In providing a sustainable and meaningful landscape design for the growing populations surrounding ‘John Clare Country’, this project looks at the causal relationship between ecological health and human health, with a particular focus on changing landscapes and place identity.

Habitat loss through the rapid expansion of Peterborough, the threat of sea level rise and future flood risks on this fen edge landscape is a core issue for a relatively small area of landscape that sits between Peterborough, Stamford and the A1 motorway and yet the increasing local population need to access this green space for their wellbeing and sense of local cultural identity.

The unspectacular agricultural landscape of this area has enormous cultural significance largely thanks to the life and poetry of John Clare. His importance is made all the more so as his work described the ecology of this very landscape in exceptional detail.

John Clare (1793–1864) wrote at a time of huge environmental and social upheaval. His poetic exploration of loss, of place, of nature and of community has never been more relevant in today’s climate of ecological crisis.

To find work within the Landscape Architecture sector and focus on nature recovery programmes, access to nature, nature based solutions and placemaking.