Famous Landscape Design Plans

Central Park

• Central Park is located on 843 acres in New York City. The park was designed by Frederick Law Olmstead, who created a pastoral landscape, with extensive construction of features that look natural. One of its most successful innovations was a circulation plan that separated pedestrian and carriage traffic.

  Central Park was the first urban landscaped park in the United States.In 1963 it was registered as a National Historic Landmark, for its role in encouraging the urban park movement, and as "an outstanding example of the art of landscape architecture".

Home Grounds

• The residential gardens of Thomas Church viewed the outdoor landscape as an extension of the house. This relaxed approach became known as "California style". Believing that gardens were for people to use, Church provided features like patios and pools that draw people outdoors. Church designed thousands of gardens using his principles of scale, functionality, simplicity and unity. His theories continue to resonate in contemporary residential landscape design.

Gertrude Jekyll

• Contemporary landscape design owes much to Gertrude Jekyll, an English garden designer who brought an artistic sensibility to her planting plans. Jekyll used plant material as her medium, and incorporated natural settings into the composition. She designed hundreds of gardens on both sides of the Atlantic, in partnership with architect Edwin Lutyens.

  Jekyll's principles of creating outdoor rooms in the landscape and harmonizing plantings with formal architecture inspired North American designers like Olmstead and Church.

Vietnam Veterans Memorial

• The Vietnam Veterans Memorial site, designed by architect Maya Lin, was conceived as a park within a park. Black granite walls reflect the surrounding landscape and the people searching for names set out chronologically. The two walls meet in a V, and point to the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial. Lin's design was a radical departure in its simplicity from the traditional memorial sculpture, and offers a powerful experience for visitors.