"Can Pastoral Beauty Heal the Mind?" Therapeutic Landscapes in Psychiatric Hospitals

Image of Naumkeg Orchard courtesy Henry Domke Fine Art

Jane Roy Brown's article, "Can Pastoral Beauty Heal the Mind" in this year's Library of American Landscape History's annual journal, View, caught my eye last week. In two pithy pages (pp. 11-12), Brown provides an overview of the history of Northern State Hospital in Washington, a psychiatric hospital built at the turn of the twentieth century. The 227-acre hospital campus, as well as the adjacent 720-acre farm, were designed by John Charles Olmsted (yes, son of Frederick Law) and James Frederick Dawson of the Olmsted Brothers firm between 1910 and 1913.

The landscape architects designed several institutional landscapes, and Northern State Hospital was but one example of the ethos of the time in sanitoria and psychiatric institutions, when fresh air, proximity to and contact with nature, and gardening and farming were thought to be not only beneficial to the patient but in many cases a vital part of treatment. Brown says that "...the property is a rare intact example of an institutional landscape that reflected a Reform-era therapeutic approach to illness and disability, emphasizing the spiritual and moral benefits of nature," (p. 12).

In researching the historic section of my chapter on psychiatric hospitals for Clare Cooper Marcus and Marni Barnes' Healing Gardens: Therapeutic Benefits and Design Recommendations, I came across many such examples, and was intrigued by the cyclical nature of how people view, value, and utilize "nature." Fortunately, we seem to be in another age where people see nature, and the environment (hello, green movement) as something worth working with and fighting for. I do worry sometimes that history will repeat itself and we'll one day turn out backs on nature again, but I'm hoping that perhaps for once, history will not repeat itself, or if it does, it won't be for a long, long time.

In addition to the chapter above, here are a few more good resources; some are already on the Therapeutic Landscapes Network's site (re-launch of new site coming soon!) and some will be added in the near future:

Barnhart, S., N. H. Perkins, and J. FitzSimons (1998). "Behavioural and Setting Preferences at a Psychiatric Hospital." Landscape and Urban Planning, Vol. 42, Nos. 2-4, pp. 147-157.

Gerlach-Spriggs, Nancy, Richard Enoch Kaufmann and Sam Bass Warner, Jr. (1998). Restorative Gardens. See especially the chapter on Friends Hospital

Frangipani's fascinating and beautifully illustrated Flickr post on the Oriental Gardens at Callan Park (or Rozelle Hospital, near Lilyfield, Australia - see this Wikipedia entry for more information).

Hickman, Clare (2006). "Therapeutic Gardens: An Overview of the History of Hospital Gardens in England from 1800." Bristol University, UK. Paper Presented at the Forum UNESCO University and Heritage 10th International Seminar "Cultural Landscapes in the 21st Century."

Kovary, Myra M. (1999). "Healing Landscapes: Design Guidelines for Mental Health Facilities." Master of Landscape Architecture Thesis, Cornell University.

A similar version of Kovary's thesis was published with the same title as Chapter 12 of Shoemaker, Candice A. (Ed.) (2002). Interaction by Design: Bringing People and Plants Together for Health and Well-Being. Ames, Iowa: Iowa State Press.

If you'd like an electronic copy of this thesis, contact the author: mmk29@cornell.edu.

Neuberger, Konrad R. "Horticultural Therapy in a Psychiatric Hospital: Picking the Fruit." Note: I found this pdf on the web, and it's Chapter 34 of ??? Need to do a little digging - no pun intended - to find out what it's Ch. 34 of. If anyone knows, please help me out!

Regnier, Victor (2002). Design for Assisted Living: Guidelines for Housing the Physically and Mentally Ill. New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

And as always, if you know of other good references or resources, please leave a comment.

Nature as Therapy for Hypertension and Other Stress-Related Disorders

Image of dogwood leaves courtesy Henry Domke Fine Art

I met several members of the American Society of Hypertension yesterday, and they were intrigued by the idea of nature as an antidote to stress and, specifically, hypertension. As someone who works in this field every day, I forget that there are lots of people who don't make the connection, other than intuitively ("well sure, every time I work in the garden, I feel better!"), that interaction with nature facilitates good health.

For example, these ASH members were surprised to learn that clinical studies have shown, on a quantitative rather than simply qualitative level, that gardens and other natural landscapes lower blood pressure and heart rate, speed up recovery in hospital patients, increase people's ability to concentrate and recover from stressful situations, and generally increase people's sense of well-being. Many of those positive benefits have to do with lowering stress. And guess what one of the leading causes of hypertension is? You guessed it: Stress! Therefore, it stands to reason that interaction with nature could be an excellent prescription for hypertension and so many of its associated illnesses.

Hypertension is the clinical word for high blood pressure; it is a medical condition in which blood pressure is chronically elevated. It is one of the leading risk factors for a slew of other serious health problems, including strokes, heart attacks and other heart failure, arterial aneurisms, and renal failure.

So just as stress sets up a chain reaction that adversely affects our health, interaction with gardens and other landscapes initiates a positive chain reaction that can ameliorate stress and its domino effect. If that's too simplistic, you can refer to some of the research below for more detailed explanations. And if you have references that aren't below or on the Therapeutic Landscapes Database's References page, we'd love your input. And as always, your comments are welcome.

In Sweden, gardens and horticultural therapy are being used clinically to treat patients with stress-related illnesses such as burnout and chronic fatigue syndrome. Here are two articles about these programs:

Clare Cooper Marcus, "Gardens as Treatment Milieu: Two Swedish Gardens Counteract the Effects of Stress." Landscape Architecture Magazine, Vol. 96, No. 5, May 2006.

Patrick Millet, "Integrating Horticulture into the Vocational Rehabilitation Process of Individuals with Fatigue, Chronic Fatigue, and Burnout: A Theoretical Model." Journal of Therapeutic Horticulture, Vol. 19, 2009, pp. 10-22.

In almost every article and presentation on the benefits of nature, Roger S. Ulrich refers to reduction of stress. Here are just a couple of examples:

Roger S. Ulrich, "Health Benefits of Gardens in Hospitals." Paper for conference, "Plants for People," International Exhibition Floriade, 2002.

Roger S. Ulrich, R. F. Simmons, B. D. Losito, E. Fiorito, M. A. Miles, and M. Zelson, "Stress Recovery During Exposure to Natural Urban Environments." Journal of Environmental Psychology, Vol. 11, 1191, pp. 201-230.

In a blog post from a while back ("How the City Hurts Your Brain - and what you can do about it"), I discussed Stephen and Rachel Kaplans' Attention Restoration Theory (ART), which is one explanation about how interaction with nature reduces stress. Here's a good article about that: "The Cognitive Benefits of Interacting With Nature," by Mark G. Berman, John Jonides, and Stephen Kaplan in Psychological Science, Vol. 19, No. 12, pp. 1207-1212.

Mountain Laurel and Russel Wright

Native mountain laurel (Kalmia latifolia) at Manitoga today

I'm lucky enough to live in the lower Hudson Valley, home - among many other wonderful things - of the Russel Wright Design Center in Garrison, NY. When Wright found the property in 1942, it was a former quarry that had been marred by a century of quarrying and lumbering. He made it his home, and began to "heal" the damaged landscape where he lived and worked. He named the place "Manitoga," which means Place of the Great Spirit in Algonquin. "Over the next three decades, until his death in 1976, he carefully redesigned and re-sculpted Manitoga's 75 acres using native plants, his training as a theater designer and sculptor, and his innovative design ideas. Though the landscape appears natural, it is actually a careful design of native trees, rocks, ferns, mosses, and wild flowers."* (He also built a beautiful house and studio there, and made some pretty cool dishware as well).

My favorite examples of healing gardens are those where the designers have done their part to heal the site, and in so doing, have created a place that restores and rejuvenates us, as well.

It's a beautiful site throughout the year, and when the native mountain laurel is in bloom, it's simply stunning. Wright once said, "When in full bloom, the mountain laurel reminds me of fields of strawberry ice cream." Yum. But of course this wouldn't be the TLDBlog without a caveat, so here goes: Mountain laurel may be beautiful, but it's also quite toxic! Not for planting in gardens for children, the developmentally disabled, and people with dementia. You can read more about what plants use with caution on the Therapeutic Landscapes Database Plants page.

Beech sapling emerging from quarry stone

*Manitoga/The Russel Wright Design Center

More on scent, fragrance, and memory - guest blog post

Image courtesy Henry Domke Fine Art

Wendy Meyer, a recent MLA graduate of the University of Texas at Arlington left such an informative comment on the last blog post on scent as an emotional memory trigger that I thought it was worth printing in its entirety, especially since she provides a link to her thesis, "Persistence of Memory: Scent Gardens for Therapeutic Life Review in Communities for the Elderly."  

"Aha, I finally figured out how to post a comment! I wrote my master's thesis in landscape architecture on this subject--specifically, on using fragrant plants in gardens for elderly people to help conduct reminiscence therapy. There is a ton of new brain science being done on the links between smells, emotions and memories. It turns out that early, emotional autobiographical memories are strongly related to smells, because of the way the brain evolved. I looked at how reminiscence helps older people come to terms with their lives, historic use of scent in gardens as well as history of therapeutic gardens. I also interviewed a group of practitioners for their advice and insights on using scent for therapy in gardens. I got different perspectives from landscape architects who design therapeutic gardens, nurses/therapists who work with elderly populations and horticultural therapists who work in all kinds of settings. One of the recurring themes was the need for everyone involved to work together in creating these gardens--not just garden designers and hospital/nursing home administrators, but the therapy staff, families, patients and (not to be forgotten!) the maintenance staff. I spent two and a half years reading and could have spent lots longer (but I needed to graduate)! You can see the thesis at this link:
http://dspace.uta.edu/bitstream/10106/550/1/umi-uta-1697.pdf. Or if that doesn't work, I'm sending a PDF to the Therapeutic Landscapes Database website."

When I asked Wendy for permission to post this, and mentioned I might use a rose for the image, here's what she had to say: 

"Roses were probably the flower that came up the most--particularly rugosas, because the hips have a distinctive scent--but also lavender, gardenias, rosemary and lilac. People mentioned a lot of scents outside the garden as well--firs in the Northwest, sagebrush after a thunderstorm in the Southwest, crabapple blossoms in Wisconsin. I have a bunch of plant lists in the appendices--that was one of the fun parts to put together!"

Thanks so much, Wendy! 

Garden fragrance as an emotional memory trigger

Lilac image courtesy What Do I Know? blog

Lilacs. Roses. Jasmine. Gardenia. Freshly mown grass. Chaparral. Depending on where you grew up, these scents probably conjure up some pretty powerful emotions and memories. In fact, of the five, our olfactory sense is the strongest emotional memory trigger. According to a recent article in the June '09 issue of Organic Gardening, "That's because the part of our brain responsible for basic memory evolved out of the tissue that makes up the olfactory cortex."  (For a slightly more detailed explanation, see this article on the psychology of scent, "Whisking up a memory with a whiff.") 

For this reason, using plants with fragrant flowers and foliage is an important part of designing the healing garden.* Especially in nursing homes, dementia gardens, and other landscapes for people with memory loss, scent can be very powerful. Consider this story, from Martha M. Tyson's wonderful book The Healing Landscape: Therapeutic Outdoor Environments, about our colleague Vince Healy: 

Vince's grandmother was in her nineties. For quite some time she had not recognized Vince and was not really fully aware of what was going on around her. Since it was Easter time, Vince decided to pay her a visit. During his drive there, Vince came upon a roadside stand that advertised lilacs for sale. In southern California, lilacs do not grow well. This stand, however, had great quantities of them, and they were cheap. So Vince brought an enormous number of the lilacs and put them in the back of his van...By the time Vince arrived at the nursing home, the lilacs were looking very sad. When Vince walked into his grandmother's room, she looked at him as always, blankly, and then she looked at the flowers. "They're wilted! Throw them away!" After all this effort Vince was not about to throw them away, so he moved the lilacs closer, right under her nose. She drew in the fragrance with a deep breath and a sigh and said, "Lilacs...." Then she looked up at Vince and said, "Vinnie, how are you?" 

Gets me every time. But even with less miraculous results, scents that elderly people remember fondly - "old-fashioned" flowers like lilacs, honeysuckle, gardenia, mock orange, roses - can evoke positive feelings and often facilitate conversations, thus providing something important but often lacking in places like nursing homes: Personal connection. Because our sense of smell often decreases as we age, strongly scented plants have a better chance of triggering a reaction than something subtle. I highly recommend Tyson's book for more information, and Clare Cooper Marcus and Marni Barnes' book Healing Gardens: Therapeutic Benefits and Design Recommendations is also valuable, especially the chapters on nursing home gardens (chapter 8) and Alzheimer's treatment gardens (chapter 9). Several other books have been published on gardens for the elderly, including Jack Carman et al's new book Recreating Neighborhoods for Successful Aging (which I don't have yet). If you know of books that specifically address this issue of scent as a memory trigger in healing gardens, I'll add it to our list! 

*One caveat: In some cases, such as with gardens for cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy, even a good scent may be too overwhelming, and even nauseating. I don't know of any specific research on what to steer clear of - if anyone reading this knows, please pass the information my way and I'll list it on the Therapeutic Landscapes Network's website.

Where'd the blogger go?

Image courtesy Henry Domke Fine Art

It's been weeks since the last blog post. I'm sorry. This happened last year, too, because right now, this TLN blogging thing is a one-woman show, and the one woman happens to be frantically busy since spring arrived on the scene. The new Therapeutic Landscapes Network website is getting close to completion, which is very exciting (and very time-consuming). We plan to launch in June. Design work has also picked up - whether that's a sign of a gradually recovering economy or just spring, I'm not sure, but I'm grateful. 

The TLN is also looking for a summer intern! If you or someone you know would like to live in or near Beacon, NY (60 miles north of NYC - an easy ride on the Metro North line) this summer and work (part-time, unpaid) on most aspects of the Therapeutic Landscapes Network, please see our post on the ASLA joblink website. This is a great opportunity to learn about healing gardens and other landscapes that facilitate health and wellness; to learn or hone valuable skills such as writing, research, development, communication, grantwriting, Dreamweaver and HTML, and pretty much anything else that goes on here; and of course to help the TLN grow and thrive. If you're interested, post a comment and we'll get back with you. 

In the meantime, please be patient and stay tuned for the big launch and the TLN offering even more great information and abilities for people to connect and collaborate; we promise it'll be worth the wait!

New book! "Restorative Commons: Creating Health and Well-being through Urban Landscapes"

I'm very excited about this hot-off-the-press book, the result of the 2007 Meristem Forum "Restorative Commons for Community Health." This collection of 18 articles, edited by Lindsay Campbell and Anne Wiesen and published by the U.S. Forest Service Northern Research Station, "...explores human health in relation to the urban environment, drawing attention to sites and programs that utilize restorative design, foster civic stewardship of natural resources, and promote resilient neighborhoods." If you know what the Therapeutic Landscapes Network is about (providing information and education about landscapes that facilitate health and well-being), you know we're all over this one! You can get more information, and request or download a copy of the book, by clicking on this Meristem splashpage.

An "Urban Book Launch" is the first in a series of upcoming events surrounding the book's release. It will be in New York City on Thursday, May 7th at the Sheila C. Johnson Design Center, 66 Fifth Avenue at 13th Street. Book talk from 6-7 PM and book signing from 7-8 PM.

See you there!

Planting the Healing Garden: Medicinal Herbs

Lavender fields image courtesy Oregon Lavender Festival website

One of the most frequently-asked questions at the Therapeutic Landscapes Network is about what grows in a healing garden. Many people assume that a "therapeutic landscape" is a garden filled with herbs grown and harvested for their medicinal properties - in essence, that the healing comes from the plants in the garden. And this is certainly true some of the time (for a more thorough explanation about and definition of healing gardens, therapeutic landscapes, and landscapes for health, see this post and this post). More often, though, a healing garden is simply a garden filled with plants; research has shown that the more heavily planted a garden is, the more restorative it will be. The type of plant seems to be less important, though a variety of flora that stimulates the senses is a good start.

That said, many healing gardens contain at least some medicinal herbs, which are grown for a variety reasons: Their scent, or texture, or aesthetic qualities, or for their symbolism (for example, Topher Delaney designed the Carolyn S. Stolman Healing Garden at the Avon Foundation Breast Center in San Francisco, CA with plants that were traditionally used to treat cancer). Are they always harvested, processed, and used for salutary purposes? Nope. The fact is that especially in a healthcare setting, there often isn't time or knowledge or the right equipment for, say, distilling Echinacea flowers into the tincture that you would use to boost the immune system. Are they beautiful, native, easy-to-maintain flowers that attract butterflies and symbolize health? Absolutely! Do they get harvested to ward off the common cold? Not usually.

The wonderful thing about herbs is their versatility. Lavender, for example, is easy to grow; drought tolerant; beautiful; attracts honeybees; smells wonderful; and is easy to harvest for a variety of uses, including in tea, cooking, baking, and potpourri. Lavender is known for its calming properties, and, if distilled in a tincture, is an excellent anti-bacterial disinfectant.

Some other reasons to grow herbs:

1. Herbs are great for children's gardens because they tend to be easy to grow and are a delight to the senses.

2. Many herbs do well in containers and small spaces, as they don't take up much space and often need less water than other annuals or perennials. For many years, the only gardens I had were herb gardens in pots on steps or front porches.

3. To the delight of gardeners with deer, rabbits, and other ravenous garden invaders, many herbs are not attractive for nibbling. In fact, sometimes they can even act as a deterrent and a "mask" for other more inviting flora.

4. Herbs often do "double duty" as culinary and medicinal herbs. If you have a kitchen garden, you may already be growing medicinal herbs: Rosemary improves memory and circulation and relieves sore throats and gums; peppermint aids digestion and treats sore throats, colds, and toothaches; parsley cures urinary tract infections and also helps to alleviate bad breath; marjoram treats tonsillitis, asthma, and bronchitis; thyme is used to treat gastrointestinal problems as well as sore throats and coughs; lemon balm is calming; basil reduces fever, lowers blood pressure, and is also an analgesic.

Sometimes you don't even have to grow medicinal herbs - you can simply find them in your backyard or woods; those dandelions and pursane plants that are "ruining" your lawn? Think of them (or better yet, use them!) as medicinal herbs and/or delicious, nutritious greens and maybe your grass will look greener on this side (who needs a full-blown victory garden when you can just graze from your weedy lawn, right?). Worried about the stinging nettle at the edge of the garden? Harvest it - carefully! - to treat a whole slew of ailments, as well as for delicious meals like nettle soup.

With any herb, a little research may be needed to find out what part of the plant to use and how to prepare it for use in an herbal remedy. Sometimes it's as simple as harvesting the flowers (chamomile, lavender) or leaves (lemon balm, peppermint) and making tea, other times preparation may be a bit more complex.

There are so many good books and websites about medicinal herbs, but here are a few resources that we list on the Therapeutic Landscapes Database. As the Therapeutic Landscapes Network gears up to launch our new website, we are looking to add to our list. If you know of a great book, website, organization, or garden as resource about medicinal herbs, please share it with us! We will gladly add it. We are also looking for more examples of healthcare gardens and horticultural therapy programs that use specific plant material, including medicinal herbs. Use the comments section at the end of this post to submit suggestions, ideas, and information.

To get you started, here's a nice article from About.com about common medicinal herbs that are easy to grow, harvest, and use, and another one from Medhunters.

And here are a few fairly comprehensive websites to bookmark as references:

Herbs to Herbs

The Herb Research Foundation

Plants for a Future (Includes a 7,000 plant database for US and UK, and they have a book, too. Very impressive!)

Traditional Chinese Medicine Database System

The University of Washington Medicinal Herb Garden

And thanks to WMassHerbGarden on twitter for this recommendation: Growing 101 Herbs That Heal.

Planting the Healing Garden: Bring on the Bees!

This image is courtesy of sciencemuseum.org.uk

I haven't been able to keep up with the regular blog posts lately (hm, same thing happened last spring, I wonder why?), and today is not much of an exception. I'm actually going to direct you to a great article on bumblebees and honeybees on the Fine Gardening website ("Bring the Buzzzzz Back to Your Garden"); it's got some great information about various kinds of bees and what you can plant in your garden to attract them. And here's another great website that I stumbled upon while looking for good bee pictures: The Science Museum's "Bumblebees like it hot."

 

As a landscape designer who specializes in restorative gardens, I have the funny experience of some clients wanting gardens that attract bees, and other clients wanting gardens that don't. After a nasty yellowjacket incident when I was five (involving over 25 of the beasts attacking me after I accidentally stepped on their nest), I've struggled to master my stinging-insect phobia. I can relate to people who would be happy if the bees just stayed away. Nevertheless, I like to educate clients about the fact that honeybees and bumblebees rarely sting (something I've learned from my own gardening experience - I've been stung by many a wasp in my life, but never by a bee), and I also stress the importance of providing food and habitat for our wonderful pollinating friends who've been having a bit of a tough time lately (you can read about Colony Collapse Disorder on many websites and blogs, but here's the Wikipedia article to get you started). Incidentally, beekeeping has really taken off in the past couple of years. A friend in Beacon has a great blog called Beacon Bee, and I've been learning a lot from her. There are even urban beekeepers; in france, they call it "concrete honey."

New ASLA Professional Practice Network: Children's Outdoor Environments

Here's another sign that people are recognizing the importance of outdoor environments for kids: The American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA) recently approved a new Professional Practice Network (PPN) on Children’s Outdoor Environments. The Healthcare and Therapeutic Design and other PPNs have touched on this subject, but it's high time it had its own PPN, so kudos to Jena Ponti, this year's chair, for making it happen. Here's her guest blog post about the new ASLA Children's Outdoor Environments PPN:

"Landscape architects play a critical role in advocating and designing a variety of places for children to play, learn, and develop a relationship with the natural environment to carry with them into adulthood and citizenship.  The movement to (re)connect children with nature has been steadily growing and gaining momentum.  

In a time when children, on average, spend 45 hours a week “plugged in” and less than 30 minutes a week in outdoor unstructured play, our profession has no option but to act.

One exciting step forward is the recent passing of the No Child Left Inside Act H.R. 3036 and S. 1981.  This Act symbolizes recognition on a federal level of the movement to uplift ecological literacy in schools through enhanced environmental education curriculum.  The NCLI Act requires K-12 school systems to strengthen environmental education curriculums, provide teacher training, and provide federal grant money for schools to pay for environmental education.  This Act will provide $100 million a year to support this work in participating school systems."

For more information on the Children’s Outdoor Environments PPN please contact Jena Ponti, RLA at jena@bruceboody.com or click HERE. 

Many thanks to Jena for this guest post, and to A.S. for the photo of his lovely daughter.

Alzheimer's Awareness Perennial Garden

Better Homes & Gardens has teamed up with the Alzheimer's Association to offer an exclusive Alzheimer Awareness Perennial Garden to help champion Alzheimer's research and programs.

The collection of five perennials (echinacea, aster, salvia, phlox, and sedum) in whites and blues creates a beautiful, fragrant display that also attracts butterflies, all while raising awareness about and funding for Alzheimer's disease.

The Alzheimer's Association receives 10% of the gross sales from all Alzheimer's Awareness Perennial Gardens (which sell for $99.95) to support research and services in communities nationwide for people touched by Alzheimer's and related types of dementia. Recipients get a personalized gift card, planting instructions, and a planting plan. 

Nice idea, right? Thanks to Jasmine's Blog for blogging about this first! As she so eloquently put it, "Not only does the garden raise funds for the fight against Alzheimer's, but part of the beauty of the concept is the stress-reduction offered by the pastime of gardening. The Alzheimer's Association hopes that some of the 10 million unpaid caregivers in America will find relaxation through gardening. The kit also makes a beautiful tribute to a loved one."

Alzheimer's Association conference in Houston, May 1st

Image of hawthorne blossoms courtesy of Lotus Petal's Flickr page. 

Hawthorne is considered to be a good herb to improve 

memory and mental alertness. Learn more on this website.

Mark your calendars for the Alzheimer's Association's Schlicting Education Conference for Professionals, May 1st, 2009 in Houston, TX. This announcement came through someone who's interested in therapeutic landscapes, so imagine the conference will have some component about outdoor space. Find out more by visiting this website.

Many thanks to Suzanne at the Alzheimer's Association's Houston & Southeast TX Chapter for the heads-up!

Signs of Spring - Lovely images from boston.com

A/P photo of crocuses in Husum, Germany by Heribert Proepper. 

One of many beautiful images at boston.com's The Big Picture.

Spring is inching along at a snail's pace here in the northeast (in the 30's and windy today), so boston.com's collection of giant, gorgeous images - "Signs of Spring" - were a welcome reminder that it really is coming. And that people and animals celebrate it in so many different ways. Enjoy! 

Landscapes of Remembrance: Cemeteries and Memorials as Healing Landscapes

Image of Stirling Cemetery in Scotland courtesy of The Daily Undertaker, 

an interesting blog about love, grief, and remembrance.

Cemeteries as healing landscapes? I can just imagine some wise-guy's comment: "Um, I hate to break it to ya, but those folks are, well, you know, beyond healing." Sure, cemeteries are for people who have died. But just as much, they are for the living: We plan them, bury and visit our family and friends in them, and maintain them - individual gravesites, family burial plots, and cemeteries as a whole. People also visit cemeteries as parks - more on that in a bit. Grief is one of the most painful of human emotions, and mortality is one of most people's greatest fears. Nevertheless, cemeteries can be powerful landscapes not just as sites to inter the dead but as places for us to grieve, remember, and even celebrate life. All of these life-affirming actions contribute to our health and well-being. Therefore, in my opinion, they are healing landscapes.

Image of Maya Lin's Vietnam Veterans Memorial 

in Washington, D.C. courtesy of this website

For years, I've thought of memorials as healing landscapes, and there's a section of the Therapeutic Landscapes Database devoted to memorials. Memorials serve as reminders and touchstones for the living to remember people and events. But it wasn't until recently, when a local cemetery board contacted me about a design job, that I started to think of cemeteries (or what we called graveyards in the no-nonsense New England village where I grew up) as healing landscapes. They both serve as landscapes of remembrance, catalysts for individual and collective grieving and memory. 

Frederick Law Olmsted, "the father of landscape architecture," was inspired to create public parks in urban areas after learning that people were spending their Sundays at Mt. Auburn Cemetery because it was the only park-like setting within close reach of the city (to learn more, link to this earlier blog post). Olmsted also designed some beautiful and historically significant cemeteries, including Mountain View Cemetery in Oakland, CA. When I was in graduate school at UC Berkeley, I used to visit Mountain View; I had no connection to the people buried there, but it was a beautiful, quiet, serene landscape for walking and thinking. 

There are millions of cemeteries, of all different kinds, in all different places. Some are sad and bleak, some are beautiful and park-like, some are tourist destinations for famous people (Elvis, John Lennon, J.F.K. - there are even celebrity gravesite tours) or just for themselves (Arlington National Cemetery, the "Cities of the Dead" in New Orleans). Many reflect a time period, place, and culture. My father-in-law's ashes are buried at Colney Wood Natural Burial Park, one of a growing number of natural burial parks in Europe (we've got a few in the U.S., too - see The Centre for Natural Burial for more information and lists of sites). Not a religious man, he did not want his remains to be buried in a church graveyard; but rather than just strewing his ashes, the family wanted to have a place we could visit - a beautiful place that he would have liked to walk in and that we and other family and friends would be comforted by visiting. Colney Wood is just that: A lovely forest that is also a cemetery. We chose a spot under a majestic multi-trunk chestnut tree, and we continue to take comfort from the place. 

My father-in-law's ashes are buried here.

View of the chestnut trees over my father-in-law's burial plot.

As for me, I've got a plot picked out in the small town where I grew up. It's a very rural spot, surrounded by trees and grass and old New England stone walls. I'm hoping it'll be a long time until my relatives have to think about that, but there's comfort in knowing that when the time comes, they'll be able to wish me goodbye and visit me in a landscape that continues to give solace even after I'm gone.

Journal of Therapeutic Horticulture, 2009 - Hot Off the Press!

Well, they've gone and done it again. The American Horticultural Therapy Association has published another great volume of the Journal of Therapeutic Horticulture. I swear, the journal alone makes the annual membership at AHTA worthwhile. Some of the articles are very specific to horticultural therapy (no big surprise there), but many of them are broad enough to pertain to the work that landscape architects and other designers do. I think any self-respecting healthcare-focused landscape designer/architect should also be a member of AHTA.

Here are some of the articles in this year's issue (Volume XIX):

"Integrating Horticulture into the Vocational Rehabilitation Process of Individuals with Fatigue, Chronic Fatigue, and Burnout: A Theoretical Model."

"Survey of Hort. Therapy Programs in Tennessee."

"It's More Than Seeing Green: Exploring the Senses Through Gardening."

"A New Model for Hort. Therapy Documentation in a Clinical Setting."

"A Theoretical Perspective for Using Hort. Therapy with Children."

And then there are the 23 AHTA Annual Conference Abstracts from 2008, many of them compelling enough to make me want to contact the authors. And building on the last blog post about the importance of PLAY, many of these articles and abstracts have to do with connecting children and teenagers with nature. Good stuff!

The Importance of PLAY

Did you know that there's a National Institute for Play? (www.nifplay.org). How cool is that? There's been a lot of talk lately about play: Its importance not only for early childhood development (which is very important), but for people  - and animals, too - of all ages. The new book by Stuart Brown and Christopher Vaughan called Play: How it Shapes the Brain, Opens the Imagination, and Invigorates the Soul has been getting a lot of press, and for good reason. We need play, and just as Richard Louv uncovered that kids are not getting outdoors enough in Last Child in the Woods, we are not playing enough, either. So, if we're suffering from nature-deficit disorder and play-deficit disorder, wouldn't the perfect antidote be some outdoor playtime?

A lot of play does occur outdoors - in "wild nature," in backyards, in playgrounds, even on sidewalks and cul-de-sacs. When people think of "therapeutic landscapes," they often imagine a quiet, contemplative healing garden with a bench and a fountain and pretty flowers. And this is absolutely one example of a restorative landscape. But a landscape for health - a landscape that facilitates health and well-being - can be so much more. Under this broader definition, any outdoor space that allows and encourages play would be a landscape for health. 

I've recently come across a slew great websites, blogs, and articles about play and playgrounds, so this seems like an appropriate post to list a bunch of them:

National Children & Youth Garden Symposium, July 23-25 at the Cleveland Botanical Garden in Ohio, sponsored by the American Horticultural Society. Sign up now (and please take notes so you can report back to us)!

Of course, the Children & Nature Network has great information and resources about getting kids active outside, as does the National Wildlife Federation's Green Hour.

The Grass Stain Guru is Bethe Almeras' brand-new rockin' blog. Check it out for a great list of other play-friendly sites (I won't list all the ones she does - just go take a look). Bethe, I'm going to get you on here for an interview one of these days!

Kaboom, a national non-profit organization that empowers communities to build playgrounds. Also a great resource for news and information about getting kids outside to play.

ASLA has a new Professional Practice Network called Children's Outdoor Environments, chaired by Jena Ponti, ASLA.

The Krasnoyarsk Playground Project: A project to build a new playground in the birth home of Alex Griffith (now living with his adoptive family in Forest Hill, MD). Alex took this on as his Boy Scout Eagle Scout project after reading his adoptive father's journal of their experience in Russia. "The journal mentioned a playground at Hospital #20 in great disrepair. The playground had one rusty swing with a rotten wooden seat, a sandbox mostly covered in dirt and mud, and a small gazebo with a picnic table." Alex spent six months researching and planning the project and has gotten a huge amount of support. Very inspiring!

Playground Builders (www.playgroundbuilders.org), a non-profit organization devoted to building playgrounds in war-torn countries such as Iraq, Afghanistan, and the West Bank and Gaza. 

SOL, or Sequential Outdoor Learning Environment, was developed by Tamara M. Vincenta of Artemis Landscape Architects as a sequence of outdoor spaces designed to meet the needs of children and families living with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Tamara began this project for her Healthcare Garden Design Certification at the Chicago Botanic Garden, and she has created something really beautiful and powerful from it.

Learning Landscapes ("Building Community Through Play" - www.learninglandscapes.org): A project with The University of Colorado Denver and the City of Denver to "connect the design and construction of urban public spaces with healthy initiatives. Since 1998, in partnership with Denver Public Schools, we have transformed 48 neglected public elementary school playgrounds into attractive and safe multi-use parks tailored to the needs and desires of their neighbors and communities."

Robin Moore's Natural Learning Initiative. Moore's book Plants for Play is one that I refer to again and again. 

If you can get a back issue, Landscape Architect and Specifier News had a great issue devoted to play in October of 2008 (Vol. 24, No. 10), even with articles on playgrounds in healthcare facilities. 

"Working in the Margins: A non-traditional approach to the practice of landscape architecture creates a much-needed playground in a women's prison." by Daniel Winterbottom, ASLA Landscape Architecture Magazine, December 2007, Vol. 97, No. 12, pp. 38-47. This article is about the construction of a playground at the Bedford Hills Correctional Facility in New York.

"Reclaiming Outdoor Space for the Digital Generation," by Helle Burlingame (of the Kompan Institute), Landscape Architect and Specifier News, December 2008, Vol. 24, No. 12, pp. 28-30.

Most of these references are about kids, but play is important for us grown-ups, too. If you have some great resources about the benefits of play in the outdoors for people over the age of 12, I'd love to add them to the list. Anyone out there have stuff specific to seniors? That, too, would be great. Submit comments and I'll add them here or in another blog post. Please and thank you!

Thanks also to Guy for the great picture of E. at Storm King Art Center.

Forcing spring

Image from House Beautiful, 2008

It's the third warm, sunny day here in the Hudson Valley, and it really feels like spring. Today I celebrated by cutting some stems from our giant forsythia hedge to force indoors. Even though forsythia and magnolia are three of the earliest spring-blooming shrubs (but later than witch hazel - see this post), we've still got a few weeks before they really burst into full glory. By taking cuttings and bringing them inside, you can trick trees and shrubs into thinking spring is further along, hence the term "forcing." I actually could have done this weeks ago, but I always forget! You can force lots of other shrubs and trees, too, including azalea, flowering quince, pussywillow, witch hazel, serviceberry, redbud, rhododendron, beautybush, crabapple, and other fruit trees such as cherry, apricot, pear, and apple. To see some really gorgeous examples, check out this blog post from Habitually Chic: "Forcing Spring." 

Forcing trees and shrubs is also a nice idea in the healthcare setting, particularly in long-term care facilities like nursing homes and hospices. Think how nice it would be in a place where residents have been cooped up indoors all winter, if the horticultural therapist or another health care worker or a family member took some cuttings and brought them indoors for a little spring preview. Or better yet, went with the residents on a "field trip" to prune a few branches on the grounds. Most long-term care facilities have flowering trees and shrubs, and as long as they are pruned carefully and not too overzealously, no one will miss a few branches here and there. If you are letting residents help, make sure to oversee the use of sharp tools, and of course no matter who's doing the cutting, make sure to prune so that the actual tree or shrub isn't harmed. Here's a good article from About.com, that tells you when and how: "Forcing Spring Flowering Trees and Shrubs." A bouquet of twigs, then buds, then flowering branches becomes a great conversation piece and provides that joyful anticipation of spring's arrival. 

Of course, people force bulbs, too. Paperwhites and hyacinths are the most popular two, but other spring bulbs work as well. Here's a good article about that from About.com: "Forcing Flowering Bulbs for Winter Color." 

Planting the Healing Garden: Growing Your Own Bird Seed

Image of prairie warbler courtesy Henry Domke Fine Art

Not much time for blogging lately, but here's a good article about planting flowers that will attract birds into your garden. And if they don't eat it all while it's "on the vine," you can harvest to feed the birds later. "How to Grow Your Own Bird Seed in the Garden." Enjoy, and the birds will, too!

Gardening for Health - another good article

Image courtesy Henry Domke Fine Art

Twitter can sometimes be a supreme distraction, but it can also send good articles my way, including this one, "Gardening for Health." It's old (2000), and repeats a lot of the same stuff I and others have been saying again and again, but there's a personal component to this piece that - in my opinion - makes it worth sharing. I hope you agree!

Sorry to not be keeping up with the daily blog postings. Work with the web designer on our "new improved" website for the Therapeutic Landscapes Network is progressing, and it's taking a lot of my attention these days as we make decisions about images, layout, features to add to the site that aren't there now (like a search feature - progress at last!). If you have any thoughts on what you like about the existing site (www.healinglandscapes.org) and what you would really like to see different with the new site, I'd love to hear from you. The TLN will continue to provide all of the same information (plus more!), but in a juicier, more accessible, easier-to-search format. Think organic peaches rather than bran cereal. Above is one of the images that will be in our homepage slideshow. We're shooting to launch at the end of this month, so get your comments and ideas to me soon!

Thanks to twitterbo for "tweeting" this! 

Planting the Healing Garden: Ornamental Grasses

This and other images for this post courtesy Henry Domke Fine Art

It's a balmy 41 degrees here in the Hudson Valley today. I'm not being sarcastic! Anything over 40 degrees is a welcome change, and it's sunny to add...hm, what's the opposite of adding insult to injury? Icing to cake? 

Anyway, it was warm enough for me to get out and garden for the first time in months, and it felt really good. Not much to do yet, but it is the time to cut back any perennial stalks that you left up for the winter for vertical interest and birds, and it's also time to cut back your ornamental grasses, which is what I did today. Note to self: Next fall, plant lots of bulbs amidst the grasses so that something green and colorful will be coming up after the grasses have been cut back and before they start to grow in again. More on this in a minute.

Ornamental grasses are a wonderful plant for any garden, including the healing garden. Many people think that a "healing garden" has to have medicinal plants. Not necessarily so! While herbs are certainly great - for actual medicinal use, or as symbols of healing, or just because they smell good and are therefore a delight to the senses - many more healing gardens don't have any medicinal plants at all, or they have a mix of herbs, vegetables and fruit, trees, shrubs, perennials, annuals and any other kind of plant material that seems appropriate for the intended user (the technical term for the person who will be enjoying the garden) and the space. 

Here are some reasons why I think ornamental grasses are ideal for healing gardens:

1. They are beautiful! Aesthetically speaking, ornamental grasses really do it for me. So reasons #1-6 all have to do with beauty.

2. Color: Who can resist the bright and rich greens, bronzes, tans, and even reds of grasses, a constantly shifting display of color throughout the year? From the moment they emerge from the ground to when they get cut back in the spring, grasses put on a show of sometimes subtle, sometimes stop-in-your tracks color variation. 

3. Play with light: If you've ever seen bright-red Japanese bloodgrass (Imperata) in summer or copper little bluestem (Schizachyrium scoparium, above) in autumn backlit by the sun, you have experienced a thing of true beauty. Sometimes it's the foliage that gets highlighted, sometimes the flowers, and sometimes both; when you're thinking about where to site grasses, keep in mind where the light comes from; backlighting can have a really dramatic effect. 

4. Movement: Most grasses are very light and airy, and therefore catch the slightest movement of air. There's something enchanting about seeing grasses dancing and shimmering in the breeze.

5. Seasonal interest: Most grasses offer almost four whole seasons of interest. There's about a month in the early spring when they get cut back (hence the note to self about bulbs to fill in the gaps), but other than that they put on a great show year-round with changing colors of foliage and flowers, and with texture as well. Like evergreens but with more variation, they provide a kind of structure and continuity in the garden as other plants around them appear, grow, bloom, fade, and go dormant again.

Other great reasons to use grasses:

7. Sound: Many ornamental grasses make a rustling sound when moved by the breeze, bringing an element of sound into the garden. That gentle "ssshhh" adds another layer to the sensory experience, and can even stand in for visual elements in gardens for the visually impaired. 

8. Critter-proof! Whether you're battling squirrels, deer, Japanese beetles or any other kind of pest, grasses are pretty tough. Most animals (other than my dogs - they love to chew on some of my grasses!) don't like them. 

9. Low maintenance: As mentioned above, most ornamental grasses are pretty good at fending for themselves. Other than being cut back in the spring, they don't need the pruning, staking, deadheading, raking, etc. that we have to do for our other beloved garden inhabitants. 

10. Good in containers. Grasses do well in pots and other containers, making them excellent candidates for small-space, rooftop, and other types of container gardens. They can act as nice vertical and or/softening accents, they are often drought- and wind-tolerant, and they (usually -see below!) get along well with their neighbors. 

Caution Caveat: A few species of ornamental grasses (especially pampas grass) have very sharp blades (I guess they don't call them blades for nothing); if you're using grasses for a children's garden or another space where people might grab hold or have to brush past, make sure to plant the kinder, gentler, touch-friendly species.

Also, a few species of ornamental grasses do not make good neighbors; they can be a garden nuisance (Hakonochlea and Stipa tennuissima, for example) or even a threat to native grasses and other flora (especially pampas grass, runner bamboos, and varieties of Miscanthus in some parts of the country). So whether it's your own garden and especially if it's a garden for a client, do your homework: Make sure you're not saddling yourself or someone else with a lovely but unruly beast! Here are a couple of articles to start you off: "Native and Invasive Ornamental Grasses" and "Bad Boys of Ornamental Grasses."

Oh, and one more thing: Here's an interesting article on caring for ornamental grasses - turns out it depends on whether they are really grasses (vs. sedges or rushes). Thanks to gardenmentor for sending me the link on twitter!