Wednesday, October 5, 2016

How green is my lawn? landscaping and and value addition

When kaleidoscope had to join at his new workplace at the heart of the IT hub, he was quite impressed by the the apparent appearance of it. His new workplace has a postmodern glass reflecting architecture with a landscaped lusty green lawn in front. The reflecting glass part and the green landscaping complement each other well. There are several jokes which revolves around the architecture, like it was supposed to be a guest house (as many of the classrooms have attached washrooms with them) and so on. However, on a serious note, Kaleidoscope finds this landscaping as a brilliant attempt of showing a supposed aristocracy and of course the downfall of it!
Glassy classy appearance

Archaeology of lawn:

Kaleidoscope is reasonably sure that stone age hunters did not seek a lawn to be maintained  in front of their cave home. Flintstones cartoon also ratifies such conclusions!
Then lawns become symbols of authority, particularly because it demanded land and a lot of works, in exchange they produce nothing of value.
The symbolic value attached to it is nevertheless formidable. Royal palaces, government buildings and public venues often aided with signs 'keep off the grass.' A sign that makes it conspicuous that lawns are associated with political power, social status, and economic wealth. One can easily understand the wealth and position of a family by the size and nature of the lawn.
While laws began as a craze of Europe and America, it is no longer restricted to there only. It had since then invaded several other corners of the world. Kaleidoscope's workplace is no exception. The only thing which interests him is that the lawn is constructed by a government which supposedly represents subalterns in


Flag hoisting on the landscaped aristocracy 
their slogans 'mother, earth/soil and humans.'
However, the symbol aristocracy also has its counterparts.. A badly shaped lawn can indicate the condition of its owner as well. With a couple of walking ways, because of a couple of shortcuts and often decorated with cow-dung - the symbols representing rightful owners of the land, the lawn, however, represents not a downfall, rather an attempted fake identity that couldn't hold itself long!

Some of the rightful owners near Kaleidoscope's workplace

For those who are interested:

Lionel S Smith & Mark D E Fellowes 2013. Towards a Lawn without Grass: The journey of the imperfect lawn and its analogues. Studies in History of Gardens & Designed Landscape 33: 3,158-159