The Alphabet of Art Shape Type Contrast Resulting Attributes Naturalistic Maximum Emotionally Active Esthetically dynamic Spatially in depth Geometric Minimum Emotionally passive Esthetically decorative Spatially static Shapes can be divided into naturalistic shapes and geometric shapes. In a landscape, naturalistic shapes, such as trees, usually predominate in contrast to manmade, geometric shapes, such as houses. Landscape architecture is the art of reconciling the two extremes of landscape and manmade shapes.
Geometric shapes express minimum contrast and are thus more decorative than naturalistic shapes.
Multiple or repeated use of geometric shapes increases and enhances their decorative effects. One way of making a geometric shape more decorative or less contrasting is to employ the Golden Mean Rectangle. Draw a square. Use the diagonal of half the square as a radius. Rotate this radius to the base line, then extend the rectangle to the point where the arc meets the baseline.