Geoffrey Jellicoe lecture on the relationship of landscape architecture to architecture

Lecturing on the relationship of landscape architecture to architecture,  Jellicoe explains why these arts are ‘interlocked’. He describes Landscape Architecture as ‘the most comprehensive of the arts’ and Architecture as ‘the noblest of the arts’. ‘Noble’ is an interesting adjective. Jellicoe probably used it in the OED sense ‘Of a person or people: illustrious or distinguished by virtue of position, character, or exploits’. When sites are developed, buildings do tend to be the most prominent features ‘by virtue of position or character’ but are, of course, only one element in landscape composition. We now appreciate that landscape architecture, rather than architecture, is ‘the mother of the arts’.

Geoffrey Jellicoe’s Studies in landscape design are brilliant examples of how to explain the art of landscape architecture and explanation is one the things landscape architecture most needs.  I see this video as a small supplement to the Studies. It is a recording, with new illustrations,  of a lecture Jellicoe gave to a group of students in 1982. He discusses the relationship between landscape architecture and architecture while talking about four of the design projects he was then working on, one in England, one in Texas and two in Italy. Sadly, only Sutton Place was implemented – and only in part. I am sorry about the quality of my tape recording which I decided to publish after 35 years in my attic.

The video throws light on three important points

1. Jellicoe’s approach was post-modern. I argued in an essay on Jellicoe and the subconscious that this was so at least from the 1930’s. Skipping modernism, he moved from the classicism he learned at the AA to a post-modernism first seen in his Cheddar Caves project.
2. Jellicoe saw the Kennedy Memorial design as the turning point in his career, when he recognised the place of the subconscious in his work
3. Jellicoe anticipated the approach now described as ‘landscape urbanism‘ with the following comments on his project for Modena: ‘we take something perfectly ordinary… and make it into something much greater… we are beginning to build up the grandeur of landscape in relation to our region. And now we come on to what I think is the most interesting thing in the history of landscape. The mayor wanted it so much that he actually came to see me in London… he made it clear that they want this to be a landscape conception and not an architectural conception’.

This is surprisingly close to the approach now advocated by James Corner and Charles Waldheim: landscape concepts, rather than architectural concepts, should lead urban design.

See also: more Geoffrey Jellicoe videos