Gardens of Memory as Cultural Landscapes for Sustainable Destination Planning

Marianna Olivadese ()
Additional contact information
Marianna Olivadese: Department of Agricultural and Food Sciences, University of Bologna, Viale Fanin, 42, 40127 Bologna, Italy

Tourism and Hospitality, 2025, vol. 6, issue 4, 1-27

Abstract: Commemorative gardens—particularly those shaped by classical arboreal symbolism—offer underexplored potential for sustainable destination planning. This study investigates how evergreen species such as laurel, cypress, and holm oak function as cultural signifiers in historic cemeteries, contributing to ecological resilience, civic education, and ethical tourism. Through a qualitative, transdisciplinary methodology combining site observation, symbolic analysis, and landscape semiotics, the paper examines three Florentine memorial sites: Santa Croce, the English Cemetery, and the Florence American Cemetery. Each represents a distinct commemorative paradigm—national, cosmopolitan, and transnational—yet all employ a vegetated design to inscribe memory within a landscape. The findings reveal how these gardens foster slow, multisensory visitor engagement while anchoring cultural identity and biodiversity, with participatory stewardship and symbolic vegetation emerging as key factors in transforming cemeteries into living heritage infrastructures. By tracing the evolution of commemorative landscapes from Greco–Roman groves to Romantic and modern garden cemeteries, the study illuminates their enduring capacity to mediate memory, ecology, and place. The paper argues that integrating symbolic literacy and environmental care into tourism policy can generate meaningful, low-impact visitor experiences. Florence exemplifies how commemorative gardens, rooted in ancient codes yet adaptable to contemporary needs, can serve as ethical blueprints for resilient, inclusive, and culturally legible destinations.

Keywords: sustainable tourism planning; cultural heritage; participatory governance; commemorative landscapes; arboreal symbolism; environmental humanities (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Z3 Z30 Z31 Z32 Z33 Z38 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2673-5768/6/4/174/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2673-5768/6/4/174/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jtourh:v:6:y:2025:i:4:p:174-:d:1745289

Access Statistics for this article

Tourism and Hospitality is currently edited by Mr. Philip Li

More articles in Tourism and Hospitality from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().