cultural landscapes studies how culture and nature interact to shape the surface of the earth, and combines many disciplines, including landscape architecture, gardening, biology and ecology, architecture, sociology and archeology

The Centre for the Future's concern with cultural landscapes hinges on the understanding that the study of how human action interacts with the surface of the Earth, and the natural systems on which our civilization depends, not only serves to enhance our understanding of cultural development but is also the basis for a healthy and sustainable vision for the future.

For two years we presented Cultural Landscapes festivals which served as a public interface for these ideas, combining exhibition and symposia, panels, lectures and discussions, guided tours, a children’s workshop and film screenings.

We are now preparing to launch a Cultural Landscapes department, which will provide a year-round academic base to pursue these ideas, in partnership with practitioners, Universities and other international institutions around the world. We also intend to produce related publications and media content as well as establishing permanent research facilities and educational programs.

Major areas of interest for us include:

• water in the landscape 
  As potable water becomes a diminishing global resource, how can we combine modern technologies with historic and indigenous understandings of water storage and distribution from around the world to create efficient ways of using water in the landscape? The goal of this program combines:
   
  • improving the health of water bodies
  • ensuring adequate water supply for mutiple human uses
  • providing adequate food supplies
  • protecting ecosystems, especially forests, woodlands and wetlands
  • maintaining and enhancing the aesthetic delight that water brings in all cultures
    
• the European Greenbelt
  Slavonice lies within the 8,500Km strip of the European Greenbelt, which has replaced the barbed wire and minefields of the Iron Curtain with a remarkable nature preserve stretching from the Arctic to the Black Sea. The Greenbelt spans 23 nations and connects thousands of communities. At the Centre for the Future we recognize that the Greenbelt provides a perfect protoyping area for combining the preservation of natural systems and biological diversity with limited amounts of state-of-the-art sustainable development.