Designerly Research Into The Landscape Conversion Of Irregular Landfills Surrounding Beijing City

This dissertation initiates a process of Designerly Research, which is composed bya series of related design processes, to study the landscape conversion of irregularlandfills surrounding Beijing city. The research verifies the design principle ofcombining landscape conversion and environmental remediation, as well as theprinciple of technological aesthetics. The design experiences to convert the landscape ofirregular landfills are summerised. The foundings on the landscape design of irregularlandfills fill a theoricial gap in the field of landscape architecture. The process of theresearch, known as “Designerly Research”, also contributes renovated development tothe methodology of “Research through Design”(RtD).This dissertation articulates the application of the methodology of RtD in the fieldof landscape architecture. The concpets and definitions on design research and itshistorical developments are introduced systematically. Then, by revealing itsepistemological significance to design discipline, methodological significance tolandscape architectural design research and social significance to academic research, themethod of Designerly Research is identified and discussed.Based on aforementioned discussion, this dissertation initiates the research into thespecific problems of landscape conversion of irregular landfills surrounding Beijing city,by applying the methodology of Designerly Research. Firstly, a reference framework isset up for case study, which is structured by exploring existing urban municipal wastemanagement and environmential protecting mechanism in China. Then, successful casesfrom developed contries are studied with the comparison to the position and function ofthe landscape conversion in China according to the reference framework. The results ofcase study help to raise the theoretical hypothesis for the design methods of landscapeconversion of irregular landfills surrounding Beijing, which is:“combining the processof landscape conversion and environmental remediation” in the design procedure and“taking the value of technological aesthetics as design principle” for the design concept.The first part of the hypothesis is verified with the project of sealing disposal andecological restoration of the municipal waste landfill of Yangfushan in Wenzhou. Thesecond part of the hypothesis is verified with the project of the design of “the splendidvalley” in the9th China (Beijing) International Garden Exposition. After reflecting andverifying the hypothesis by the two independent projects, the dissertation chooses a characteristic site of the irregular landfills in Beijing to complete the landscapeconversion design by synthetically implementing the design methods raised by theverified hypothesis. With design reflection, design experiences in this project aresummarized and specialized design knowledge on similar problems for landscapearchitects is structured. They generally cover the aspects of the extension of landscapedesign process, the principles of site planning and space layout, the transformation ofstie elements and so forth.The aforementioned research process that includes the case study and threeprojects composes a complete structure of Designerly Research. It is the application ofthe methodology of RtD in the field of landscape architecture. It develops the existingtheory that bases on single design process, and contributes renovated development tothe methodology of Research through Design.