The cognitive process of Chinese gardens in the West is like a painting of ups and downs. With the changes of the times and the evolution of communication channels, it has gone through a tortuous process from praise to criticism, and finally returned to rationality. In this long and complex journey of cognition, the turning point of the early 20th century was particularly crucial. With the specialized investigation of architectural art and the widespread application of photography technology, the Western academic community opened a new chapter in the study of Chinese gardens, and a series of garden monographs emerged one after another. Among them, Florence Lee Powell's In the Chinese Garden became a brilliant pearl in the history of cross-cultural communication with its unique perspective and presentation. This paper aims to deeply analyze the unique position and value of the book In the Chinese Garden in the Western understanding of Chinese gardens from the perspective of cross-cultural communication, by examining the author's life, writing purpose, discourse structure, discourse style, and the use of photographs. By examining the research of Florence Lee Powell, we can have a more comprehensive, fair, and objective understanding of the profound cultural heritage of Chinese gardens. Florence Lee Powell, a foreign teacher with an infinite passion for Chinese culture, was deeply attracted to Chinese culture during her teaching period at Suzhou Jinghai Women's Normal School in 1926, and began to explore and record Chinese gardens in depth. She captured the beauty of Suzhou Lingering Garden and Lion Grove Garden with her feminine delicacy and sensitivity, engraving every detail of these two classic gardens into the memory of history. In 1943, she compiled these precious images and profound insights into a formal book for publication. This work is not only a heartfelt tribute to Chinese garden art, but also a successful practice in cross-cultural dialogue, opening a unique window for Western readers to explore the beauty of Chinese gardens. In terms of discourse structure, In the Chinese Garden demonstrates a rigorous academic style and clear logical clues. At the beginning, Florence Lee Powell sincerely explained the original intention and historical background of writing this book, laying a guiding stone for readers to reach the hall of Chinese classical garden art. Subsequently, as an almost tour guide, she led readers to explore the deep secrets of the Lingering Garden and Lion Grove Garden step by step according to the actual tour route. The clever combination of floor plans and sequence photos in the book makes readers feel as if they are walking among the gardens themselves. They can not only intuitively feel the ingenuity and harmony of the garden layout, but also understand the profound cultural connotations and symbolic meanings behind each scenery through delicate and meticulous textual explanations. This narrative strategy, which combines graphics and text, greatly enhances the readability and attractiveness of books, providing Western readers with an unprecedented perspective to understand and appreciate the subtleties of Chinese garden art. In the application and analysis of photos, Florence Lee Powell demonstrated extraordinary aesthetic insight. She is skilled in using central composition techniques, cleverly utilizing doors, windows, doorways, and even natural branches in the garden as the framework of the picture, not only guiding the viewer's visual focus, but also endowing the photo with deeper aesthetic connotations. By accurately capturing the details of the garden, whether it is the intricate textures on the rockery, the exquisite patterns on the leaky windows, or even the delicate tiles on the roof, they are all recorded one by one by Florence Lee Powell's lens, allowing Western readers to experience the delicacy and delicacy of Chinese gardens up close, as if crossing time and space, and personally touching the physical objects that carry heavy historical and cultural memories, experiencing a spiritual baptism and cultural exploration. The innovative value of In the Chinese Garden is not only reflected in filling the gap in Western research on the Chinese landscape system, but more importantly, as a successful case of cross-cultural communication, it provides valuable methodological inspiration for later scholars and researchers. The combination of sequential photography and textual description used in the book not only deepens the Western world's understanding and appreciation of Chinese garden art, but also opens up new paths for the fields of garden photography, recording, and analysis. This work builds a bridge connecting Eastern and Western cultures through its unique discourse logic and rich visual materials, promoting mutual understanding and respect between the two civilizations. To this day, In the Chinese Garden still shines with its immortal academic brilliance and cultural value. The photos in the book, as precious historical witnesses, not only provide intuitive visual materials for scholars to study the historical evolution of Chinese gardens, but also provide important references for the protection, restoration, and inheritance of modern gardens. In the wave of globalization, we must cherish and inherit this cultural treasure that transcends national borders, so that the unique charm of Chinese gardens can continue to shine on the stage of world culture and become a common spiritual wealth of all mankind.

With China's urban development transitioning from incremental expansion to a phase characterized by stock renewal and quality improvement, the principle of "cities should be built by the people and for the people" has become a fundamental guiding principle for contemporary urban governance and spatial production. Within this context, the concept of People's Garden has emerged as a critical response from the discipline of landscape architecture to the demands of people-centered urban transformation. By shifting the focus from elite-oriented landscape production toward everyday spaces shaped, used, and maintained by ordinary citizens, People's Garden reorients landscape practice toward livelihood needs, social participation, and grassroots governance. This paper systematically traces the ideological origins and practical evolution of People's Garden, situating it within both Chinese and international traditions of public space creation and civic participation. In the Chinese context, its roots can be found in vernacular practices of spontaneous spatial construction and the longstanding cultural notion of "sharing landscapes with the people", evident in early public garden traditions and informal, community-based landscape making. In Western contexts, comparable traditions include ancient public groves, the rise of urban parks during industrialization, and later bottom-up movements such as community gardens and civic environmental activism. Together, these diverse historical trajectories reveal a shared pursuit of publicness, participation, and collective stewardship of everyday landscapes. Building on this historical review, the study further examines the transition of landscape architecture from elite and symbolic garden forms to modern public parks, and ultimately toward contemporary participatory landscapes. While modern public parks marked an important step toward openness and accessibility, they largely remained products of top-down planning processes in which citizens were passive users rather than active creators. People's Garden, formally articulated in China in 2024, represents a qualitative shift beyond these earlier models. It integrates the principles of the People-Centered City with current social conditions of urban regeneration, emphasizing residents' subjectivity, multi-actor collaboration, and the embedding of landscape practices within daily life. From a theoretical perspective, the paper constructs an analytical framework for People's Garden by drawing on landscape architecture theory, sociology, and anthropology. Concepts such as People-oriented, the Public Sphere, Social Capital, Daily Life, and Place-making provide intellectual support for understanding how People's Garden functions not merely as a spatial form, but as a social process. Empirically, the study reviews 26 representative cases from China and abroad, covering a wide range of scales and contexts, including national parks, urban parks, community gardens, and micro-regeneration projects. Based on the leading actors and participation mechanisms involved, these cases are classified into three main practice models: government-led initiatives, multi-stakeholder co-governance practices, and resident-initiated self-organized actions. To support comparative analysis, a three-dimensional evaluative framework is developed, focusing on government support, citizen participation, and collaborative networks. This framework helps reveal the gradual shift from state-dominated provision toward deeper forms of civic engagement and self-governance. Drawing on the comparative analysis of these cases, the paper synthesizes a practical pathway for People's Landscape structured around the integrated principles of co-construction, co-governance, and sharing. Co-construction emphasizes the establishment of collaborative platforms that integrate governmental guidance, professional expertise, social organizations, market resources, and residents' local knowledge. Co-governance focuses on institutionalizing participatory mechanisms throughout the entire life cycle of landscape projects, from planning and construction to long-term management, thereby ensuring sustainability and collective responsibility. Sharing highlights the equitable distribution of ecological, social, and cultural benefits, transforming landscape outcomes into tangible improvements in everyday life, community cohesion, and environmental well-being. In conclusion, People's Garden represents a fundamental reorientation of landscape architecture in contemporary China - from the creation of designed objects toward the cultivation of people-centered processes of spatial governance. By embedding landscape practices within everyday life and empowering citizens as co-creators and co-managers, People's Garden contributes to the enhancement of urban environmental quality, the strengthening of social capital, and the advancement of grassroots governance. Although the concept is still in an exploratory stage and faces challenges related to classification, scalability, and long-term institutional support, it offers significant potential for supporting high-quality urban development and improved quality of life under the framework of Chinese modernization. As such, People's Garden provides both theoretical insights and practical guidance for realizing the vision of the People-Centered City and advancing sustainable urban futures.

As China's urban development gradually shifts from scale expansion to the stage of optimizing and renewing the existing stock, the core goal of urban greening construction has changed from merely increasing the area of green space to enhancing the quality of space and the efficiency of public services. This transformation has made strengthening the public participation mechanism an urgent need for current urban greening work. Against this backdrop, the urban public green space construction model with the core concept of "People's Garden" has emerged. It emphasizes a green governance path oriented towards residents' demands and jointly built by multiple subjects, becoming an important exploration direction to solve the problem of the disconnection between traditional green space construction and public demands. However, at present, the practice of public participation in the construction of urban green Spaces in our country still faces many challenges - there are operational difficulties such as the lack of standardized guidelines for the participation process and the unsmooth feedback channels for residents' demands, as well as institutional shortcomings such as the ambiguous definition of the rights and responsibilities of the participating subjects in policies and regulations and the insufficiency of incentive mechanisms. The overall implementation path has not yet formed a clear framework. The relevant supporting institutional system is in urgent need of systematic improvement. As a typical example of public-participatory green space construction on a global scale, Setagaya Ward in Tokyo, Japan, has been focusing on the needs of urban refined management since the 1990s. Through a combination of policy guidance, mechanism innovation, and community mobilization, it has systematically promoted the institutionalization and systematization of the entire construction process. After more than three decades of practical exploration, A public-participatory green space construction model that is both operational and has demonstration value has been formed. This study conducts in-depth exploration around three core dimensions: First, it systematically sorts out the development trajectory of public participation in green space construction in Japan, from the rise of civic movements to the transformation of community building after the bubble economy, clarifying the changes in policy-driven and social demands at different stages; Secondly, taking Setanagaya District as the empirical research object, through literature analysis and field investigation, the organizational structure of its public participation in green space construction is analyzed in detail, and the policy framework including the detailed implementation rules of the "Urban Park Law", district-level special regulations, and the community building subsidy system is systematically sorted out. And summarize its supporting system in terms of fundraising, technical guidance, publicity and promotion, etc. Thirdly, for the key hub organization, Setagaya Trust & Community Design, core members were selected to conduct semi-structured in-depth interviews. A comprehensive assessment and reflection were carried out on its green space construction practices from dimensions such as practical effectiveness, existing challenges, and sustainability. Summarize successful experiences and room for improvement. Based on the above research, this paper ultimately returns to the reflection on the construction of "People's Gardens" in our country. In light of local realities, it puts forward targeted suggestions from three aspects: policy improvement, organizational optimization, and action innovation. At the policy level, it is necessary to accelerate special legislation to clarify the rights and responsibilities of participants. At the organizational level, a cross-departmental collaborative platform should be established to promote resource integration. At the action level, it is necessary to stimulate residents' continuous participation motivation through capacity building and cultural cultivation, thereby providing practical references for the construction of public-participatory green Spaces in the context of urban stock renewal in China.

In recent decades, contemporary urban renewal has gradually moved away from the conventional paradigm of large-scale demolition and reconstruction and has entered a phase characterized by incremental development and fine-grained spatial intervention. As the basic spatial and social unit of the city, the community plays a critical role in supporting refined urban development, maintaining social cohesion, and safeguarding residents' everyday well-being. In parallel with this shift, the governance model of co-construction, co-governance, and co-sharing, which emphasizes the integration of diverse social resources and the active involvement of residents, has become a widely adopted approach in both policy discourse and practical implementation. Although a wide range of flexible and participatory community renewal initiatives have been launched in recent years, many of these projects encounter difficulties in sustaining spatial quality and social vitality over time, often due to limited maintenance capacity and the absence of long-term operational mechanisms. In response to these challenges, this study conducted a community garden co-creation experiment at the Neighborly Gate Garden in Shanghai, using it as an empirical case to explore whether micro-renewal practices guided by participatory principles and a sustainability-oriented framework can effectively support the long-term operation and stewardship of community spaces. Grounded in sustainability theory, the research established a four-dimensional analytical framework encompassing ecological sustainability, cultural-spiritual sustainability, economic sustainability, and social sustainability. This framework was employed to structure both the design of the experiment and the subsequent evaluation of its outcomes. Methodologically, the study adopted a mixed research approach that combined interdisciplinary analysis with participatory observation, enabling a systematic documentation of the planning process, implementation stages, and post-intervention conditions of the community garden. The findings indicate that public participation informed by sustainability principles can significantly enhance residents' willingness to engage in community affairs, reduce the financial burden on local governments, and improve short-term site maintenance outcomes. However, the study also reveals that the capacity of self-organized groups to independently sustain long-term maintenance remains limited. Longitudinal observations suggest that enduring stewardship of community micro-spaces still depends on continuous policy support, institutional guidance, and stable resource input from the top down. The experiment further reveals that participants of different ages and identities demonstrated distinct levels of engagement at various stages; public activities with artistic or general attributes were more effective in stimulating participation among residents and children than those requiring specialized expertise; and a degree of positive correlation emerged between the condition of site maintenance and residents' digital engagement in community platforms. Based on the empirical observations and the organizational experience accumulated during the experiment, the study proposes a set of strategies with potential transferability and replicability. These include ecological sustainability strategies focused on strengthening residents' ecological knowledge, establishing designated points for sustainable material sorting, and recommending appropriate sustainable materials; cultural-spiritual strategies that clarify organizational pathways across different participation stages and foster a shared sense of belonging among diverse groups; economic sustainability strategies that emphasize multi-actor governance, cost optimization, and the diversification of community-based economic activities; and social sustainability strategies that integrate top-down policy support, bottom-up self-organization, and the cultivation of responsible teams and community compacts. Through the design of this co-creation experiment and the articulation of strategies within a four-dimensional sustainability framework, this study aims to enhance the artistic, public, and sustainable qualities of community micro-spaces and to provide practical insights for future research and community renewal practice.

Drawing on phenomenological theory and concrete cases of socially engaged design, this article seeks to describe an action script termed "Leveraging (Qiaodong)", offering a theoretical perspective for attending to and understanding seemingly localized and small-scale social actions that nonetheless have the potential to generate ongoing change, such as beginning to cultivate a garden on an unused plot of land. Such actions do not usually originate from clearly defined, comprehensive plans. Instead, they emerge in situations where people confront limited conditions, insufficient resources, or complex social problems that cannot be directly resolved. Rather than aiming to "solve" problems, actors initiate actions that are immediately doable and capable of being taken up in the present, gradually reopening possibilities for further action. In the process of continuing to do things, actors often develop a sense of guidance or handiness, which is a feeling of "there are more things to do". This sense does not arise from certainty about outcomes, but from a directional momentum that takes shape through action itself. It helps reorganize attention toward one's surroundings and toward others, sustaining engagement amid uncertainty. Through such processes, localized actions may become noticeable to others, invite participation, and elicit responses, thereby gradually stimulating broader forms of public collaboration and the emergence of public life. The central question of this article is how such seemingly minor, low-threshold actions accumulate social effects over time, reorganize attention, and respond to long-standing social problems that are structurally complex and resistant to direct solutions. Theoretically, this article situates itself within contemporary discussions of co-design, while entering into dialogue with phenomenological traditions associated with Heidegger, Ingold, and Gibson. The discussion is grounded in a series of concrete cases observed or participated in by the author between 2022 and 2024, including socially engaged design initiatives such as community gardening, publicly engaged art projects, and design workshops. The articulation of leveraging as an action script is not intended to introduce a new method for participatory design. Rather, it aims to provide conceptual language for an action mode that is already widely present in everyday life and professional practice, yet often remains under-theorized. By foregrounding leveraging, the article seeks to support readers in becoming more attentive to how one action gives rise to another, and how action unfolds through mutual responsiveness within concrete situations. To elaborate on this script, the article addresses three interrelated questions. The first two concern epistemology: how can we narrate change as it unfolds through action without reducing it to linear causality, and how can small-scale actions in everyday life be taken seriously as forms of design practice? The third question concerns the ethics of action: when social problems cannot be directly solved, should the responsibility of design still be framed in terms of problem-solving, or should it instead be understood as a sustained capacity to respond to concrete lived situations?

In ecologically sensitive and geographically constrained plateau regions, the dynamic relationship between cities and lakes constitutes a fundamental driver of regional sustainability. These landscapes exist in a state of deep interdependence, where the symbiotic interfaces - the transitional zones where urban and lacustrine systems converge-serve as vital arenas for continuous material and energy flows, as well as profound land use and land cover changes. The spatial configuration and functional management of these interfaces are therefore of paramount importance, directly influencing urban ecological resilience, biodiversity, microclimate regulation, and ultimately, the quality of human habitation. Focusing on the emblematic plateau lake-city system of Kunming and Dianchi Lake, this research employs a longitudinal, spatially-explicit analytical framework to unravel the complex co-evolution of urban development and lake ecology. By integrating multi-source remote sensing imagery, geographic information system (GIS) techniques, and statistical data spanning from 1990 to 2020, we systematically quantified the spatiotemporal patterns of urban expansion and lakeshore transformation. The core of our analysis lies in applying a coupled coordination degree model to evaluate the synergistic symbiosis level of the city-lake landscape system, moving beyond descriptive analysis to a quantified assessment of system harmony. The principal findings of this study reveal a nuanced trajectory of interaction and co-adaptation: 1) Spatial-Temporal Dynamics: The evolving tension and negotiation between urban spatial growth and the imperative for lake ecological protection have been the dominant force reshaping the landscape symbiotic interfaces. This has manifested in cyclical patterns of encroachment, retreat, and stabilization, fundamentally altering the structure and functionality of these critical edge zones. 2) Evolution of Synergy: The city-lake landscape relationship has undergone a significant qualitative shift, transitioning from a prolonged period of disharmony and maladjustment (characterized by urban sprawl at the expense of lake health) to an emerging phase of preliminary coordination and mutualism in recent years. Nevertheless, this coordinated state remains fragile and nascent, with the calculated coordination index indicating substantial scope for progression towards a more robust and stable symbiotic regime. 3) Multifaceted Drivers: The pathway towards synergistic development is not deterministic but is mediated by a complex, hierarchical set of interacting factors. Our analysis identifies a confluence of drivers including macro-level economic and demographic policies, the immutable constraints and opportunities presented by the natural terrain and hydrological environment, and the tangible impacts of specific urban planning decisions and construction activities. In conclusion, fostering ecologically livable cities in fragile plateau lake regions requires a holistic, system-level governance approach. This study posits that future strategies must pivot towards two synergistic core pillars: firstly, the intentional enhancement of ecosystem service quality through ecological restoration, blue-green infrastructure networks, and sustainable land use planning within the symbiotic interfaces; and secondly, the implementation of integrated, watershed-scale governance mechanisms that transcend administrative boundaries. Such mechanisms should coordinate water resource management, pollution control, spatial planning, and socio-economic development to align human activities with the carrying capacity of the lake ecosystem, thereby securing a sustainable and synergistic future for plateau city-lake landscapes. Notwithstanding these contributions and policy implications, this study acknowledges certain limitations. The construction of assessment indicators for the city-lake system was constrained by the availability and continuity of spatiotemporal data. Furthermore, the underlying mechanisms driving city-lake symbiosis were primarily explored through qualitative analysis, warranting future quantification and mechanistic modeling. Looking ahead, we propose that future research adopt a more systematic and in-depth perspective to explore the synergistic co-evolution between the entire Dianchi water system-encompassing its tributaries, catchment, and hydrological cycles - and the urban fabric, which would further illuminate pathways toward sustainable coexistence in complex plateau lake basins.

Under the global aspiration for carbon neutrality, enhancing urban carbon sink capacity has become an increasingly critical focus for nations worldwide. As urbanization continues at an unprecedented pace globally, the rapid expansion of cities has led to notable changes in land use patterns and increased habitat fragmentation, thereby exerting profound impacts on regional carbon balances. The development and optimization of ecological networks have emerged as vital strategies for safeguarding ecological security and promoting sustainable development. In recent years, an expanding body of research has demonstrated that ecological network construction is closely linked to the enhancement of urban ecosystems' carbon sequestration capacities, confirming that it is an effective approach to achieving the overarching goal of global carbon neutrality. The cities within the Yangtze River Delta (YRD), a prominent emblem of China's modernization, exemplify typical conflicts between urban expansion and ecological preservation. These conflicts highlight the urgency of adopting integrated ecological planning to reconcile urban growth with ecological integrity. In this context, the present study selects Suzhou, a key city in the YRD, as a case to investigate ecological network construction and optimization. Employing the mainstream "ecological source areas-ecological resistance surface-ecological corridors" framework, the research identifies critical ecological sources through morphological spatial pattern analysis and landscape connectivity indices. 8 factors - including dem, slope, NDVI, population density, land use, land cover, and so on - are incorporated to comprehensively evaluate landscape resistance. Using a least-cost path model, a combined ecological resistance surface is developed to quantify landscape resistance. Building upon this, core ecological corridors are extracted utilizing circuit theory and gravity models, enabling the identification of key pathways for ecological flow and connectivity. These corridors form the backbone of Suzhou's ecological network system, designed to enhance habitat connectivity and ecological stability. Subsequently, complex network theory is introduced to model the ecological topological network of Suzhou, facilitating an analysis of its structural features and their relationship with carbon sequestration capacity. Metrics such as degree centrality, clustering coefficient, and eigenvector centrality are employed to examine the network's topological roles and their influence on ecological function. The analysis reveals that Suzhou's ecological network exhibits typical water-network spatial characteristics, with primary source habitats mainly comprising lakes and forests. Ecological corridors are predominantly aligned along urban rivers and tributaries, yet the spatial distribution of ecological resources displays a notable imbalance. Correlation analyses demonstrate that the carbon sequestration capacity of ecological sources is significantly positively related to network characteristics such as degree, clustering coefficient, and eigenvector centrality. Improving these metrics - by adding ecological "stepping stones" and expanding corridors - proves effective in enhancing the network's overall carbon sequestration function. Based on the above findings, the study proposes a series of ecological network optimization strategies aimed at ecological function restoration and carbon sequestration capacity enhancement. Notably, 11 ecological stepping stones and 15 new corridors are incorporated into the network. Robustness assessments - evaluating the network's resilience and attack tolerance - show that the optimized network demonstrates higher stability and resistance against disturbances, confirming the scientific validity and practical feasibility of the optimization approach. These results validate that targeted ecological network modifications can enhance its resilience and carbon sequestration capacity. The study's outcome highlights that Suzhou's ecological network embodies a water-centric spatial pattern, with key ecological sources mainly being lakes and forests, and corridors predominantly along rivers. Although the spatial distribution of ecological resources remains uneven, targeted interventions through adding stepping stones and corridors can significantly enhance the network's carbon sequestration ability. The research aims to deepen understanding of the spatial relationship between ecological topological structures and carbon sequestration capacity, providing a scientific foundation for ecological network optimization centered on ecological function recovery and carbon storage enhancement. Overall, this study offers valuable insights for optimizing urban ecological networks in water-rich cities, with significant implications for regional ecological resilience, biodiversity conservation, and carbon sink functions. The findings hold important theoretical and practical significance for advancing urban ecological planning and contributing to the broader goals of ecological security and climate change mitigation.

The maze represents a significant spatial typology within the formal gardens of Western classicism. Its formal origins can be traced back to choreographic ritual symbols from antiquity, which later frequently appeared as sacred geometric patterns in medieval religious spaces, and ultimately evolved into a spatial feature within aristocratic gardens during the Renaissance. Although diverse cultural types of maze spaces existed across different periods and regions in the West, they all share commonalities in spatial formal composition and experiential engagement. Post-Renaissance garden mazes transformed these planar formal commonalities into three-dimensional labyrinthine spaces that offer more profound landscape experiences. Drawing upon materials such as mythology, dance, painting, architecture, and garden imagery, and employing research methodologies including iconology, cross-referencing of historical, sources, and diagrammatic analysis, this study examines the constitutive mechanisms of maze spatial forms from three perspectives: the origins and evolution, typological variations, and essential components of Western maze culture. It interprets the historical, conceptual, and the significance of spatial experience inherent in the maze. The research aims to provide specific design references for contemporary landscape practice and to contribute to deepening the comparative study of Chinese and Western gardens, particularly regarding the cultural experience and perception of this distinctive spatial type. The maze's foundational form derives from ancient ritual dances, where patterned movements inscribed symbolic trajectories onto the ground, serving as early spatial representations of cosmological or spiritual narratives. During the medieval period, these forms were assimilated into Christian contexts, most notably as pavement labyrinths in cathedrals, such as the renowned example at Chartres. These functioned as sites for symbolic pilgrimage, condensing a spiritual journey into a compact, contemplative physical path. The transition to the Renaissance witnessed the secularization and aestheticization of the maze. Integrated into the elaborate designs of expansive gardens, such as those at the Villa d'Este or Hampton Court, it became an instrument of courtly leisure, allegory, and demonstration of humanist control over nature. The spatial experience shifted from devotional meditation to one of amusement, disorientation, and eventual discovery, often imbued with metaphorical meanings related to love, fate, or knowledge. Despite varying contextual interpretations - sacred, symbolic, or recreational - the core formal principle of the maze remained a single, non-branching but intricately coiling path leading to a center. This unicursal model emphasizes process and journey over puzzle-solving. However, later developments, especially the hedge maze, introduced multicursal layouts with dead ends and choices, thereby emphasizing confusion, decision-making, and playful challenge. This evolution from a unicursal ritual path to a multicursal recreational puzzle marks a significant shift in spatial experience. The study analyzes the maze's formal constituents: the path (its width, texture, and modulation by planting or walls), the nodal points (turns, decision points, or centers), and the vertical boundaries (hedges, walls, or terraces) that define the sensory experience of enclosure, revelation, and surprise. The interaction between the predetermined geometry of the plan and the kinesthetic, perceptual, and psychological experience of the user is central to its spatial mechanism. In conclusion, the Western maze constitutes a rich palimpsest of cultural meanings encoded in spatial form. By deciphering its historical layers and operational logic, this research seeks to abstract transferable principles of path sequencing, perceptual manipulation, and narrative spatialization. These insights can inform contemporary landscape architecture, offering strategies for creating immersive, sequential, and meaningful spatial journeys. Furthermore, a structured understanding of the maze provides a concrete framework for cross-cultural comparison, illuminating how different traditions conceive of, design, and experience manipulated ritual or recreational pathways, thereby enriching the discourse on global garden history and spatial culture.

Conventional metrics for evaluating equality in urban green space planning, primarily based on two-dimensional green space (2DGS) area coverage, are insufficient for characterizing the intricate distribution of green resources in three-dimensional space. These traditional measures overlook the substantial contributions of vertical vegetation structures, such as trees and shrubs, to urban ecological health, biodiversity, and aesthetic quality, potentially leading to suboptimal planning outcomes. To address this gap, this study establishes a novel analytical framework that synergizes high-precision remote sensing with advanced machine learning to enable a precise and comprehensive assessment of equality in three-dimensional green volume (3DGV) allocation, thereby supporting more integrated and effective urban green planning. The framework was implemented in the main city of Nanjing through four sequential stages: 1) 2DGS Extraction: Precise delineation of surface green coverage was achieved by applying a Support Vector Machine (SVM) classifier to high-resolution remote sensing imagery, generating an accurate foundational map for spatial analysis. 2) 3DGV Modeling and Calculation: A robust Random Forest regression model was developed to estimate 3DGV across the entire study area. This model was trained using detailed field-measured 3DGV data from sample plots and a suite of spectral vegetation indices derived from satellite data, effectively capturing non-linear relationships to ensure reliable volume inversion. 3) Accessibility-Based Equity Measurement: The equity of access to green resources was evaluated using the Two-Step Floating Catchment Area (2SFCA) method. This approach calculated the accessible 3DGV for each residential community by balancing the spatial supply of green volume with local population demand, highlighting fine-grained spatial disparities in availability. 4) Comparative Equity Analysis: The overall equity level was quantified using the Gini coefficient for accessible 3DGV, while the location quotient identified units with relative surplus or deficit. A direct comparison of equity indicators derived from 3DGV and conventional 2DGS metrics revealed the distinct analytical insights provided by the volumetric perspective. The analysis yields several key findings. First, inequalities in 2DGS distribution are amplified in the 3DGV, indicating that area-based disparities lead to even greater volumetric imbalances. Second, the dynamics of 3DGV are more complex and sensitive; it exhibits a lagged and non-linear response to significant changes in surface greenery, making its equity patterns during urbanization more volatile than those of 2DGS. This underscores the critical limitation of relying solely on planar metrics, as they mask these heightened and more sensitive volumetric inequalities. Therefore, the study concludes that achieving equitable green space allocation requires planning policies and regulatory interventions specifically designed to monitor and manage 3DGV. The proposed framework offers a multidimensional, scientifically robust basis for spatial decision-making, providing innovative methodology for advancing sustainable and just urban green environments.