Sir Geoffrey Jellicoe
Introduction
Sir Geoffrey Jellicoe was probably the foremost British landscape
architect of this century and his career spanned almost seventy
years. From a background of the classics and a day to day exposure
to modern art and architecture he was able effortlessly to combine
both traditions.
Born in 1900 Jellicoe had a traditional classical education which
inspired in him a lasting love of the Greek and Roman poets and
philosophers. From 1919 he studied at the Architects Association
School and for his final year thesis he visited Italy and wrote
a definitive book on Italian renaissance gardens. This early experience
gave him a wealth of detail to draw on throughout his career.
Works, from his modifications to Ditchley Park in 1935, through
to his designs for Sutton Place in 1980 showed this early influence.
Throughout the 1920's and 30's Jellicoe remained associated with
the Architects Association, as a lecturer and, later, president.
During this period the Association was a center of modernism and
its influence was shown in one of his first architectural commissions.
His design for the restaurant at Goughs Caves in the Cheddar Gorge
combined contemporary European lines with a renaissance feel for
setting - the long low lines of the building emphasising the vertical
grain and scale of the rocks above. This design also introduced
one of Jellicoe's main themes in his exciting use of a pool and
fountains to bring the terrace to life. Water remained one of
his paramount elements, whether in actuality as at Shute, Sutton
Place, and many others, or implied as at Horsted Place.
Jellicoe became increasingly involved in landscape design from
the mid-1930's and was a founder member of the Institute of Landscape
Architects. During and after the war he became more involved in
industrial and urban landscaping schemes and started to address
the problems of maintaining human scale within large developments.
He also developed his ideas about the relationship between painting
and landscape design, bringing them together in a series of lectures
which formed the basis for his "Studies in Landscape Design".
After his formal retirement he took on a new lease of life. Having
time to think and reflect brought to fruition his ideas on the
link between the conscious and the sub-conscious in the appreciation
of design. In his eighties he embarked on a remarkable series
of projects, culminating in his monumental design for the Moody
Historical Gardens in Galveston, Texas.
It is obviously impossible to do justice to such a rich career
in a short essay but it is interesting to reflect on two, perhaps
overlapping, aspects of his work, viz. the influence of water
and of the sub-conscious in his work.
Water
Water reoccurs in many of Jellicoe's designs. In places it is
still and reflective, in others tumbling down steep slopes adding
an extra, auditory, dimension to the design. Indeed, at Horsted
Place there is no water. Instead the lawns flow out towards the
woods like lakes and planters seem to float on their surface.
In his later schemes it is also possible to interpret his use
of water in an allegorical sense, or as an attempt to engage the
sub-conscious.
The gardens at Shute, developed from 1969 onwards, seem to have
provided Jellicoe with one of his most satisfy projects. Not only
was there water in abundance but Jellicoe and his clients, Michael
and Anne Tree, developed a superb working relationship. Jellicoe
was so impressed by the way that the empathy grew between them
that he developed a simple diagram, based on Jung's methods, to
explain it.
Shute was blessed with a number of natural springs, one of which
rose at the highest point of the garden and fed into an old stone
canal. Jellicoe used this as the source of a new stream which
ran in a straight line down the hillside in a series of rills,
linked by falls. This feature works superbly, and on several levels:
- from the top of the fall the waterway acts like a classical
`long walk' leading the eye to a distant vista, in this case a
small statue. This statue, heroic in style but small in size,
helps to increase the apparent length of the vista. From this
end of the stream the water appears smooth and tranquil.
- from the base of the rills the view is completely different.
Each fall provides constant movement and reflection. The band
of dense planting on either side emphasises the slope and heightens
the sounds.
- on another plane the movement of the water and its accompanying
planting can be seen as an allusion to human life. At the top
is the old canal, the source, or the creation. Initially the water
runs through exuberant planting and the first waterfall is designed
to give a treble trill as it flows. Progressive drops also drop
in note through alto, tenor, and bass whilst the planting becomes
more restrained. At its foot the water runs slowly through lawns
before returning to water in a river.
At Sutton Place (1980) Jellicoe designed in several areas of still
water. In the Paradise Garden a large formal pond bars direct
entry to the garden, its tranquil surface hardly disturbed by
spouting gargoyles. Access to `paradise' is over a series of stepping
stones representing the hazards of human life. Interestingly,
Jellicoe here uses a feature which he first formally referred
to in his 1960 book "Studies in Landscape Design". In
his chapter, "Scale, Diversity, and Space" he gives
a critique of Bellini's "The Earthly Paradise" and praises
the way the balustrade `interlocks the foreground and middle distance'.
Here, at the edge of the pond, we have a series of Bellini balustrades.
Further on the swimming pool, known as the Miro Mirror, features
an elegant trick. A wooden deck is reached via a series of stepping
stones but, unlike the stones, the deck is floating - merely being
restrained in place by chains. Stepping onto it can produce an
alarming tilt, hinting, perhaps, at the impermanence of life.
At the other end of the series of gardens at Sutton Place, themselves
an allegory on human life, stands a monumental sculpture by Ben
Nicholson. Apparently floating in space, the effect of this magnificently
simple piece is magnified by its reflection in the still pool
before it.
The heroic use of water continued right to the end of Jellicoe's
career. His last major design, the Moody Historical Gardens, encountered
water on a grand scale. On one side of a 5 metre high wall the
ocean was to expend its energy - on the other visitors were to
be taken through a series of canals by water bus.
The Sub-conscious
In his later work Jellicoe came to feel that the contribution
of the sub-conscious in the overall appreciation of a design was
being underrated or ignored. Earlier in his career he had been
closely associated with the work of modern artists as they struggled
to suggest a third and fourth dimension in their work. Cubism
presented an attempt to show the passing of time on a flat canvas
but artists such as Victor Pasmore, moving from representational
drawing to abstracted forms, grew to feel that landscape design
was a far better medium for their work. Landscapes already existed
in three dimensions so the suggestion of the fourth, time, was
far more readily achievable. The use of moving elements such as
water and, more importantly, changing aspects as people moved
through the design supplied the extra dimension. Although most
of Pasmore's work was conceived on paper or canvass he felt a
strong spatial relationship to each aspect of it. His paintings
invite imaginary journeys.
Jellicoe felt drawn to `abstract' work. One particularly rewarding
friendship was with Ben Nicholson. Not only did Nicholson provide
the culminating sculpture for Sutton Place but his abstract, "Painted
Relief" provided inspiration for Jellicoe's landscaping around
Oldbury-on-Severn power station. Another influence was Paul Klee
whose closely detailed works echoed the comparatively new science
of aerial photography. Although architects such as Corbusier believed
that this new technique could provide an extra dimension to their
work the scope for its appreciation by the general public was
limited. However this was not to mean that the aerial view was
to be shunned. Many of Jellicoe's designs, such as the fish shaped
lake for Sutton Place, look stunning in plan view but what gave
them an added resonance over a simpler or more `hackneyed' design?
Their shape couldn't be fully appreciated from most normal viewpoints
so was there another sense at work?
Carl Jung proposed the idea that our sub-conscious responses to
sensations are governed by the interplay between the `personal
unconscious' and the `collective unconscious'. Jung proposed that
a person's response to any situation will be conditioned by `
race, nation, family, spirit of the age, and personal experience'.
Thus a Japanese garden may attract respect and excitement from
a British audience but not the empathy that a native would feel.
We miss the nuances, the references to tradition. We recognise
the artistry but lack the `collective memory' necessary to truly
appreciate it.
In a similar vein the gardens left by the Raj in India are looking
increasingly bereft. Although until recently there has been little
money to support any public gardens those based on Moghul and
earlier Islamic designs have fared best. Although it can be claimed
that the neglect of British style gardens is a conscious rejection
of colonialism even the cemeteries around Christian and Anglophile
enclaves, such as that close to Old Delhi Station, are decaying.
Despite the years of British rule and the care that been put into
them by both races the gardens are still, on a more or less sub-conscious
level, alien.
Jellicoe's triumph was to use his eclectic knowledge of current
and past practice to relate to the `collective consciousness'
of the target audience. Thus he could move from a sympathetic
restoration at St. Paul's Walden Bury to the water garden at Hemel
Hempstead to the landscaping of the centre of Modena.
Jellicoe became increasingly absorbed by the role of the sub-conscious
in landscape and garden design and Jung's theses. At Shute House
he was delighted by the empathy between himself and the Trees.
He felt that their relationship went beyond the formal architect/client
partnership and that they were starting to correspond on a sub-conscious
level. To explain the process he devised a diagram based on a
circle, with a triangle within - its base across the diameter
and its apex at the lowest point on the circumference. The thoughts
of the client and the designer start at opposite sides of the
circle and flow backwards and forwards around the rim as their
conscious and unconscious thoughts converge. Both will also draw
from a deep subconscious at the bottom of the circle. The final
stage should be when agreement is reached at the centre of the
circle, midway between client and designer.
This diagram epitomised his relationship with the Trees (and with
Stanley Seeger at Sutton Place where his initial plans were approved
within 10 minutes) but also suggests the importance of the `personal'
and `collective unconscious'. If client and designer have no shared
culture there is less likely to be a successful collaboration.
Conclusion
Sir Geoffrey Jellicoe holds a unique position in modern British
landscape design. Coming into practice in the period after `The
Great War' when the old nostrums were naturally reviled he combined
an appreciation of the classical with a love of the modern. Through
a long career he skillfully combined the two and interwove them
with a regard for human scale and feelings.
In his work he can be said to have invented the idea of the professional
landscape designer, taking the treatment of a building's exterior
beyond being just an adjunct to the structural design. His work
confirmed the artistry in landscape and garden design.
Bibliography
Colliers Encyclopedia
P F Collier 1996
Studies in Landscape Design
by G A Jellicoe
Oxford University Press 1960
The Oxford Companion to Gardens
Edited by G and S Jellicoe, P Goode, and M Lancaster
Oxford University Press 1986
The Garden Makers
by G Plumptre
Pavilion Books Ltd. 1993
The History of Garden Design
Edited by M Mosser and G Teysott
Thames and Hudson 1990
Gardens of the Mind
by M Spens
Antique Collectors Club Ltd. 1992
Jellicoe at Shute
by M Spens
Academy Editions 1993
The Complete Landscape Designs and Gardens of Geoffrey Jellicoe
by M Spens
Thames and Hudson Ltd. 1994