Settlements in Context

The careful and robust design of gardens and of the spaces in our settlements has an enormous visual impact. A response to slope, view, shelter, and sun may generate important decisions on the placing and form of building and its relation to outdoor space around it. So too a response to the context of the site and the character of the buildings around it will suggest the kind of detailing appropriate for hard surfaces, boundary walls, gates and planting design.

As the public character of buildings in the National Park is established by the sum of many details, in which external landscape elements play a major part, it is very important that a sufficient proportion of total costs should be included for external works in the overall financial plan for any development. Building design should not be a separate process from the design of the surrounding site, yet all too often it looks as if the site has received no consideration.