Perception in the rural designing within the rural New Zealand landscape

Abstract

This project explores how perception can be used to facilitate design within the rural landscape of New Zealand. From the earliest days of European settlement, the environmental history of New Zealand's rural landscapes has been a record of confrontation of image and reality. Historically ideas on Landscape have been painted, and through this, societies form landscape taste and values. When European settlers came to New Zealand they used these perceptions when forming their landscapes and this explains how they transformed from wild wilderness to what we see today.

The current theory on landscape perception is that it is necessary to gain a better understanding of people's values and landscape tastes when designing in these landscapes . It is not simply a matter of imposing any design on these communities as they will not be embraced. This is the key to sustaining new landscape ideas as scenic perception of landscape is divorced from an understanding of ecological processes.

This project reveals that If landscape architects understand what underpins aesthetic preferences in terms of perception and respond with a creative articulation of environmentally sustainable landscape designs, in a way which allows people to maintain a connection with it, the land­ scape will be more resilient. For landscape architecture , it represents a challenge to the popular preferences for the ornamental , groomed and controlled landscapes which reflected the legacy of designers such as Capability Brown and Frederick Law Olmsted.

Project site: South Head Kaipara, north of Helensville.