Identification of landscape elements in Malaysian garden development

Malaysian garden might not have been developed to the equivalence of English, French, Chinese, or Japanese garden. In the literature review, the achievement of developing Malaysian garden might be determined parallel to cultural development similar with other type of gardens. It is posited that Malaysian garden is currently at the preliminary development stage of basic structure or ‘sub-structure.’ The development of ‘sub-structure’ arguably will lead to the formation of the ‘base course’ of garden-making practice which will then be transfer to be actual garden style or the ‘surface layer’. In order to identify the basic or ‘sub-structure’ of Malaysian garden, three methods have been employed to determine landscape elements perceived as important for Malaysian garden through the relationship between nature and garden. From the web analysis, it is found that the garden image is closely related with nature especially in the established garden cultures such as Chinese, Japanese, French, and English garden. However, for Malaysian garden, analysis found that there is no relationship between the images of Malaysian garden with Malaysian nature. In the self-photo analysis, one hundred photographs of Malaysian landscape have been analyzed through content analysis method. The analysis found that plants are the most frequently used to representation Malaysian landscape followed by geographical feature such as mountains, stones/rocks, and islands. Meanwhile, twelve ordinary Malaysian consist of Malay, Chinese and Indian have been interviewed to identify their experiences with landscape and nature from their pasts and the results were examined and analyzed. The analysis reveals that the participants have positive attachment to nature especially waterfalls, streams, forests and trees. The participants also enhanced the importance of landscape spaces for social bonding, relationship to nature, village environment and family affairs. Findings from these three methods are triangulated and, landscape elements are categorized into primary, secondary and minor subjects in conclusion. Among the primary elements are plants, moving water features and rocks and these elements are important to be basic or sub-structure for Malaysian garden. Moreover, the landscape also must function for community social activity spaces. These elements shall be included in the development of Malaysian garden.

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