6o LANDSCAPE DESIGN 



himself with the typical forms occurring in each style and considers 

 how these forms will serve and express the economic uses of his own 



designs. 

 Choice of In studying styles which we may wish to adapt to our own needs, 



^'^^^ we should therefore try to discover their creating factors, that is, we 



should study the history and characteristics of the people who originated 

 them, their purposes, the surroundings in which the work was done, 

 and the various materials used, because if these conditions are not 

 paralleled in new work after that style, the work is apt to be both in- 

 congruous and inconvenient. Indeed, the very perfection of a design 

 meeting one set of conditions, may make it unfit for other conditions, 

 and hard to change in parts without destroying the unity of the whole. 

 In the matter of suitability of a design in a certain style to its land- 

 scape surroundings, it is hardly possible to draw any general conclusions. 

 An Italian villa is definitely separated from the country about it, an 

 English landscape scheme blends into its surroundings by imperceptible 

 degrees. Whether in a new case harmony or contrast would be 

 more desirable, only a study of the individual new problem will tell. 

 In matters of association, however, the harmony or contrast of a certain 

 style with its surroundings is reasonably predictable. A perfect copy 

 of an Italian villa set down upon a New England hillside would prob- 

 ably seem, at least to any one familiar with Italy, incongruous, purely 

 through the tremendous difference in association between the scheme 

 and the surrounding landscape, but if an Italian scheme without 

 essential difference of organization were worked out in New England 

 in local material and planted with local trees, no particular associa- 

 tional incongruity might result. The great variety of climate, topog- 

 raphy, and plant materials and the different nationalities which have 

 contributed to our population suggest to us a wide range of inspiration 

 from the styles of other countries. 



Practical considerations of construction and upkeep will of course 

 play an important part in determining the choice of style. A style 

 which depends for its beauty on delicate detail and elaborate ornament 

 cannot be adapted to an inexpensive scheme. A style which, although 

 in its original it bears such detail, depends for its essential effect on 

 boldness and solidity of mass, may perhaps be successfully translated 



