Nature or not, it's all the Great Outdoors

So, I’m gonna get a little landscape architecture nerdy on you for a minute… Being in the Netherlands has been pretty trippy, from a landscape perspective. I promise I haven’t been into the space cakes again. But my American concept of nature is being turned upside down by the Dutch engineering and the whole “draining the ocean and living on the bottom of the sea” thing.

The word “nature” is a highly contested term in the LA realm. I could write a whole dissertation on this topic, and I’m sure many already have, so I’ll give you a short(ish) summary: Nature is a human construct. While the forests and mountains exist on their own right, the word “nature,” and all of the connotations that go along with it, are totally invented. The ideas about what nature is and what it should be differ across cultures, and Americans tend to have a much different perspective on nature is because our country was founded very recently (in the grand scheme of things).

The idea of national parks was developed before we even settled the whole 50, thus large expanses of wilderness have been preserved. Space is plentiful in the amber waves of grain, so we associate nature with big tracts of undeveloped land hosting sublime views of mountain peaks and towering trees. 

Endless and untouched; the typical American idea of "nature." Near where my family and I camp every year in the Sierra Nevadas, California.

Europe, on the other hand, is obviously much older and has been settled for hundreds of years (around the time my dad was a kid). Consequently, most of the land has been developed and large carnivores hunted out, not leaving much pristine wilderness or wildlife to later be preserved once the concept of national parks came around. So, Europe embraces “new nature,” and has re-planted and reconstructed many of their natural areas, making it feel very different from the United States.

Dutch "new nature" in Bloeyendael Park, Utrecht, a former landfill. Moments earlier, not one, but two people wearing backpacking gear "hiked" by us. Note the apartment towers in the background.

I’ve been pondering all this while driving around the Netherlands on our first week of class. Shaped by my American perceptions of nature, I arrived here with a concept that the highly constructed Dutch landscape was somehow inferior to a more natural system. With such a heavy focus on sustainability in our education now, the preservationist in me wonders how can something artificial possibly be better than what was already there?? But as we drove around the polders (drained lakes or sea, used for farmland), it didn’t look as unnatural as I thought it would. I would momentarily forget that the beautiful pastures and bosques were totally constructed and manmade.

Small white birds dotted the fields, perforating the expansive, green carpeted farmland. Canals systematically pierce through the land, reflecting the sky in silvery metallic lines. A midwesterner from the Land of 10,000 lakes would feel very comfortable amongst all of this water, in spite of it’s synthetic origins. It was beautiful, and it all just seemed to work.

Hmm, that's a lot of turf. I wonder what the native vegetation is here. OH YEAH, sand. Because, you know. Ocean floor.

Okay, so the polders are obviously madmade, but what about the nature preserves in the Netherlands? The Oostvaadersplassen is on a polder, but was not used for farming, and was actually planned for industrial development that never came to fruition. It was, as Wikipedia phrases it, “rewilded” in the late 1960s. It has a highly trafficked rail line running along the southern perimeter, cutting through a peaceful view of pastureland. Oh, and did I mention the animals here? Cows, horses, deer, and foxes. To be fair, they are heritage cattle and wild ponies, but still… not exactly the wolves of Yellowstone.

Then, we spent a day exploring De Hoge Veluwe, the Netherlands’ largest national park (perched in the highlands on a hill they call a “Dutch mountain”). Over 20 square miles of dunes, forest, and heathland, wrapped up in perfect, silent tranquility under an endless sky. Once the estate of a wealthy businessman, much of the land is reconstructed nature and continues to be pretty heavily managed and maintained.

Biking through the rolling heathland and birch groves, it looked as if it has always been that way, as if it was that piece of land’s destiny to bare those trees. The forest suddenly fell away into the blistering white drifts of an expansive dune landscape, the big “Zand,” interrupted by the occasional lonely gnarled, silvering cypress.

Edged by whispy moorgrass, the dreamy moonscape taunted me. I mean, there are hundreds, thousands, maybe a million cubic yards of sand in these dunes. Surely THIS feature was naturally occurring… Even the Dutch aren’t crazy enough to construct something as elaborate this this…. are they?