The landscape project as the hidden dimension in the European Landscape Convention: opportunity or new capacity for local action

The European Landscape Convention (ELC, 2000) has made it possible to re-examine the cultures of transformation and land management shaped by inherited practices of knowledge’ sectorisation. This reflection involves on tools and times required to transpose ELC principles into actions. The concept of project, as a hidden dimension, is being tested in a pilot area: the Vesdre valley (BE). In situ observations are used to experiment with the socio-spatial conditions of landscapes hitherto little considered. Observation, as a specificity of landscape approaches, allows to know what happened and to communicate with places and inhabitants. Recognising the gaps between environmental conditions after functionalist management and the today need of systemic landscape’s knowledge has paved the way for design alternatives. In the absence of an institutionalised vision and forward-looking tools, research by design is an exploratory method that responds to the need for landscape-focused perspectives and makes the project a means of raising awareness of the local landscape.