Between landschaft and landskip : examining the landscape urbanism discourse through post-infrastructural open space projects in Berlin

Abstract

This research examines how post-infrastructural open space has been approached in contemporary design practice using three urban parks in Berlin as sites for investigation: Tempelhofer Feld, Park am Gleisdreieck, and Natur-Park Schöneberger Südgelände. These sites are analyzed in juxtaposition with the discourse around "landscape urbanism," as these projects' timelines are dispersed across the beginning, rise, and plateau of that movement. First, I have tracked how landscape urbanism has been discussed in the literature since its coinage -- what terms are used most frequently within the discourse and in what manner, which projects are most often called upon to illustrate central themes, and what theoretical building blocks are used in support of the concept. I then pull out specific themes prevalent in the literature that help to construct a method for analyzing the three aforementioned open spaces: how the historically dichotomized conceptions of "urban" and "nature" are approached in each space by examining edge conditions in relation to their surrounding urban fabric, how time and process are considered in each site's staging of new programmatic interventions, and how the sites incorporate elements of previous infrastructural use, including relics and ruins. This section contains a series of drawings, diagrams, and annotated photographs illustrating this analysis, along with experiential observations and timelines describing the development process in each sites transformation from infrastructure to open space. The critique explores how the theoretical discourse around landscape urbanism has engaged built projects and why such an examination is critical as the larger discipline continues to evolve and reorient.