Water management runs in the blood of the Dutch: draining the Netherlands and keeping it dry is a process they started centuries ago and continue to this day. In Sweet & Salt: Water and the Dutch, author Tracy Metz and art historian Maartje van den Heuvel demonstrate, in text and images, how the Netherlands negotiates its evolving relationship with water--and what the rest of the world can learn from them as our sea levels rise, our rivers swell and storms and droughts multiply. From New Orleans and Hamburg to Vietnam and China, the world is facing landscapes in drastic metamorphosis. And from the dikes and dams of the past to the new solutions of Dutch design practice for the future, the Netherlands’ history with water offers a much-needed perspective on life in our new waterworld.
Featured image, of "De Sphinxen"--five residential blocks in the water of the Gooimeer
lake, Huizen, designed by Neutelings Riedijk Architects--is reproduced from Sweet & Salt.
PRAISE AND REVIEWS
Architectural Record
James S Russell
Sweet & Salt is an intensely heavily visual consideration of the history, culture, and engineering of water that engages our senses and our emotions—not just our intellect—with its ravishing (and beautifully printed) photography, cartography, and art. We’re awed and enraptured by water—when we’re not fighting it off. You will not find any hand-wringing in this volume. Sweet & Salt is a profoundly humanistic consideration of the culture of water, with, along the way, many ideas by designers about how to deal with water’s myriad challenges. Architects, planners, and landscape designers will never think of a riverbank, levee, or seashore the same way again.
In the October issue of Architectural Record, James S. Russell writes, "You can open Sweet & Salt to a photo of torrential water ripping through the streets of a medieval town or a golden-hued painting of a peaceful ice-covered pond just after the chilly sun has set. Is this a history, a guidebook, a cautionary tale of climate change, a dike-designer’s handbook, or an art book? In the hands of Tracy Metz, a long-time contributor to Architectural Record, and art historian Maartje van den Heuvel, it is all of the above.
Sweet & Salt is an intensely heavily visual consideration of the history, culture, and engineering of water that engages our senses and our emotions—not just our intellect—with its ravishing (and beautifully printed) photography, cartography, and art… The not-so-underlying theme is of the Dutch as canaries in the global-warming coal mine. Much of Holland’s most productive land is below sea level, so the Dutch are acutely aware of subtle changes in the rivers, seas, and weather that get lost in the climactic background noise in America. After all, the nation has built its culture, government, social arrangements, and urban planning around water for hundreds of years." Inspiration lies within. Featured image, a filtering plant for drinking water designed by architect Wim Quist, is reproduced from Sweet & Salt. continue to blog
Featured image, of "De Sphinxen"—five residential blocks designed by Neutelings Riedijk Architects in the water of Gooimeer Lake, the Netherands—is reproduced from Tracy Metz and Maartje van den Heuvel's essential new study of Dutch water management, Sweet & Salt, which Michael Kimmelman calls "required reading" for anyone interested in how New York, and the world, will cope with rising waters and new weather patterns at sea level. See the full feature in this weekend's New York Times. continue to blog
FORMAT: Pbk, 9 x 11 in. / 296 pgs / 280 color. LIST PRICE: U.S. $44.95 LIST PRICE: CANADA $62.95 ISBN: 9789056628482 PUBLISHER: nai010 publishers AVAILABLE: 8/31/2012 DISTRIBUTION: D.A.P. RETAILER DISC: TRADE PUBLISHING STATUS: Active AVAILABILITY: In stock TERRITORY: NA LA ME
Published by nai010 publishers. Edited by Tracy Metz, Maartje van den Heuvel.
Water management runs in the blood of the Dutch: draining the Netherlands and keeping it dry is a process they started centuries ago and continue to this day. In Sweet & Salt: Water and the Dutch, author Tracy Metz and art historian Maartje van den Heuvel demonstrate, in text and images, how the Netherlands negotiates its evolving relationship with water--and what the rest of the world can learn from them as our sea levels rise, our rivers swell and storms and droughts multiply. From New Orleans and Hamburg to Vietnam and China, the world is facing landscapes in drastic metamorphosis. And from the dikes and dams of the past to the new solutions of Dutch design practice for the future, the Netherlands’ history with water offers a much-needed perspective on life in our new waterworld.
