Garrett Eckbo
Encyclopedia
Garrett Eckbo was an American
landscape architect
notable for his seminal 1950 book Landscape for Living.
to Axel Eckbo, a businessman, and Theodora Munn Eckbo. In 1912, the family moved to Chicago, Illinois. After Eckbo’s parents divorced, he and his mother relocated to Alameda, California
where they struggled financially while he grew up. After Eckbo graduated from high school in 1929, he felt a lack of ambition and direction and went to stay with a wealthy paternal uncle, Eivind Eckbo, in Norway
. It was during his stay in Norway that he began to focus on his future. Once he returned to the U.S., he worked for several years at various jobs saving money so that he could attend college.
where he majored in landscape architecture
.
While Eckbo was at Berkeley he was influenced by two of the programs faculty members, H. Leland Vaughan and Thomas Church
, who inspired him to move beyond the formalized beaux-arts style that was popular at the time. The Beaux Arts-movement is defined as being carefully planned, richly decorated and being influenced by classical art and architecture. Eckbo graduated with a B.S. in landscape architecture in 1935 and subsequently worked at Armstrong Nurseries in Ontario
near Los Angeles
where he designed about a hundred gardens in less than a year. After working at the Nurseries, he was restless to expand his creative horizons and entered Harvard University
’s Graduate School of Design
by way of a scholarship competition, which he won.
Beginning his studies at Harvard, Eckbo found that the curriculum followed the Beaux-Arts method and was similar to the one at Berkeley but more rigidly entrenched. Eckbo, along with fellow students Dan Kiley
and James Rose resisted and began to "explore science, architecture, and art as sources for a modern landscape design." Eckbo began to take architecture classes with the former Bauhaus
director Walter Gropius
, who was then head of the architecture department while continuing to take classes in the landscape architecture department. Gropius and Marcel Breuer
introduced Eckbo to the idea of the social role in architecture, the link between society and spatial design.
Eckbo was also influenced by the works of several abstract painters, including Wassily Kandinsky
, László Moholy-Nagy
and Kasimir Malevich. Eckbo would convey a sense of movement in his designs by the layering and massing of plants as inspired by the artists’ paintings.
. He designed camps for the migrant agricultural workers in California’s Central Valley. He applied his modernist ideas to these camps attempting to improve the workers living environments.
In 1940 Eckbo joined with his brother–in-law, Edward Williams
to form the firm Eckbo and Williams. Five years later Robert Royston
joined the firm. The very successful firm of Eckbo, Royston and Williams designed hundreds of projects including residential gardens, planned community developments, urban plazas, churches and college campuses. He would eventually form the highly successful firm Eckbo, Dean, Austin and Williams, (EDAW) in 1964. Leaving the firm in 1979, he first formed the firm Garrett Eckbo and Associates and finally Eckbo Kay Associates with Kenneth Kay.
Throughout Eckbo's career he maintained his vision of the interaction of art and science to create environments that were functional and livable, while maintaining the social, ecological and cultural approach to design.
In 1968, he signed the “Writers and Editors War Tax Protest” pledge, vowing to refuse tax payments in protest against the Vietnam War.
from 1948-56.
He was the chairman of the Department of Landscape Architecture at UC Berkeley from 1963-69.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
landscape architect
Landscape architect
A landscape architect is a person involved in the planning, design and sometimes direction of a landscape, garden, or distinct space. The professional practice is known as landscape architecture....
notable for his seminal 1950 book Landscape for Living.
Youth
He was born in Cooperstown, New YorkCooperstown, New York
Cooperstown is a village in Otsego County, New York, USA. It is located in the Town of Otsego. The population was estimated to be 1,852 at the 2010 census.The Village of Cooperstown is the county seat of Otsego County, New York...
to Axel Eckbo, a businessman, and Theodora Munn Eckbo. In 1912, the family moved to Chicago, Illinois. After Eckbo’s parents divorced, he and his mother relocated to Alameda, California
Alameda, California
Alameda is a city in Alameda County, California, United States. It is located on Alameda Island and Bay Farm Island, and is adjacent to Oakland in the San Francisco Bay. The Bay Farm Island portion of the city is adjacent to the Oakland International Airport. At the 2010 census, the city had a...
where they struggled financially while he grew up. After Eckbo graduated from high school in 1929, he felt a lack of ambition and direction and went to stay with a wealthy paternal uncle, Eivind Eckbo, in Norway
Norway
Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
. It was during his stay in Norway that he began to focus on his future. Once he returned to the U.S., he worked for several years at various jobs saving money so that he could attend college.
Education
After attending Marin Junior College for a year, he enrolled at the University of California, BerkeleyUniversity of California, Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley , is a teaching and research university established in 1868 and located in Berkeley, California, USA...
where he majored in landscape architecture
Landscape architecture
Landscape architecture is the design of outdoor and public spaces to achieve environmental, socio-behavioral, or aesthetic outcomes. It involves the systematic investigation of existing social, ecological, and geological conditions and processes in the landscape, and the design of interventions...
.
While Eckbo was at Berkeley he was influenced by two of the programs faculty members, H. Leland Vaughan and Thomas Church
Thomas Dolliver Church
Thomas Dolliver Church , called "Dolliver" by his family and "Tommy" by his friends, was a landscape architect.- Life :...
, who inspired him to move beyond the formalized beaux-arts style that was popular at the time. The Beaux Arts-movement is defined as being carefully planned, richly decorated and being influenced by classical art and architecture. Eckbo graduated with a B.S. in landscape architecture in 1935 and subsequently worked at Armstrong Nurseries in Ontario
Ontario, California
Ontario is a city located in San Bernardino County, California, United States, 35 miles east of downtown Los Angeles. Located in the western part of the Inland Empire region, it lies just east of the Los Angeles county line and is part of the Greater Los Angeles Area...
near Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
where he designed about a hundred gardens in less than a year. After working at the Nurseries, he was restless to expand his creative horizons and entered Harvard University
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...
’s Graduate School of Design
Harvard Graduate School of Design
The Harvard Graduate School of Design is a graduate school at Harvard University offering degrees in Architecture, Landscape Architecture, and Urban Planning and Design.-History:...
by way of a scholarship competition, which he won.
Beginning his studies at Harvard, Eckbo found that the curriculum followed the Beaux-Arts method and was similar to the one at Berkeley but more rigidly entrenched. Eckbo, along with fellow students Dan Kiley
Dan Kiley
Daniel Urban Kiley was a noted American landscape architect in the modernist style.- Life and career :Kiley was born in Boston, Massachusetts...
and James Rose resisted and began to "explore science, architecture, and art as sources for a modern landscape design." Eckbo began to take architecture classes with the former Bauhaus
Bauhaus
', commonly known simply as Bauhaus, was a school in Germany that combined crafts and the fine arts, and was famous for the approach to design that it publicized and taught. It operated from 1919 to 1933. At that time the German term stood for "School of Building".The Bauhaus school was founded by...
director Walter Gropius
Walter Gropius
Walter Adolph Georg Gropius was a German architect and founder of the Bauhaus School who, along with Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Le Corbusier, is widely regarded as one of the pioneering masters of modern architecture....
, who was then head of the architecture department while continuing to take classes in the landscape architecture department. Gropius and Marcel Breuer
Marcel Breuer
Marcel Lajos Breuer , was a Hungarian-born modernist, architect and furniture designer of Jewish descent. One of the masters of Modernism, Breuer displayed interest in modular construction and simple forms.- Life and work :Known to his friends and associates as Lajkó, Breuer studied and taught at...
introduced Eckbo to the idea of the social role in architecture, the link between society and spatial design.
Eckbo was also influenced by the works of several abstract painters, including Wassily Kandinsky
Wassily Kandinsky
Wassily Wassilyevich Kandinsky was an influential Russian painter and art theorist. He is credited with painting the first purely-abstract works. Born in Moscow, Kandinsky spent his childhood in Odessa. He enrolled at the University of Moscow, studying law and economics...
, László Moholy-Nagy
László Moholy-Nagy
László Moholy-Nagy was a Hungarian painter and photographer as well as professor in the Bauhaus school. He was highly influenced by constructivism and a strong advocate of the integration of technology and industry into the arts.-Early life:...
and Kasimir Malevich. Eckbo would convey a sense of movement in his designs by the layering and massing of plants as inspired by the artists’ paintings.
Professional Work and Philosophy
After receiving his MLA degree from Harvard in 1938, Eckbo returned to California where he worked for the Farm Security AdministrationFarm Security Administration
Initially created as the Resettlement Administration in 1935 as part of the New Deal in the United States, the Farm Security Administration was an effort during the Depression to combat American rural poverty...
. He designed camps for the migrant agricultural workers in California’s Central Valley. He applied his modernist ideas to these camps attempting to improve the workers living environments.
In 1940 Eckbo joined with his brother–in-law, Edward Williams
Edward Williams
Edward, Ed or Eddie Williams may refer to:*Iolo Morganwg , Welsh antiquarian*Edward Williams , English painter*Edward Ellerker Williams , British Army officer...
to form the firm Eckbo and Williams. Five years later Robert Royston
Robert Royston
Robert N. Royston was one of America’s most distinguished landscape architects, based in the San Francisco Bay Area of California in the United States. His design work and university teaching in the years following World War II helped define and establish the California modernism style in the...
joined the firm. The very successful firm of Eckbo, Royston and Williams designed hundreds of projects including residential gardens, planned community developments, urban plazas, churches and college campuses. He would eventually form the highly successful firm Eckbo, Dean, Austin and Williams, (EDAW) in 1964. Leaving the firm in 1979, he first formed the firm Garrett Eckbo and Associates and finally Eckbo Kay Associates with Kenneth Kay.
Throughout Eckbo's career he maintained his vision of the interaction of art and science to create environments that were functional and livable, while maintaining the social, ecological and cultural approach to design.
In 1968, he signed the “Writers and Editors War Tax Protest” pledge, vowing to refuse tax payments in protest against the Vietnam War.
Selected Projects
- 1935: Landscape design for architect Edwin Lewis SnyderEdwin Lewis SnyderEdwin Lewis Snyder was an architect and pioneer in the use of Spanish Colonial Revival Style architecture, building homes in Northern California for decades from the early to mid-twentieth century. The Snyder-designed , built in 1930, is on the city's historical register; the Roy O. Long Co....
, Berkeley, CA - 1938-44: Housing for migrant workers in California, Arizona and Texas
- 1946: Park Planned Homes (architect: Gregory AinGregory AinGregory Ain was an American architect active in the mid-20th century. Working primarily in the Los Angeles area, Ain is best known for bringing elements of modern architecture to lower- and medium-cost housing.- Biography :...
), Altadena, CA - 1947-48: Community Homes (architect: Gregory AinGregory AinGregory Ain was an American architect active in the mid-20th century. Working primarily in the Los Angeles area, Ain is best known for bringing elements of modern architecture to lower- and medium-cost housing.- Biography :...
), Reseda, CA (unbuilt) - 1947: Ladera Cooperative (architects: John Funk and Joseph Allen SteinJoseph Allen SteinJoseph Stein, was an American architect. An a major figure in the establishment of a regional modern architecture in the San Francisco Bay area in the 1940s and 1950s during the early days of the environmental design movement, he is noted for designing several important buildings in India, most...
), Palo Alto, CA - 1948: Avenel Homes (architect: Gregory AinGregory AinGregory Ain was an American architect active in the mid-20th century. Working primarily in the Los Angeles area, Ain is best known for bringing elements of modern architecture to lower- and medium-cost housing.- Biography :...
), Los Angeles, CA - 1948: Mar Vista Housing (architect: Gregory AinGregory AinGregory Ain was an American architect active in the mid-20th century. Working primarily in the Los Angeles area, Ain is best known for bringing elements of modern architecture to lower- and medium-cost housing.- Biography :...
), Los Angeles, CA - 1952: Alcoa Forecast Garden (Eckbo residence), Los Angeles, CA
- 1962: Long-range development plan for the University of New MexicoUniversity of New MexicoThe University of New Mexico at Albuquerque is a public research university located in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in the United States. It is the state's flagship research institution...
- 1964-68: Union Bank Plaza (architect: Harrison & AbramovitzHarrison & AbramovitzHarrison & Abramovitz was an American architectural firm based in New York and active from 1941 through 1976, a partnership of Wallace Harrison and Max Abramovitz....
), Los Angeles, CA - 1966: Fulton MallFulton Mall (Fresno)Fulton Mall is a six-block pedestrian mall located in the central business district of downtown Fresno, California. The mall runs along historic Fulton Street between Inyo and Tuolumne Streets and is home to a wide variety of shopping, restaurants, offices and public art...
, Fresno, CaliforniaFresno, CaliforniaFresno is a city in central California, United States, the county seat of Fresno County. As of the 2010 census, the city's population was 510,365, making it the fifth largest city in California, the largest inland city in California, and the 34th largest in the nation... - 1968: Lodhi Garden (architect: Joseph Allen SteinJoseph Allen SteinJoseph Stein, was an American architect. An a major figure in the establishment of a regional modern architecture in the San Francisco Bay area in the 1940s and 1950s during the early days of the environmental design movement, he is noted for designing several important buildings in India, most...
), New Delhi, India - 1970: Tucson Community Center, Tucson, AZ
Teaching
Eckbo taught at the School of Architecture at the University of Southern CaliforniaUniversity of Southern California
The University of Southern California is a private, not-for-profit, nonsectarian, research university located in Los Angeles, California, United States. USC was founded in 1880, making it California's oldest private research university...
from 1948-56.
He was the chairman of the Department of Landscape Architecture at UC Berkeley from 1963-69.
Publications
- 1950: Landscape for Living (Duell, Sloan & Pearce)
- "a seminal book in landscape architecture"
- republished in 2002 (Hennessey & Ingalls)
- 1956: Art of Home Landscaping (McGraw-Hill)
- 1964: Urban Landscape Design (McGraw-Hill)
- 1969: The Landscape We See (McGraw-Hill)
Additional Sources
- Francis, M. & Hester, R. T. Jr. (eds): The Meaning of Gardens. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press; 1990. ISBN 0-262-06127-9
- Rogers, E. B.: Landscape Design: a Cultural and Architectural History. New York, NY: Harry Abrams, Inc.; 2001. ISBN 0-8109-4253-4
External links
- Maclay, K. (2000, June 8). Garrett Eckbo, UC Berkeley professor known for inspiring the modern landscape movement,dies at 89. Retrieved Sep 7, 2004.
- Schwenk, K. (2001). "Garrett Eckbo: Pioneer of Modern Landscape". UNM-Quantum 2001. Retrieved August 30, 2004.
- Treib, M. (2000). Thomas Church, Garrett Eckbo, and the Postwar California Garden (PDF file, 49 KBKilobyteThe kilobyte is a multiple of the unit byte for digital information. Although the prefix kilo- means 1000, the term kilobyte and symbol KB have historically been used to refer to either 1024 bytes or 1000 bytes, dependent upon context, in the fields of computer science and information...
). - Finding aid to the Garrett Eckbo Collection, Environmental Design Archives, University of California, Berkeley