Genius Loci - Spirit of Place
. We believe that the world in which we all inhabit is special. That the higher ecological balances need to be sustained for future generations of people, plants and animals. That life on earth is but a passing ‘journey’ to be made the most of by travelling lightly and considerately, and by putting back more than we take away.
. We really care about the environment in which we live. We want to design places that people will love to use. We also want to create places that are sustainable and in balance with natural processes. It is the excitement of seeing our Masterplan’s and designs become reality that excites us. Seeing people happy in places that we planned and designed, co-existing with nature is a measure of our success and is what gets us out of bed in the morning. The fact that people really care about what we create is our passion.
. We strive to make our designs as successful and beautiful as they possibly can be. To do this we believe in challenging the status quo. We challenge ourselves every day in all the design work that we undertake. We do this is by endeavouring to make all our designs as elegant, functional and sustainable as possible. We are continuously searching for new innovations and inspirations to build our visions. And work closely with clients to bring fully considered designs that address the mission of the project to fruition.
. We take pride in championing public art and integrating craft into the fabric of the public realm.
. Many schemes on which we work are complex with historic, urban and environmental design challenges. Social, environmental and economic issues go hand in hand with this and we believe it is our job to achieve an outcome that addresses these factors in a sustainable and contemporary manner. We genuinely believe that the art of good design is not what more you can add in but what can be removed or be left untouched without affecting the essence of the design or the history and ‘Spirit of Place’ in which it is created.
Landscape Architecture deals with man and land, and the stories they tell about one another. We need to listen to the stories and continue the tale, allowing the memory and imagination of what has gone before to inspire fresh design in the evolving pattern.
(Iteriad)
‘Land is not land alone, something that simply is itself. Land partakes of what we breathe into it, is touched by our moods and our memories.’
(VS Naipaul, The Enigma of Arrival)
It is vain to dream of a wilderness distant from ourselves. There is none such. It is the bog in our brain and bowels, the primitive vigour of Nature in us, that inspires our dreams!’
(Thoreau)
‘I have felt at times, and perhaps this is a kind of delirium, no gap between me and the place. I have absorbed it and been absorbed by it, as if I have had no existence apart from it. I have been shaped by those island times, and find it difficult now to achieve any kind of distance from them. The place has entered me. It has coloured my life like a stain.
(Adam Nicolson, Sea Room)
‘People have often been happy here and the walls have absorbed some of that delight.’
(Adam Nicolson, Sea Room)
‘The landscape is not seen for itself, but as a commentary upon the human condition, as a speculation upon the tension between order and disorder.’
(JMW Turner)
‘One cannot understand the English landscape and enjoy it to the full, apprehend all its wonderful variety from region to region…without going back to the history that lies behind it.’
(William Hoskins)
‘A specific geographical understanding…….resides with men and women more or less sworn to a place, who abide there, who have a feel for the soil and the history, for the turn of the leaves and night sounds.’
(Barry Lopez)