A Semantic Analysis of the Plan View of the Small Urban Park Designed during the Reconstruction Period after the Great Kanto Earthquake in 1923

Abstract

Because of the “Architectural Design Style” applied to the design process, thesmall urban parks designed and built in the Tokyo during the reconstruction period after the Great Kanto Earthquake in 1923 have been given a critical position in the modern history of urban park development in Japan. A series of semantic analysis of the spatial form found in the plan view of the parks were conducted in this study. The result indicates that, in addition to their physical existence, the trees and facilities, major compositional elements of the parks, contain a complex meaning which requires a formal structure to be settled in relation with overall plan of the park. Also, a concept of formal structure originated in an internal formal composition of the plan was defined as a frame of reference to understand the complexity in the meaning of the compositional elements.