Memory of the Designed LandscapeMemory of the Designed Landscape

Within the programme, the impetus is given to a jointly supported and future-proof perspective on the unique history of the designed landscape. This focuses not only on preserving, sharing and interpreting the important archives, but also on using them in future design assignments and preserving the cultural-historical values of gardens and landscapes.

A programmatic approach makes it possible to work step by step towards a long-term perspective for garden and landscape archives. It focuses primarily on exploring the possible contours of a method for valuing and selecting garden and landscape architecture archives, and the associated network. In order to explore the possible forms of such a network and archive, the programme is organised around concrete case studies.

The programmatic process provides several concrete case studies of different archives and archival approaches, ranging from an existing archive that urgently needs to find a home to an archive that has yet to be formed by bringing together several sub-archives. The cases each have their own scale and approach, a specific network and type of archive material. They each deal with specific aspects of the content-related, methodological and strategic aspects of the archive issue.

The case studies represent the diversity of archives that characterize the landscape: an active firm with a living archive, a dissolved firm with a fragmented and disappearing archive, a municipal archive, and an archive of a spatial project encompassing multiple provinces. In each case, we worked with a team of independent researchers to investigate potential solutions for acquisition, collection, and accessibility. This team consisted of Marlies Brinkhuijsen, Imke van Hellemondt, Andrea Prins, and Lara Voerman.

The choice for a decentralised network form builds on the organically grown infrastructure of archives. A network, as a sum of actors from different sectors and groups in society, does not yet exist. This is why the programme will initially focus on consolidating the connections that arose at the time of the initial inventory, in which a clear commitment and consensus has been established. But the network should equally represent the voices of other actors involved in the creation of gardens and landscapes.

On 15 November 2024, Youssef Louakili of the Ministry of OC&W received the advisory report Memory of the Designed Landscape. On this occasion, he indicated that OC&W wants to facilitate a follow-up study, in which the recommendations from the report would serve as guidelines.

In addition to this written report, a physical presentation was made as part of the exhibition Garden Futures, on show at the Nieuwe Instituut from 15 November 2024 to 13 April 2025. Together, they form the conclusion of the Programme.

Through four real-life cases, we see how diverse garden and landscape archives can be, each with their own challenges and opportunities for management and conservation. For this presentation, photographer Johannes Schwartz visited eight archives across the country. The result is a photo series that gives a first-hand insight into the state of the archives, some of which are endangered or wandering. Filmmaker Luc Schraauwers made a series of portraits of the four case studies.