Garden Museum

Room 2 – Formal gardens and landscape gardens

In the 18th century there was a radical change in European garden design. The formal or French style was gradually replaced by the landscape or English style.

The formal style was allied to architectural conventions. Nature was subordinated to the will of man and shaped according to geometric principles. The formal garden thus reflected the hierarchical political order of absolutism.

The landscape style on the other hand was related to painting. It recreated the beauties of nature and presented them in an idealized form. The landscape garden was an individual interpretation of nature, which was part of the philosophical and political programme of the Enlightenment.