Date of Award

5-2009

Document Type

Terminal Project

Degree Name

Master of Landscape Architecture (MLA)

Department

Planning and Landscape Architecture

Advisor

Cari L. Goetcheus

Committee Member

Dr. Miller G. Cunningham

Committee Member

Dr. Umit Yilmaz

Abstract

This project explores historic and cultural components of two sweetgrass basket making communities adjacent to Mount Pleasant, South Carolina in an effort to conserve crucial ecosystems in an associated greenspace network while enhancing connections between established historic and new communities. Located in the recently established Gullah/Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor running from North Carolina to Florida, these two historic communities once served as valuable agriculture and cultural art resources in and of themselves as well as to the city of Charleston, South Carolina. As growth in the greater Mt. Pleasant has increased over the past 30 years, many of the definitive boundaries of the historic communities have been blurred as a result of new developments. Fragmentation of the physical communities directly relates to fragmentation of the unique habitats where basket-making materials once grew naturally. Analysis of the existing cultural and natural resource patterns of the historic communities and their relationships can influence design strategies that may assist the communities to tie into a broader regional framework. This product documents the spatial relationships of the built environment in relation to adjacent greenspace. This relationship served as a tool to further define the community design attributes, patterns, rhythms. These design attributes, patterns, rhythms can then suggest planning and design strategies that reinforce and protect the historic cultural fabric that makes up those communities as well as provide a solution to accommodate potential growth in and around the specific communities.

Download

Share

COinS