, private and voluntary planning should take place, not
mere "public participation in planning. Wise plans, which may conflict, will be required: some for rivers, some for greenspace, some for pedestrians,
some for boroughs, some for groups of boroughs, some for street corners, some for London, some for the Dover to Bristol Edge City, some for the Calais-Folkestone
Economic Zone, some for the areas around suburban stations in Washington DC. Planning competitions and exhibitions should be held, with prizes. Assistance
from professional planners will be required. All the plans should be stored in geographical information systems.

Countries are unlikely to get plans of the necessary imaginative quality from downtrodden bureaucracies, even if their staffs contain brilliant and committed
people, as they undoubtedly do. The fatal disease, which Parkinson named Injelititis, overwhelms forward planning departments. The inventor of Parkinsons
Law named the disease and proposed a cure:

No portion of the old and diseased foundation can be regarded as free from infection. No staff, no equipment, no tradition must be removed from the original
site. Strict quarantine should be followed by complete disinfection. Infected personnel should be dispatched with a warm testimonial to such rival institutions
as are regarded with particular hostility. All equipment and files should be destroyed without hesitation. As for the buildings, the best plan is to insure
them heavily and then set them alight. Only when the site is a blackened ruin can we feel certain that the germs of the disease are dead. (Northcote Parkinson,
1959)

He exaggerated, no doubt. But it is only by drastic means that the regeneration of "town and "country planning will be accomplished. Far-sighted and imaginative
plans require a shusa. This was Abercrombies role in the 1943-44 London plans (London County Council, 1943, 1944). His plan had excellent qualities but
fell short through aiming at comprehensiveness.

Planners have felt themselves to be under attack since "one way, one truth modernism became questioned. My hope is that by producing varied plans that
are better, more useful, more client-oriented, and more knowledge-intensive, it will be possible to raise the popularity of planning and, incidentally,
to improve employment prospects for planners. As car firms throughout the world adopt the principles of lean planning and lean production, they are producing
better products at lower prices with happier staff. Planners and designers need to follow these paths.

Modernist planning

Warming Trends does all of our manufacturing here right on site at our headquarters in Denver, Colorado. If you can dream up a design, we can build it! Here, Steven, Head of Manufacturing Operations, measures, cuts and welds a custom sidewall to a aluminum fire pit pan.

When the landscape designer