Polders

Polders are low-lying tracts of land reclaimed from water, most famously in the Netherlands, enclosed by dikes and drained for agriculture and settlement. They are symbols of human conquest over water, landscapes of control where nature is engineered into order. Yet they are also precarious—always at risk of flooding, demanding constant maintenance and vigilance. Polders embody both ingenuity and fragility. They show how design can reshape entire geographies, but also how ecological and climatic forces can undo centuries of effort in an instant. Polders are concentrated in the Netherlands where there is a saying that "God created the Earth, but the Dutch created the Netherlands", also from the soil they dug from the sea. This engineered landscape is flat and small topographic modifications can have big consequences. Due to this conditions, Dutch landscape architects are being, to this day, considered as remarkable engineers when it comes to designing water and topography.

/ Urška Škerl

The Dutch Landscape, The Ultimate Guide for Study, Professional and Personal Use by Alexandra Tišma[1] and Han Lörzing[2] is a “text-book” and a thorough yet very accessible guide on landscapes in the Netherlands – described from many angles and scales, historical, geographical, geological and biotic layers, cultural landscapes, from development, and planning to conservation – […]

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