>’The Garden City is not a suburb but the antithesis of a suburb: not a mere rual retreat, but a more integrated foundation for an effective urban life.’ - Lewis Mumford The garden city movement was an eco-architectural project created by [[@Ebenezer Howard]]. His hope was to create a new type of society where everyone benefited, not just the rich or the middle class who attempted to escape to a slightly more rural everyday living situation. The goal was to prevent to propagation of social ills and the permanent poverty cycle in cities. Howard was also heavily influenced by [[Communtarianism]]. Cooperative ownership of land was a central component of many of these types of projects. Howard wrote ‘Garden Cities of To-Morrow’ to describe how the garden city was an alternative to urban and rural living. Letchworth was the first attempt at building a garden city. It began in 1903 with Barry Parker and Raymond Unwin as designers. The planners had to work with a lack of funding which caused problems. While it was a great place to live, it failed to include enough industry to support residents. Wlewyn was the second garden city, built on empty land 21 miles from London. It was a minor industrial center and ended up becoming just another suburb in the end. Investors ended up maximizing profit instead of community benefit. Clarence Stein and Henry Wright took inspiration from Wlewyn for the United States, creating Radburn in 1929, in New Jersey. At this point, the walkable city was adapted for the automobile friendly with tons of gardens and parks that didn’t interact with roads. Eventually garden city designs inspired several types of cities around the world. Unfortunately, company towns, religious groups, and for profit groups also adapted the designs for their work. And the design was left behind for the modern suburb which distributes residents as much as possible and making them car dependent. All of these designs, never allowed for true garden city design because they had to rely on: - outside funding - investors - didn’t expand industry - became depedent on cities - didn’t implement community ownership or coops - use promo while only adopting 1-2 garden city principles ![[Garden_City_Concept_by_Howard.jpg|236]] ## Sources: - [The Strange and Wonderful 19th Century Utopian Suburbs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LkSuBdckb4) - [[@Frederick Law Olmstead]] - [[Communitarianism]] - [[Home Colony Movement]] - ‘Paradise Planned: The Garden Suburb and the Modern City’ by Robert A.M. Stern -