From fragments to system: a research on the mesoscale structure of vernacular landscapes in the Hang-Jia-Hu area, China

Vernacular landscape incorporates spatial structures intimately associated with regional environments, agricultural production, and rural life. Analyzing and understanding these structures can help reveal spatial patterns and intrinsic mechanisms of vernacular landscapes and provide reference for contemporary rural construction. This paper aims to analyze the mesoscale structure of vernacular landscapes in the Hang-Jia-Hu area by discussing spatial relationships between four main elemental patches: water systems, farmlands, settlements and hills. Special attention is given to the correlations between landscape structure and local agriculture. Initially adopting a grid sampling approach, the paper extracts 31 fragment samples of vernacular landscape images (each 2 × 2 km) from the satellite imagery of the Hang-Jia-Hu area. Subsequently, via semantic segmentation, the four elements are identified and differentiated. Integrating related knowledge from environmental history, agricultural history, human geography, and other disciplines, the paper carries out a typological analysis on the vernacular fragment samples, deriving the latent structural types, which consist of concepts and abstract schemas. Based on the association between these structural types, establishes a structural system, as the primary integrated conclusion of this research, and looking forward to offering framework reference for contemporary rural construction.