From gardening to landscaping, from La Quintinie to tomorrow.
Du jardinage au paysage, de La Quintinie à demain
Published on Thursday, July 10, 2025
Abstract
The transition from gardening to spatial design or planning, and vice versa, is a common issue in gardens and large parks, both historic and contemporary. The aim of this symposium is to bring together gardeners, historians, geographers, landscape architects, urban planners and other disciplines concerned with the art of gardening and landscape design, to examine and explore this transition between gardening and landscape. The 400th anniversary of the birth of Jean de La Quintinie (March 1st, 1626), designer and first gardener of the Potager du Roi, and the 50th anniversary of the creation of the Ecole nationale supérieure de paysage at the Potager du Roi (October 15th 1976) serve as catalysts.
Announcement
International symposium at the Ecole nationale supérieure de paysage, Versailles
Conference dates: Wednesday 11th and Thursday 12th, March 2026
Argument
The transition from gardening to spatial design or planning, and vice versa, is a common issue in gardens and large parks, both historic and contemporaryThis transition also concerns the agricultural world, which is reworking its connection to the landIt has become an urgent issue in a world seeking coherence between individual and collective actions, grappling with increasingly specialised knowledge and increasingly contradictory social demandsThe aim of this symposium is to bring together gardeners, historians, geographers, landscape architects, urban planners and other disciplines concerned with the art of gardening and landscape design, to examine and explore this transition between gardening and landscapeThe 400th anniversary of the birth of Jean de La Quintinie (March 1st, 1626), designer and first gardener of the Potager du Roi, and the 50th anniversary of the creation of the Ecole nationale supérieure de paysage at the Potager du Roi (October 15th 1976) serve as catalystsTo build on the results of this symposium, a publication is planned, provisionally entitled From Gardening to Landscape and Vice VersaThe Legacy of La Quintinie.
The author of Instruction pour les jardins fruitiers et potagers (Instruction for Fruit and Vegetable Gardens, 1690) and director of all Louis XIVth's fruit and vegetable gardens, La Quintinie is both well known and obscureA scholar who corresponded with the Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge and a renowned creator of fruit and vegetable gardens, La Quintinie is considered by some historians to be the father of French horticultureThis designation promotes the profession of horticulturist through professional lineage, following in the footsteps of agronomists who claim Olivier de Serres as the father of French agronomy and landscape architects who designate André Le Nôtre as the first French landscape architectDespite a considerable number of references by gardeners, landscape architects and historians, information about La Quintinie is scattered and ultimately inconsistentOpinions are based on his only printed work, as well as his creation of the Potager du Roi in Versailles, his only garden that is still actively cultivated as a kitchen garden.
The call for contributions is divided into four parts, but is not limited to them.
1 The gardens of La Quintinie
The Potager du Roi is La Quintinie's best-known work, but several other fruit and vegetable gardens are attributed to himWhether it be those he himself mentions in Chantilly, Rambouillet, Saint-Ouen and Sceaux, or the gardens in which he is thought to have been involved, such as Vaux-le-Vicomte, and others not yet identified (in France or abroad): studies of these attributions and of his role in these gardens are scarceThis symposium is an opportunity to better explore and expose what is known and what should be
2 Agriculture and gardening through treatises: before and after the Instruction pour les jardins fruitiers et potagers (1690)
La Quintinie ends his Instruction with ‘Reflections on Agriculture’The content of La Quintinie's work goes beyond a contribution to the practice of gardening aloneLa Quintinie's scholarly reputation is well known in his own time as can be ascertained through the 1675 epistle dedicated to him by Jean Laurent, author of the Abrégé pour les arbres nains (Compendium for Dwarf Trees)In this symposium we seek to place La Quintinie's work in the context of scientific research and competition among publishers for an audience of ‘curious’ individuals (collectors and scholars) who were interested in gardensLa Quintinie's work is both traditional, with its marginalia referring to ancient authors, and innovative, explicitly placing itself on the side of the ‘moderns’ with its use of scientific instruments and taste for noveltyFinally, several readings of La Quintinie are possible, even necessary; and the history in which La Quintinie took his place continues to this dayWho reads yesterday's gardening and agriculture books today, and why? Are there historical readings that are necessary, or at least important, for gardeners, farmers..and landscape architects?
3 From gardening to landscaping and vice versa: the transversality of living things
“Louis XIV, by offering his benefits to MLe Nôtre and Mde la Quintinie, gave masters of gardening to all of France: or rather, the parks and kitchen garden of Versailles became the school of the whole of Europe.” Abbé Pluche, Le spectacle de la nature, 1732(translation by AJacobsohn)
The idea that Le Nôtre and La Quintinie set an example, founded a school, seems to have been first expressed by Abbé Pluche in 1732It was taken up and repeated by Voltaire in 1751 and by others during the French RevolutionBut what is the relationship between landscape architects and gardeners? Are landscape architects necessarily gardeners? Is every gardener a landscape architect? What are the fundamental differences between their knowledge and practices? Gilles Vexlard (with Laurence Vacherot, Grand Prix du Paysage, 2009) sometimes used the following analogy: the mason is to the architect what the gardener is to the landscape architectIs this a heuristic and accurate analogy? And between the gardener and the landscape architect, where do the engineer, the manager, or even the artist fit in? How can we understand the relationship between Le Nôtre and La Quintinie from our current perspective? And how does our understanding of what is alive, of biology or of nature shape us today?
This perspective could also be discussed in terms of the professional titles given to garden designers, a history that has not yet been written, even though it is a subject of regular debate within professional federations and even among students who have chosen this career: gardener (the title first claimed by Gilles Clément), garden designer, landscape architect, landscape designer, landscape artist, landscape engineer, etcWhile the title of landscape architect offers greater clarity to the general public, does it not betray a relationship with gardening?
4 Teaching practices and gardening in higher education and outside the classroom
The Ecole Nationale Supérieure de Paysage is responsible for the Potager du Roi, and for 50 years, its students have all been, for a limited time, ‘inhabitants’ of the siteHow has the relationship between gardening and landscape design shaped landscape architecture education over the past 50 years? Have the similarities and differences between gardening and landscape design evolved, and if so, why? Landscape design is now taught in higher education institutions with different traditions (agronomy, architecture, decorative arts, fine arts, environment, horticulture, urban planning, etc.)Given their different heritages, what are the educational content and objectives based on gardening practice in these different higher education institutions? How have they evolved and what is the current relationship with the discipline of ecology? Finally, outside the walls of schools, are there gardening projects that ‘create’ landscape?
Proposals for contributions
Proposals are limited to 2,000 characters and must be accompanied by a short biographical and bibliographical presentation (1,500 characters).
They must be sent to the following address: a.jacobsohn@ecole-paysage.fr
before September 18th, 2025 (midnight).
Organizing committee, Larep (ENSP)
Antoine Jacobsohn – secretary ; Sophie Bonin, Marion Brun, Françoise Cremel, Pauline Frileux, Roberta Pistoni
Scientific Committee
Alienor Bertrand (ENS - Lyon), Stéphanie de Courtois (ENSA-V), Sonia Kéravel (ENSP), Patrick Moquay (ENSP), Florent Quellier (UnivAngers), Aurélien Ramos (UnivParis 1), Chiara Santini (ENSP)
Short Bibliography
Alienor BERTRAND, 2023, « Regards anthropologiques et métaphysiques croisés sur l’histoire de l’âme végétante : l’exemple de l’opposition de Jean-Baptiste de la Quintinie aux conceptions cartésiennes de la croissance des plantes », Dix-septième siècle, n° 301 (4), pp.635-646.
Fanny BLANCHARD, 2015, Les éditions françaises et allochtones de l’Instruction pour les jardins fruitiers et potagers de Jean-Baptiste de La Quintinie, Université de Lyon — ENSSIB.
Jean-Luc BRISSON, Gilles TIBERGHIEN, Michel CORAJOUD, Jean-Marc BESSE, (dir.), 2000, Le jardinier, l'artiste et l'ingénieur, Besançon, Les éditions de l’imprimeur.
CO-PAYSAGISTES (LES), 2024 et 2025, Le paysage est un projet : t.1 Ménager les territoires ; t.2 Dessiner l’étendue, Paris, Hermann.
Stéphanie de COURTOIS, 1999, « Postface », dans Instruction pour les jardins fruitiers et potagers, Arles, Actes sud/ENSP (ré-impression de l’ouvrage de Jean-Baptiste de La Quintinie de 1690), nouvelle version 2016.
Françoise DUBOST, 1983, « Les paysagistes et l’invention du paysage », Sociologie du travail, 25-4, pp.432-445.
Marion ERWEIN, 2017, « Du jardinage collectif au paysagisme bénévoleTrois figures de la participation corporelle à la fabrique de la ville »Géographie et cultures, no 103, 63‑86.
Camille FRECHOU et François ROUMET (dir.), 2025, Utopies rustiques : paysages et jardins en chantier, Marseille, Editions Parenthèses.
Antoine JACOBSOHN, 2021, « Le Nôtre et La Quintinie font école », dans PaysagesL’héritage de Le Nôtre, dirAudouy et Santini, Arles, Actes sud/ENSP, pp.181-186.
Aurélien RAMOS, 2024 “Institutionnaliser le jardinage tactique dans la rue : les permis de végétaliser des villes françaises (2004 et 2018)”, Espaces et sociétés, n°192, pp.19‑37.
Julian RAXWORTHY, 2018, Overgrown: practices between landscape architecture and gardening, Cambridge, MIT Press.
Subjects
- History (Main category)
- Mind and language > Representation > Heritage
- Periods > Early modern
- Society > Urban studies
- Periods > Modern
- Society > Geography > Geography: society and territory
- Society > Political studies > Governance and public policies
- Society > Geography > Nature, landscape and environment
Places
- École nationale supérieure de paysage, Potager du Roi, 10 rue du Maréchal Joffre
Versailles, France (78000)
Event attendance modalities
Full on-site event
Date(s)
- Thursday, September 18, 2025
Keywords
- jardinage, paysage, art du jardin, histoire du paysage, enseignement
Contact(s)
- Antoine Jacobsohn
courriel : a [dot] jacobsohn [at] ecole-paysage [dot] fr
Information source
- Antoine Jacobsohn
courriel : a [dot] jacobsohn [at] ecole-paysage [dot] fr
License
This announcement is licensed under the terms of Creative Commons - Attribution 4.0 International - CC BY 4.0 .
To cite this announcement
Antoine Jacobsohn, « From gardening to landscaping, from La Quintinie to tomorrow. », Call for papers, Calenda, Published on Thursday, July 10, 2025, https://doi.org/10.58079/14b6d
Author(s)
Antoine Jacobsohn
