During our discussion on therapeutic gardens we decided to check out one of the cities most famous parks and also our neighbor to the east: Millennium Park. Before actually going to the park, we discussed healing gardens, the different theories around them, as well as how as architects we can design these spaces to accommodate for different kinds of patient acuity levels. Before checking out the park I decided to do a little bit of reading of my own and found some pretty interesting theories pertaining to these parks/gardens. One specific academic journal that I found was entitled, Therapeutic landscapes and healing gardens: A review of Chinese literature in relation to the studies in western countries. This article was especially interesting because it noted some of the most prevalent theories of healing spaces in the western culture and how they relate and differ from theories that are taught and expressed in the eastern (more specifically Chinese) culture. I decided to look into the 4 western theories stated in the article and see if I could find any correlation with their ideas and the structure, planning, and emotion of Millennium Park.
The four schools of western theory as discussed were
1. Medical Geography
2. Environmental Psychology
3. Ecological Psychology
4. Horticultural Therapy
Below is a chart that the article presented in the introduction of each of the schools of thought and the main theories associated with them:
After reading about these different theories I decided to go to Millennium Park with an open mind about the school of thought this park could possibly originate from. In the end I think that Millennium Park really joins with two different school, and I think that this mostly is the case due to the different renovations the park has gone through over the years.
The park in my opinion correlates with the first school and its four dimensions of a therapeutic landscape: natural environment, built environment, symbolic environment, and social environment. However, I also think that the addition of the neighboring Maggie Daily Park and the bridges to and from that as well as the Art Institute also correlate the park to the fourth school and its theory of "flow experience".
Millennium Park really does give the viewer a sense of place. It is an urban scaled park, but yet some areas of it like the Chase and Boeing Promenades make the viewer feel like they are in a much smaller area. We did visit during the winter, but as I walked through I was envisioning the images I gathered from being there this past fall when there were still leaves on the trees. The promenade trees form a sort of arching over typography that make the area seem more quaint and of a much smaller scale. This relates to the natural environment of the first school.
Walking in pretty much any direction from the promenades the viewer then is able to experience the built environment portion of the first theory. Not only are there pretty much panoramic views of the skyline from all edges of the park, but there are also large urban features such as the Jay Pritzker Pavilion. These remind the viewers that while they are in a nature setting they are also within the built environment as well. I think that this relates to this sense of place that the first school mentions.
The park is much more complex than that though. While yes it does include natural spaces within the greater built environment of the city it also contains areas of symbolic meaning as well as social spaces. I felt like these areas of symbolic meaning were captured in all of the different art pieces in the park. Anything from the very modern art to the Lurie Garden has symbolic meaning behind it. In fact, the Lurie Garden's design was based off of the motto, "Urbs in Horto" which means "City in a Garden". This is symbolic of Chicago's history and the metamorphosis that the landscape went through from natural prairie and marshland to thriving city.
The last part of the first school of thought is the idea of the park being a social environment which I also see in Millennium Park. This is brought out in the various attractions of the park such as Cloud Gate (or what we Midwesterners refer to as "The Bean"), The Crown Fountain, and also as mentioned before the Jay Pritzker Pavilion. These are all spaces that people want to find themselves at. Whether you are a tourist visiting for the weekend or a local you have visited the bean and taken a picture with your friends or family at least once! And, you have probably asked a complete stranger to take the picture, and then offered yourself up to take theirs! In fact, now there are special facebook groups that people from all over the city who don't even know each other are a part of that plan fake events for the bean. These are areas that allow for social interaction even outside of the park and into the virtual world. They allow for conversation amongst new individuals and spawn the growth of human interaction which is vital to our wellbeing.
The combination of all of these parts working as a whole is what makes Millennium Park so successful. You can visit the park and have the ability for privacy and to talk to no one, or come to the park with the notion of seeing and speaking to a complete stranger. The possibilities are endless and they lead to a different sensory experience each time. So go visit the park if you haven't, see how many strangers ask you to take their picture in front of the bean!
Article on western vs. eastern ideas:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2095263513000836
Photo Credit:
https://chicago.curbed.com/2017/10/27/16561000/facebook-event-windex-the-bean
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