Modern Landscape Architecture In America

With the development of economy and the changes of social requirement, the value of landscape architecture was recognized widely. Modern landscape practice started earlier in western countries than in our country. Especially in 1940s, modernism accelerated the development of landscape architecture. Thus, the study of modern landscape architecture in western countries is necessary to the development of landscape practice in our country. In America, different culture can mix together, so America was chosen as the background of the study.In this paper, representative landscape architects and their important works were chosen to explain the development of modernist landscape in America. The course can be divided to four periods. They are gestation period of modernism, turning period, modernism as mainstream and divergence period. In these periods, four generations of modernist landscape architects occurred in succession. The analysis to their theories and practice related to social background and other fields of art. After the study to the course of the development, several characters of modern landscape design were summed up. And more, the trend of modern landscape design was discussed.The development of society reflected on the development of landscape practice. At the present time, the status of our country is similar to the situation tens of years ago in America. Our landscape practice face chances and challenges.