Today, let’s time travel around 500 years ago. I know, history is boring, blah blah blah, I get it. That’s what I thought too, before learning about how the French Renaissance influenced our landscapes today. Think of any modern landscape (park, memorial, a place on campus, or even your own backyard.) It probably has neatly trimmed plants arranges in neat rows or something of the like. But the ideal, widely-recognized “neatness” of modern landscapes has to come from somewhere, right?
Most people have heard of Renée DesCartes, the French philosopher, mathematician, and scientist who gave birth to the “Cartesian” way of thinking with the infamous quote, “I think, therefore I am.” The Cartesian Self is the separation of mind and body (wild tangent, but please watch The Matrix), which implies that humans are masters of everything around them. This new way of thinking gives humans a controlling hand in nature, and results in the intense manipulation and exploitation of nature.
This is why a lot of French Renaissance landscape architecture features moats and large, flat bodies of water in non-organic shapes like rectangles; intricately maintained parterres and shaped vegetation; and elements arranged on an axis, pointing to monumental structures. Let’s take a look at two famous sites from the French Renaissance.
Vaux le Vicomte is a hot spot for tourists. Built in 1661 for Nicholas Fourquet by Andre le Notre, this summer home is a sight to see with many typical features of the French Renaissance. In the picture below, it’s easy to see the intense control of nature through the expansive parterres flaunting sharp, clean edges with intricate designs, and multiple pools and fountains. Everything is built on an axis, resulting in neat bilateral symmetry and heavy emphasis on the actual house. All these elements together bring a dramatic flair to the estate, as it was a party house and it was practically illegal to be boring in the time period.
After this successful project, Andre le Notre went on to design Versailles for the Sun King (Louis XIV) who obviously wanted to assert his dominance as a ruler. Imagine the estate above, but times ten in every aspect…including the control of nature and want for dominance and power. Along with the precisely trimmed patterns of green, the orderly placed trees, and large pool of water are several design choices that scream for attention. Among them is the impressive fountain engineering, which used 250 pumps to shoot water upstream into the chateau with 500 feet of vertical elevation in order to supply over 1400 fountains for 130 years. If that doesn’t show an overwhelming control of nature, I don’t know what will!
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