Last week I traveled to Hodges Gardens to ground truth, or field-check, a map of the landscape. The map is an undated and minimally labeled drawing I discovered a few months ago in the Hodges Foundation Archive. Given a few clues on the early development of the Garden, it’s safe to conclude the drawing is not a site masterplan from the design phase.
The map covers all of the Main Gardens, Visitor Center/Parking areas, as well as Willow Point and over to the Butterfly Garden near the Lakeside Amphitheatre. As part of the documentation process, a priority has been to compare this map to current conditions on the ground to assist in the process of analyzing the landscape’s recent change over time.
The coral colored rectangle in the above comprehensive map notes the area of interest expanded in the image below. Source: Hodges Foundation Archive.
Current and historic images, as well as historic drawings may help with dating the map. For example: when an item (or shape/form) whose known date of installation is identified on the map, it can generally be figured that the map was probably produced after the date of the given element’s establishment. Similarly, if an item of known installation date is vacant from the map, it is likely that the map was produced before that element was established in the landscape. Given enough of these types of clues, a date can be estimated for the map/plan.
Exceptions and flaws to the method exist: suppose an existing item were purposefully omitted from a map. Still, the simple process can be pretty accurate and very helpful in better understanding and using an unlabeled map. [Along other lines, historic photographs can also be roughly dated using similar clues]. This kind of information is essential to historic landscape planning.
The arrow above marks the intersection where two (2) elements were recognized as being established in different time periods. Walkway 1, which is also noted in Figure B below, was recognized as a later addition to the landscape. In this case, Walkway 1 was absent from the map; I penciled it in to depict existing conditions, as shown above.
Much of the Hodges Gardens map held true to the shape of the landscape today. However, I was able to update a few things–including the addition of a few current-day walkways. The example in the image below was fairly easy to identify as a later addition to the landscape. Notice both the change in material (similar but different) and also the angles connecting the paths in the intersection–both of which suggest the two paths were created at separate times.
Of course, a change in material doesn’t always suggest a different time period: such changes can be design decisions on paper before initial installation even begins (say, a clear transition from concrete to stone). In the case below though, it is pretty evident that the later addition is attempting to imitate the other material; an exercise that would usually and controversially be employed only with a later addition.
The arrow in this present-day photograph marks the intersection shown in plan view in the above map.
This photograph focuses on the intersection marked by arrows in the above images. Item 1 marks the later addition that I penciled in to the above map. Walkway 2 is the primary pedestrian circulation route at this intersection.
Another view of the intersection as discussed above. Note the lines/angle connecting the two walkways. This unique form in the landscape suggested that one element was a later addition.
Exploring Hodges Gardens 