But it is also a way of thinking that goes beyond all of these things. By studying landscape design, you will begin to see the world differently, to think about problems differently, to evaluate relationships between things differently. You will stop focusing on creating things, and instead focus on developing your judgment. When I think about teaching design, this is what I want my students to take away.
You will begin to see the world as full of conditions that influence the suitability of a response: why that building looks good there; why this plant should be grown here. And once you see those conditions, you will also see that the conditions themselves change based on other conditions, and so on and so forth. You will learn to observe these conditions, and adjust your response to them. And then you will learn to do it again. And again. And again. And as you do it more and more, you will begin to see everything in your life in this way, not just the landscapes.
So how do I try to facilitate this way of thinking? First, by never giving them an easy way out. Never telling them that a certain color always goes with a certain other color, or that a particular plant is always good in these conditions. I want them to learn to ask why, to evaluate, to think about sequences and consequences. Why does this solution feel right? Why does this one feel forced? What is different about them? We want them to develop mental models that will serve them long after they forget about the graphic software we used to draw our designs.
As this develops, we see students begin to design in a way that is less loud and more assured. They don’t have to explain as much anymore, because the space simply makes sense. And that is the real goal of design, right? To make spaces that seem inevitable. As if it could not have been any other way. But it is not an accident. It is the result of attention and careful reasoning and judgment.
And as this way of thinking develops further, we see students begin to approach complexity in a different way. Instead of trying to control it, by reducing it to its most simple parts, they begin to embrace it. They learn to love the interdependencies and the uncertainties. They begin to design resilient systems, and flexible ones. They begin to respect that landscapes are not theirs to control. This is what I mean by learning to think like a designer. It’s not just about making pretty pictures, although those are lovely. It’s about cultivating a way of observing and evaluating and responding to the world around us. And that is something that will stay with my students for the rest of their lives.