Landscape Design in Eighteenth Century Ireland - Hardcover

O'Kane, Finola

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 185918362X ISBN 13: 9781859183625

Publisher: Cork University Press, 2005

Synopsis

Winner of the inaugural John Brinckerhoff Jackson Book Prize, given by the The Foundation for Landscape Studies
A detailed and original study of 17th and 18th century landscapes in and around the Dublin Pale, of the gardens in the region, and a picture of the aesthetic, political and economic factors which persuaded their owners to create them.
Unlike the landscapes of the West of Ireland, the cultivated demesnes of the great estates at Molesworth, Powerscourt, Carton and Castletown have received little attention. Finola O'Kane provides a stunning visual history of the demesnes, underpinned by a persuasive analysis of what remains of the original landscapes today. For this reason alone her study will be controversial, given the continuing threat of urban development on these unique and priceless spaces.
The book includes an analysis of settlement history in the area from the 1600's, European landscape design, economic and political influences of conquest in Ireland and elsewhere, as well as developments in methods and technology in horticulture. Dozens of previously unpublished maps, plans, watercolors and paintings illustrate the rich stream of research the book.
As a major contribution to the study of the cultural landscape, to European garden history, Landscape Design in Eighteenth Century Ireland will be indispensable to landscape historians and garden specialists alike.

About this title

About the Author:

Finola O'Kane is a full-time landscape historian living in Dublin.

Review:

"Landscape Design in Eighteenth-Century Ireland: Mixing Foreign Trees with the Natives is a fascinating, in-depth study of the eighteenth-century landscapes around Dublin and the gardens of the region, as well as the political, monetary, and aesthetic appreciation influences that led their owners to create them. Chapters focus especially upon Robert Molesworths's landscape of Breckdenston, the landscape of Castle Town House, Carton Demesne's work which introduced foreign trees, and the school at Frescati. Part envionmental history, part narrative of the lives and decisions of wealthy individuals, part studious assessment of the ambitious large-scale projects that changed the nature of the countryside, Landscape Design in Eighteenth-Century Ireland is absorbing and detailed scrutiny. Illustrated throughout with black-and-white as well as color images, paintings, diagrams and photographs, Landscape Design in Eighteenth-Century Ireland is virtually unique in its theme of discussion yet delves into its subject matter with such depth as to eclipse rival attempts." (Wisconsin Bookwatch)

"Astute ransacking of archives--instructions from distant proprietors, family correspondence, estate plans and workbooks--allows Finola O'Kane to open windows upon three exemplary Irish landscapes--Breckdenston, Castletown House and Frescati. In the process, the Irishness of estate developments is explored--the subtle or more aggressive manipulation of English trends, the studied internationalism of sources and resources for both landscape design and agrarian efficiency (the Netherlands, most obviously, but also America and revolutionary France). But the focus also comes to include, not just estate management and landscape aesthetics, but the role of women as designers, planters and stewards of property, the education of children in country matters, Irish tourism, country house entertainment, and how all these elements were marshaled in the interests of Irish identity and political status." (John Dixon Hunt)

"As Finola O'Kane righly claims, Irish demesne landscapes near Dublin--Caron and Castletown--bear comparison with Het Loo, Hampton Court, Versailles, Potsdam and Monticello. Yet they have been despised, abandoned and ignored. Today they are subject to fragmentation and destruction from an expanding capital. Beautifully composed, and drawing equally on critical landscape theory and the widest range of written and graphic sources, Landscape Design in Eighteenth-century Ireland thoughtfully celebrates the women and men of the Whig ascendancy who shaped and used their demesne lands as spaces of polite transgression in a fraught moral and political world, and in doing so produced one of the gems of Irish heritage." (Denis Cosgrove)

About this edition

• Publisher: Cork University Press
• Publication date: 2005
• ISBN 10: 185918362X
• ISBN 13: 9781859183625
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 320