at Marcus Barnett I was in charge of our competition entry . Established in 2004 , we are one of the leading garden and landscape design practices . The practice works for clients throughout the UK and internationally with projects ranging from intimate townhouse gardens and roof terraces to large country estates and holiday villas . Other projects include public realm works for hotels , public squares , and plazas . Recent and current locations in the UK include London , Kent , Hampshire , Wiltshire and Gloucestershire and internationally in Monaco , Kuwait , Riyadh and Tokyo .

From the Yeongcheon Horse Park project I have discovered the importance of analysis and how much to an extent learning about what you are designing informs the design decisions that you actually make , not only in terms of knowing the site but also understanding the subject matter that you are responding to .

A design is like an answer to a specific question that is posed within a brief , therefore it is quite obvious that to give an coherent answer you need to really understand the nature of the question .

The big challenge to that project was that going in I didn ’ t know a lot about horsemanship or horse racing so it was challenge to get to know the discipline . It was was like starting from zero , because of this

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it forced me to know the subject matter really well before I started to make design decisions .

Secondly as the programme for the project was very complex , in terms of having to position within a mountainous landscape over a half mile stretch of flat terrain , it required quite a lot of cut and fill exercises . So from the beginning we relied on 3D modelling to estimate the optimal positioning and height of the race course to ensure that the construction would be feasible . As on projects like these the last thing you want is having your concept design being value engineered down to not exactly what you imagined .

Going forward something I will take from this project will be

to search for inspiration in non obvious places and to widen the scope of inspiration - as where inspiration can come from is limitless .

I think this is a great age for landscape and design in general , we have started to see plants introduced into buildings themselves , completely merging the two domains together we have gardens being made indoors ; we are losing the distinction of where the inside ends and the outside starts - the boundaries are becoming blurred . This is what can happen when you widen the scope of inspiration , if designers tap into this it is going to be a bright new age for design as a whole .