Landscape and Urban Planning 114 (2013) 92–101

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Landscape and Urban Planning

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/landurbplan

Research paper

Marketing landscapes: The use of landscape values in advertisements of

development projects
Tseira Maruani ∗ , Irit Amit-Cohen
Department of Geography and Environment, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan 52900, Israel

h i g h l i g h t s

 This paper presents a semiotic quantitative analysis of real estate advertisements.

 Prestige and landscape values were found to be leading themes in public preferences.
 Landscape values are appreciated both for their own merit and as symbols of prestige.
 Our findings seem to express a universal trend.
 We expect minor differences in other places due to cultural heterogeneity.

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Advertising acts as a mirror of society, reflecting its values, norms and preferences. Therefore, the
Received 14 July 2012 widespread use of signs and symbols that represent landscape values in advertising may be regarded
Received in revised form 18 February 2013 as expressing prevailing preferences of the public. This paper examines evidence supporting this claim,
Accepted 27 February 2013
based on a study of 85 full-page promotional advertisements of development projects in Israel. We
analyze the components of a typical advertisement, showing the various signs and forms that express
Keywords:
landscape as well as other values. We then present a comparative semiotic quantitative analysis of the
Real estate advertising
advertisements, focusing on one specific component: the project name. Four main themes were identified
Open space
Culture
in project names, defined as prestige, landscape, heritage and developers’ credibility. Representations of
Signs prestige and landscape appeared in project names much more than the other two, implying the attrac-
Semiotic analysis tiveness of landscape features to prospective real-estate buyers, both for their own merit and as symbols
Israel of prestige. These preferences are responded by profit-maximizing motivated private developers that
provide their projects with landscape amenities such as large man-made parks. However, this trend also
increases pressures on natural landscape resources that attract development.
© 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction in measures unprecedented in Israel until then. These campaigns

Since the beginning of the 1990s, Israel, and especially the
Tel Aviv metropolitan region (TMR) at its core, has been experi-
encing accelerated development due to significant shifts in land
and planning policies (Maruani & Amit-Cohen, 2010). Most of the
new development projects were erected on agricultural lands that
had been converted for building and infrastructure purposes. The
influx of planning and building during the decade 1990–2000
resulted in many development projects, mostly residential, that
were ready to be marketed toward the end of the 1990s and the
beginning of the 2000s, competing for potential buyers’ attention.
As an outcome, aggressive advertising campaigns were launched,
∗ Corresponding author at: P.O. Box 1015, Ramat-Gan 52110, Israel.
Tel.: +972 3 6312021/50 7843270; fax: +972 3 6315961.
E-mail address: tseiram@gmail.com (T. Maruani).
mainly used means such as advertisements in newspapers, large
roadside billboards, designated publications and special promo-
tional real estate supplements that were distributed along with
daily newspapers. Quite remarkably, many of these campaigns and
advertisements made use of signs that expressed and represented
landscape values in diverse forms, some of them highlighting the
rural or agricultural character of the site while others emphasiz-
ing adjacent natural landscapes, cultural or historical values, or
man-made parks within the project. In this context, ‘landscape val-
ues’ express a social construction of human-landscape relationship,
implying the importance attached to landscape aspects that sym-
bolize and reflect human socio-cultural needs, desires, ideas and
concepts (see also Stephenson, 2008).
The use of landscape values in real estate advertising is not spe-
cific to Israel (see e.g., Collins & Kearns, 2008; Eyles, 1987; Perkins,
Thorns, & Newton, 2008). This is not surprising given that land-
scape features are generally perceived as appreciated assets by the

0169-2046/$ – see front matter © 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.landurbplan.2013.02.012
 T. Maruani, I. Amit-Cohen / Landscape and Urban Planning 114 (2013) 92–101
public (Jim & Chen, 2009; Kaplan & Austin, 2004), which is
expressed, among others, by willingness to pay higher prices
for properties with scenic views either of natural landscapes or
urban open space (Bengochea Morancho, 2003; Crompton, 2001;
Geoghegan, 2002; Jim & Chen, 2006, 2009, 2010; Luttik, 2000;
Portnov, Odish, & Fleishman, 2005; Tyrväinen & Miettinen, 2000).
Moreover, similar findings keep on piling (see e.g., Larson &
Perrings, 2013; Melichar & Kaprová, 2013). Developers are aware
of this preference and use it for promoting their projects. In other
words, the use of landscape values in advertising reflects the attrac-
tiveness of landscape features to prospective real estate buyers.
In this paper we present evidence supporting this claim, based
on a study of 85 promotional advertisements of development
projects in Israel. The paper begins by introducing the essence of
advertising, the use it makes of symbols and signs to represent soci-
etal values and conventions, and basic concepts of semiotics and
culture. Next are described the objectives and the methodology
of the study, followed by a detailed analysis of a typical full-page
advertisement and the various options and forms in which its com-
ponents may represent and reflect landscape values. We then focus
on one specific component – the name of the project – to demon-
strate a detailed quantitative case study based on a comparative
semiotic analysis of project names and the values they reflect,
thus providing insights regarding public preferences and attitudes
toward landscape as well as other values. The paper ends with a
discussion of the results and consequent concluding remarks and
implications.
2. Advertising and the use of signs
The essential purpose of advertising is to persuade prospec-
tive customers to buy a certain product or service (Hayes, Alford,
& Cappella, 2008; Lee, 2010; Mick, 1986; Pinson, 1998). In our
contemporary consumerist society, the advertising industry plays
an important role in the economy. Despite the costs involved in
advertising we are exposed to numerous advertising campaigns
that make use of various means and devices, and associate the
advertised products with socially desirable values and preferences
in order to influence potential customers and draw their atten-
tion (Harms & Kellner, 1998; Hayes et al., 2008). The power and
omnipresence of advertising is so great that some researchers
believe that advertising may impact prevailing values and inspire
new trends, thus affecting and directing consumers’ behavior. How-
ever, studies have shown that advertising is more likely to act as a
mirror of society, reflecting its existing values, norms and prefer-
ences (Agam-Dali, 2010; Lee, 2010; Weimann, 1984).
A great deal of advertising appears to convey no direct cred-
ible information about product qualities (Kihlstrom & Riordan,
1984). Instead, it uses signs to represent ideas, values and pre-
vailing conventions that convey the desired message and highlight
the attractive attributes of the advertised product in a tempt-
ing and persuasive manner (Eyles, 1987; Harms & Kellner, 1998;
Hayes et al., 2008; Perkins et al., 2008). Signs are used in various
forms, depending on the media. In printed advertisements, signs
may appear as textual or graphic elements (or a combination of
both). Textual elements are letters, words or phrases, while graphic
elements may include size, colors, fonts, shapes, illustrations or
photographs. Either way, in semiotics – the study of signs, which
evolved mainly from the writings of the Swiss linguist Ferdinand de
Saussure and the American philosopher Charles S. Peirce – a sign is
anything that stands for something else, or, in Eco’s words, “every-
thing which can be taken as significantly substituting for something
else” (Eco, 1979:7). Saussure defined the sign as an entity that
is composed of a signifier, the form which the sign takes (i.e. its
tangible presence), and the signified, the object or the concept it
93
represents (i.e. the meanings and ideas that the sign stands for)
(Berger, 1999; Chandler, 2009; Moriarty, 2002). According to Peirce,
however, a sign stands to somebody for something in some respect;
that is, between the sign (the signifier) and the object (the signified
concept) there is what Peirce called the interpretant, the expres-
sion of the meaning that is contained in the concept as decoded by
the interpreter, which may itself be a sign and so on ad infinitum
(Eco, 1979). In linguistics the relation between the signifier (the
word) and the signified (the concept) is always arbitrary. Peirce, on
the other hand, identified three major patterns of relation between
the signifier and the signified: iconic, indexical and symbolic. An
icon is similar to or imitates the signified (such as a drawing of a
woman or a man to indicate public toilettes). An index is directly
connected or related to the signified, generally by causality (such
as the connection between smoke and fire). A symbol is a conven-
tional and arbitrary representation of the signified, and therefore is
not self-evident, and its meaning has to be learned (such as traffic
lights). Therefore, while Saussure’s approach is useful for analyzing
language-based signs, Peirce’s approach that acknowledges diverse
forms of signification is preferable for analyzing nonverbal or mixed
signification systems. Furthermore, Peirce’s focus on the concept of
interpretation is the key to making sense of visual signs (Moriarty,
2002). Yet, whether the sign is iconic, indexical or symbolic or all at
the same time depends on the way in which it is used, on the context
and on the way meaning is created through decoding by the inter-
preter (Berger, 1999; Chandler, 2009; Eco, 1979; Moriarty, 2002;
Pinson, 1998; Sebeok, 1994). This means that in order to commu-
nicate properly, signifiers need to lean on values and conventions
that are shared by those who receive the message, which leads us
to the concept of culture.
Culture is a complex and contested term, and one that is difficult
to define (Norton, 2000). A possible approach is to regard culture
as the entire collection of values, beliefs, norms and conventions
as well as tangible and material assets that characterize a certain
social group. Signs represent objects and meanings that are part of a
group’s cultural identity, and thus reflect the values and norms that
are typical of this group and shared by its members. Moreover, cor-
rect interpretation of signs and what they stand for – especially in
the case of symbols, which are arbitrary by definition – will require
the understanding of the specific culture of the receiving group,
i.e., the target population. Thus, as Eyles (1987) points out, effective
advertisements must build up significance from signs and elements
of an understood and shared meaning system or cultural code (see
also Frith & Wesson, 1991; Frith, Shaw, & Cheng, 2005; Karrh, Frith,
& Callison, 2001). In other words, the use of signs in advertising is
culturally dependent. It is also time-dependent, as cultural values
may change with time (Cheung & Ma, 2005).
Advertisers carefully select the signs to be used in their pro-
motional campaigns in order to convey a certain desired image
to the relevant target population, in a concise and brief form, and
thus create effective and persuasive advertisements. For this pur-
pose, advertisers invest in market surveys and other means that
help them achieve relevant information concerning the needs and
values of their prospective customers (Perkins et al., 2008). This
acquired knowledge is then used to design advertisements that
reflect those needs and values either in a bold and overt, or more
subtle, manner. We may therefore conclude that advertisements
reflect prevailing cultural values and preferences of their target
population.
3. Objectives and methodology
The topic of advertising has been quite intensively researched.
However, only relatively few studies have been dedicated to
aspects of place and real estate in advertising. These few tended to
94 T. Maruani, I. Amit-Cohen / Landscape and Urban Planning 114 (2013) 92–101

concentrate on qualitative aspects, such as the representation of

place in advertisements (Agam-Dali, 2010; Cheung & Ma, 2005;
Fleming & Roth, 1991) or their meaning for locality image creation
(Cheng, 2001; Eyles, 1987; Mills, 1993; Perkins, 1989; Perkins et al.,
2008). Collins and Kearns (2008) went a little further by making
a comparative analysis of newspaper advertisements, including a
quantitative comparison of some parameters. Yet, their main con-
cern was with the visual and verbal tropes – mainly the coastal
scenery – deployed to sell private coastal property in New Zealand.
The present paper offers a new approach to the study of real estate
advertising, which consists of a comparative quantitative semiotic
analysis of advertisements.
The study presented here aims to identify the preferences of
the Israeli public in regard to real estate and reveal the relative
importance of landscape values in this context, by drawing on
the text-interpretive approach as defined by McQuarrie and Mick
(1999). Our objectives were defined as follows: (a) to provide a
more comprehensive insight as to the forms in which landscape val-
ues are reflected in development advertisements and (b) to quantify
the attractiveness of landscape features compared to other values,
based on a semiotic quantitative analysis of the advertisements. For
these purposes, we examined 85 advertisements, each presenting
a specific development project (i.e., 85 projects). The advertise-
ments were selected according to the following considerations:
(a) the sources were real estate supplements of popular Hebrew
daily newspapers in Israel, i.e., they all addressed the general Israeli
Jewish population, thus minimizing biases due to cultural hetero-
geneity; (b) the supplements were all published during the year Fig. 1. Advertisement of a project in Ness Ziona.
2002, thus eliminating deviations due to differences in timing, since
cultural values and conventions are time-dependent; (c) the year
2002 was chosen because it followed a “boom” period of planning is an integral part of such real estate advertising is the logo of the
and building in Israel (see Section 1 above), which brought about project name (3). The typical advertisement also contains: a short
much advertising activity that provided a large sample of suitable text (4) describing the project’s advantages, the developer’s name
advertisements; (d) the selected advertisements were all full-page or logo (5) and contact details (such as telephone number, address
size, generally having a typical format combining text and illustra- or website) of the sales office (6).
tion (see the next section), thus using diverse forms of signs (in Let us now have a look at the messages that this advertisement
contrast to smaller advertisements that are composed mainly of is intended to deliver and the values it reflects, starting with the
short text, occasionally accompanied by a small insignificant illus- very dominant illustration, which in this example is an aerial pho-
tration). tograph of the project site and its surroundings. The site is seen
located amidst agricultural fields (7), on the margins of an existing
neighborhood of detached single-family houses. This neighborhood
4. Components of a typical advertisement is part of Ness Ziona, a small town of about 40,000 inhabitants,
located on the outskirts of the Tel Aviv metropolitan region (TMR).
Signs communicate in diverse verbal, vocal, visual and other Ness Ziona, although now completely urbanized, was established in
sensory ways. They may include words, music and sounds, odors, 1883 as a Moshava (plural – Moshavot), i.e., an agricultural settle-
gestures, pictures and paintings, clothes, colors, etc. (Berger, 1999). ment modeled after a typical European village, where each farmer
Printed advertisements, naturally, use mainly signs in textual or cultivated his privately owned land. Moshava-type settlements
graphic forms. Graphic signs are especially effective in this con- were established toward the end of the 1800s and the beginning of
text, since printed matter communicates mainly visually. Therefore the 1900s by Jews that came to the Land of Israel with the first sig-
considerable thought is dedicated to graphic aspects of the adver- nificant Zionist-oriented immigration wave from Eastern Europe.
tisements, such as color, font type, size or the use of various The Moshavot played a distinct role in the history of Israel and Zion-
illustrations. ism, and although most of them have since undergone urbanization
Fig. 1 shows one of the advertisements in our study, promoting a processes, they are still part of the Israeli collective memory, laden
new urban development of about 800 dwelling units, most of them with heritage, ideological and sentimental values. Moreover, Ness
in apartment buildings of seven and nine stories high. The adver- Ziona was not just one of the first Moshavot but one that kept on
tisement demonstrates a typical format of a full-page real estate nurturing its image as a Moshava, i.e., an historical rural settlement,
advertisement and its main structural components, using both tex- long after its urbanization. This is expressed, among others, in the
tual and graphic elements. We will present these components and slogan it has adopted since the 1990s, which describes Ness Ziona
will then show some of the meanings and values that they signify as a “city with a heart of a Moshava”.
in this specific advertisement. Going back to the illustration in Fig. 1, the agricultural fields
The full-page advertisement usually contains a graphic illustra- shown were cultivated – prior to the development project – by
tion (1), which is visually very dominant, typically covering half Nezer Sereni, the adjacent Kibbutz. A Kibbutz (plural – Kibbutzim)
or more of the advertisement’s area. In a typical advertisement is another type of agricultural settlement, where public land is held
there is also a heading (2), which may be a slogan that accom- and cultivated collectively by the Kibbutz members. The project
panies the given campaign all along, or a catchy phrase that was promoted by this advertisement was made possible by convert-
designed for the specific advertisement. Another component that ing the agricultural land for building purposes, a practice which
 T. Maruani, I. Amit-Cohen / Landscape and Urban Planning 114 (2013) 92–101
was made available in Israel – and used abundantly, especially
in the TMR – since the beginning of the 1990s, due to shifts in
land policies that have undermined the former strict agricultural
land preservation policy (Maruani & Amit-Cohen, 2010). Moreover,
in many cases, rural settlements cooperated with nearby urban
municipal authorities to promote profitable development on agri-
cultural land (Razin, 1998). Thus, the picture chosen to illustrate the
advertisement portrays an image of rural surroundings, implying
to the potential buyers that they will have a view of open agricul-
tural landscape from their windows, although in reality most of
this agricultural landscape will no longer exist once the project is
erected. The rural image of the project is further reinforced by the
slogan that appears in large letters on the green background of the
fields in the illustration (2), which reads: “living between a Kibbutz
and a Moshava”. A smaller text, which appears under the bunch of
small flowers in the middle (7) that indicate the development site,
says: “your dreams are realized here”. All this points to the under-
lying message intended to persuade prospective buyers that this
project will fulfill their dream to live in a rural lush and green land-
scape, away from crowded and noisy urban surroundings, a dream
which seems to be shared by many people world-wide (see e.g.,
Breuste, 2004; Crow, Brown, & De Young, 2006; Kaplan & Austin,
2004; Perkins, 1989).
The logo of the project name (3) – on the left of the advertise-
ment, below the aerial photo – also contributes to the rural image
both in text and in graphics. The name of the project literally means
“the Savyons of Nezer Sereni”, thus referring to the nearby Kibbutz,
i.e., a rural settlement, although the project lies within the bound-
aries of the town Ness Ziona. Savyons (singular – Savyon) are very
common annual plants with small yellow flowers (Senecio vernalis,
known in English as Eastern Groundsel), which are represented
by the yellow flowers in the logo. The background of the logo is
green, a color which conventionally symbolizes nature, natural or
rural surroundings and open spaces in general. This symbolization
repeats itself in the advertisement, from the very green agricultural
fields’ illustration through the logo, to the small map on the bot-
tom right, where Ness Ziona is marked in green, and down to the
background color of the sales office’s telephone number (6). The
short text underneath the illustration reinforces this message of
rurality by stating that the new neighborhood integrates the pro-
gressive cultural, social and educational life of Ness Ziona with the
Kibbutz pastoral way of life. To summarize, the advertisement in
Fig. 1 creates and accentuates the rural image of the project through
a combination of textual and graphic signs. This may lead us to
conclude that, at least in the advertisers’ minds, the rural image is
attractive to potential buyers. In other words, the advertisement
reflects the public’s appreciation and demand for rural landscapes.
The advertisement reflects additional values as well, even if less
conspicuously. For example, the main developer of the project is
the Africa-Israel Company (AIC), which is identified with Savyon,
its first, and very successful, project. Savyon – a small suburban set-
tlement of detached family houses in the TMR – is widely known
today as one of the most prestigious dwelling places in Israel, pop-
ulated by many affluent and famous persons. Consequently, the AIC
uses the name Savyon in various combinations in its new projects,
as in our case (the Savyons of Nezer Sereni), in order to convey a
message of prestige and success. The use of the name Savyon also
points to the credibility of the AIC, which had already proven itself
in the past by establishing and building such a prosperous project
as Savyon. Another expression of credibility is the small table which
appears on the bottom center of the advertisement in Fig. 1, citing
the results of a survey that confirmed the AIC as the best and most
reliable developer in Israel.
Two additional notions emerge from the analysis above. One is
the polysemic nature of some signs, which may carry more than one
meaning. Such is, for instance, the case with the terms “Savyon” and
95
“Moshava” in our example. Savyon represents an element of nature
(the flower Savyon), yet it also symbolizes prestige (by reference to
the wealthy and prestigious settlement Savyon) and implies credi-
bility (of the AIC – the developer who built Savyon), while Moshava
suggests both rurality and heritage values. The other notion is
that of resonance, the doubleness of signs, which exists when a
certain meaning is conveyed or echoed by more than one sign
(McQuarrie, 1989). In our example this is demonstrated by the reit-
eration of green color in several components of the advertisement,
the iconic representation of landscape elements (fields, flowers),
and the drawing of yellow flowers which echoes the name Savyon.
The textual and graphic signs that constitute this advertisement,
with their polysemic and resonant meanings, combine to create
an intricate multi-faceted message, in which landscape values and
rural character of the advertised project are visually predominant,
yet they are creatively intertwined with motives of prestige, her-
itage and developer’s credibility in varying proportions.
We wish to conclude this section by drawing attention to the
fact that the advertisement described here, like many others in our
study, does not portray the project itself as it is going to look like
in reality, nor does the text underneath the illustration. Instead, it
offers its audience the vision of this vast rural-agricultural land-
scape, entailing the promise and fantasy of peacefulness, freshness
and pastoral nature, contrary to urban surroundings. The image of
rurality and greenery, the allure of a dream come true, is intended to
invoke emotional response and persuade prospective buyers (see
also Fleming & Roth, 1991).
5. Analysis of project names
In the former section we demonstrated how various compo-
nents of a commercial real estate advertisement signify and reflect
messages and values that the advertisers wish to convey to their
potential customers. While in our example landscape values were
predominant, we could also identify signs that reflected addi-
tional values that seemed to be important to the Israeli public,
including prestige, heritage and developer’s credibility. In other
words, advertisements may reflect various sets of values; some of
them may be more prominently expressed than others, and can be
regarded as leading themes in the specific advertisement. Our pur-
pose was to identify such leading themes in the advertisements
and quantify their relative importance. Such quantification may
encounter difficulties stemming, among others, from the variety
of components and signs – which may be diverse in essence and
character (e.g., textual vs. graphic) – that constitute an advertise-
ment. Moreover, one or more of the component types described
in the former section may be missing in a specific advertisement.
Therefore, in our pioneering attempt to quantify the values that are
portrayed in the advertisements, we chose to focus on the textual
significance of the project name, a component which appears in
every advertisement.
Names belong to a special class of signs that are used to denote
singular individuals or places (Sebeok, 1994). Places are spatial geo-
graphical locations, such as settlements, neighborhoods, streets,
etc. Place names provide spatial order and orientation, and facilitate
administrative efficiency (Vuolteenaho & Ainiala, 2009). However,
from a semiotic perspective they are also cultural expressions of
social, economic and political forces, as revealed by the grow-
ing corpus of research in toponymy, the study of place naming,
especially since the 1980s (Rose-Redwood, Alderman, & Azaryahu,
2010; Vuolteenaho & Berg, 2009). As cultural expressions they may
reflect dominance and power relations, commemorate persons and
events that are part of national or local history or denote local
geographical characteristics and attributes (Azaryahu, 2009; Rose-
Redwood et al., 2010; Vuolteenaho & Ainiala, 2009; Vuolteenaho
96 T. Maruani, I. Amit-Cohen / Landscape and Urban Planning 114 (2013) 92–101

& Berg, 2009). In the postmodernist neoliberal age place names

are also used as vehicles for branding and promoting places, by
accentuating market-responsive desirable local or exotic attributes
(e.g., implying “southern” exoticism by using terms like “sun” and
“hot” for naming places in a cold northern region like Helsinki,
Finland) (Vuolteenaho & Ainiala, 2009). Similarly, the names of
real estate projects in our study are prominent representative fea-
tures of the projects’ image, and play an important role in their
promotion and marketing (Anon., 2005a). Therefore we assumed
that meanings conveyed by project names are significant and may
be regarded as leading themes (see also Eyles, 1987). Such lead-
ing themes represent values, i.e., social constructions that express
the importance of the valued objects or concepts as perceived by
the relevant socio-cultural group (Stephenson, 2008), which in our
case is the target audience of the advertisements. A comparison of
85 full-page advertisements – all of which appeared in real estate
supplements of popular daily newspapers in Israel during the year
2002 – revealed four predominant themes, that were textually
embedded in the project names: prestige, landscape, heritage and
credibility.

5.1. Prestige

Prestige is associated with high social status and wealth, which

in turn are related to luxury, well-being and the good life. It brings
to mind images of success, achievement and quality which gener-
ally are subjects of desire and aspiration (see also Harms & Kellner,
1998; Lee, 2010). Projects that are conceived as prestigious or are
located in prestigious neighborhoods will probably be more attrac-
tive to potential buyers and will sell better, i.e., sell faster and for
higher prices. It is, therefore, not surprising to find a variety of signs
that give a prestigious flair to advertised projects (see also Eyles,
1987; Cheng, 2001; Mills, 1993; Wu, 2010). Textual signs that rep-
resent prestige include, for example: (a) terms that imply height,
such as tower, top or heights; (b) terms that express uniqueness and
above the regular, such as exclusive, spectacular or luxurious; (c)
terms that stand for housing types that are connected with nobil-
ity or richness, such as palace or manor; (d) reference to existing
prestigious settlements or neighborhoods (such as Savyon in the
example presented earlier); and (e) the use of exotic or foreign
terms or a foreign language, such as using English letters – or even
English words or names of foreign places – for the project name
in an advertisement addressed to a Hebrew speaking population
in Israel (such a phenomenon was found also in other non-English
speaking countries – see for example, Cheng, 2001; Vuolteenaho &
Ainiala, 2009; Wu, 2010).
Textual signs that imply prestige may appear in various compo-
nents of the advertisement, but are most likely part of the project
name, the heading (or slogan) or the textual description of the
project’s advantages. Since in this study we focused on project
names, we present here some examples of names that signify pres-
tige (reference to prestige is in bold letters):
• Beverly Hills – a new neighborhood of detached family houses
in a small and relatively remote suburban settlement;
• Rehovot Heights – high-rise buildings in the city of Rehovot, near
the Weizmann Institute of Science;
• Terraco Exclusive – apartment buildings in the city of Petah
Tikva;
• Sea & Sun (written in English, see Fig. 2) – a seaside project in Tel
Aviv;
• Almog Tops – apartment buildings in the city of Netanya;
• Giron Manor – a new neighborhood of detached family houses
in a small suburban settlement.
Fig. 2. Sea & Sun – a seaside project in Tel Aviv.
Fig. 2 presents for example an advertisement that promotes a
seaside project in Tel Aviv. Housing prices in Tel Aviv – the core
of the TMR and the focus of demand – are about the highest in
Israel, and apartments by the sea are especially attractive and con-
sequently more expensive and prestigious. The project name in
English – Sea & Sun – and the reference to the sea accentuate the
prestigious allure for prospective affluent buyers. Moreover, the
textual signs embedded in the project name are often reinforced by
graphics. Thus, in our example the desired proximity to the sea is
emphasized by illustrating the sea (which in itself is a distinctively
much desired landscape feature) as viewed from the future house,
with the heading underneath that says: “from my house one can
hear the whisper of the waves”. In other words, the advertisement
in Fig. 2 exemplifies the use of landscape to symbolize prestige.
In some cases, the prestigious image implied by the project
name may be regarded as an attempt to raise the perceived as
well as the economic value of the project against unfavorable real-
ity. For instance, the project Neve Savyon, initiated by the AIC, is
located in Or Yehuda, a small town that is ranked low on the Israeli
socioeconomic scale. In this case, in addition to the reference to
the well-known wealthy and prosperous settlement Savyon, which
was meant to upgrade the project’s image, the location within the
town of Or Yehuda was not mentioned in the project’s advertise-
ments, thus trying to avoid its potential negative effect on the
prestigious image that the advertisers aspired to create.
5.2. Landscape
Landscape is the physical feature, the panorama one sees
from a vantage point. The dictionary offers several definitions
 T. Maruani, I. Amit-Cohen / Landscape and Urban Planning 114 (2013) 92–101 97

of “landscape”, almost all of them regarding landscape as a

view, vista or scenery, although in practice the concept of
landscape has evolved to encompass diverse values, meanings and
interpretations (Abrahamsson, 1999; Meinig, 1979; Stephenson,
2008). As mentioned earlier, many studies around the world have
already proven that scenic landscape attributes have positive eco-
nomic effects on development projects, with people willing to
pay higher prices for properties with views of open landscape
or landscape elements. Abrahamsson (1999:60) quotes a study
of the Wilderness Society in Idaho, which affirmed the view that
unspoiled scenic beauty contributes greatly to the quality of peo-
ple’s recreational experience and to the quality of life that attract
new residents and businesses to the region. This is reinforced by
Brown and Raymond (2007), who found that the esthetic (i.e.,
visual) aspect not only was perceived by residents and visitors of
a place as the most important out of 12 types of landscape val-
ues, but it also was the value most associated with special place
designations. Therefore, in this paper we refer to landscape from
a scenic esthetic perspective, as viewed from the individual house,
within the neighborhood or its surroundings. This includes scenic
landscape attributes that are associated with nature and natu-
ral sceneries, rural areas (both agricultural and non-agricultural),
parks and gardens or related elements such as plants, animals or
water bodies (for some examples see, Bastian, McLeod, Germino,
Reiners, & Blasko, 2002; Cho, Poudyal, & Roberts, 2008; Lansford &
Jones, 1995; Sander & Polasky, 2009).
Textual and graphic signs that represent landscape may be used
in various components of an advertisement. Graphic signs that may
imply landscape are: (a) all shades of green color used in fonts,
illustrations, background of text, etc.; (b) graphic icons and sym-
bols that represent features of landscapes and open spaces (such as
mountains, sea coast, lakes and rivers, animals, trees or flowers);
and (c) illustrations and photographs that portray views of scenery
or landscape features. Textual signs that represent landscape may Fig. 3. North of the Moshava – a project in Petah Tikva.
include: (a) terms that refer to landscapes and landscape features
in general, such as green or tree; (b) terms that refer to specific
landscape features, such as mountain, lake or river; (c) terms that a window. . .”, thus implying the view of the rural lush green
refer to agricultural elements, such as vineyard, orchard or citrus; landscape that the buyer will supposedly enjoy, as shown in the
(d) terms that refer to rurality in general, such as village, or to spe- predominant illustration, with the garden chairs waiting for him to
cific rural settlement types, such as a Moshava; (e) terms that refer relax in, amidst all this green. The project itself, which consists of 4
to landscape visually, such as panorama, view or vista; (f) terms high-rise buildings, is represented by a much smaller illustration,
that refer to man-made open space, such as park or garden; and (g) next to the project logo in the middle left.
terms that refer to a specific place or region known for its landscape Landscape features are also expressed graphically in many of
values, such as the Sharon region in Israel, which was known for its the project logos (for some examples see Fig. 4). Thus, a logo may
citrus orchards. represent landscape either textually or graphically or both.
Here are some examples of project names in our study that
express landscape values (reference to landscape is in bold letters):
5.3. Heritage
• Asherman on the Park – apartment buildings in the city of Herz-
lyia; Cultural heritage is associated with places, events or persons
• Rasco’s Vineyards – apartment buildings in the city of Rishon that have played a distinctive role in the history of the land (or of a
Le’Zion; specific region or settlement) and are today part of the national or
• Reut View – apartment buildings in the city of Modi’in, near the local collective myth and memory. In many cases cultural heritage
suburban settlement of Reut; values are also an integral part of ongoing culture or subcultures
• House in the Garden – apartment buildings in the city of Netanya; in society. References to cultural heritage attributes contribute to
• The Moshava Garden – apartment buildings in the city of Petah their commemoration, ensure their place in the collective mem-
Tikva; ory and culture, and empower communal identity and cohesion.
• North of the Moshava – high-rise buildings in the city of Petah Textual signs that represent heritage may be: (a) terms that refer
Tikva (see Fig. 3); to types of historic places or events, such as Moshava or Kibbutz;
• Sharon’s Front – apartment buildings in the city of Netanya (the (b) terms that refer to specific historic places, events or persons,
largest city in the Sharon region). such as Em Ha’Moshavot (literally meaning “the mother of the
Moshavot”), which is the well-known nickname for Petah Tikva,
Many of the advertisements while conspicuously portraying the first Moshava that was established in 1878, but which has since
landscape values tend to avoid showing the project itself. For exam- developed into a large city with over 200,000 inhabitants; and (c)
ple, the advertisement in Fig. 3 – promoting a project named ‘North terms that refer to features that are part of local historic tradition
of the Moshava’ in Petah Tikva – says in large white letters: “Open or prevailing material culture, such as vines (or vineyards) that
98 T. Maruani, I. Amit-Cohen / Landscape and Urban Planning 114 (2013) 92–101
Fig. 4. Graphic icons of landscape elements in project logos.
are associated with the seven plant species the Land of Israel was
blessed with according to the Bible.
Here are some examples of project names in our study that imply
heritage (reference to heritage is in bold letters):
• The Moshava Garden – apartment buildings in the city of Petah
Tikva;
• Nili Manor – a project of detached family houses in the town
of Zichron Ya’akov (“Nili” commemorates a small underground
organization that was founded in Zichron Ya’akov during World
War I in order to help the British conquer Palestine from Ottoman
rule);
• North of the Moshava – high-rise buildings in the city of Petah
Tikva;
• Rasco’s Vineyards – apartment buildings in the city of Rishon
Le’Zion (a large city that began in 1882 as a Moshava, focusing on
the culture of vineyards);
• Orchard’s Heart – a new neighborhood of detached family houses
in Tel Mond, a small suburban settlement in the Sharon region
(see Fig. 5).
The advertisement shown in Fig. 5 was designed to promote
‘Orchard’s Heart’ – a project in the Sharon region, which until the
Fig. 5. Orchard’s Heart – a project in the Sharon region.
1990s was known for its citrus orchards that served as its main
economic base for settlement in the 1920s and 1930s. In this case
the term ‘orchard’ is used both to commemorate cultural heritage
and to represent the typical agricultural landscape of the region (see
also Amit-Cohen, 2012; Egoz, 1996). The message is reinforced by
graphic signs – an orange fruit illustrated above left and the use of
green and orange colors.
5.4. Credibility
A project name that includes the name of the developer implies
trust in the developer’s credibility. The underlying message is that
the developer has proven himself as reliable, and the projects he
has built in the past are known for their quality of planning and
performance. The message of credibility is often reinforced by addi-
tional signs, as with the example of the AIC, that for many years
used to present itself as “the company which built Savyon” – the
settlement Savyon being a symbol of social status and wealth –
and it now uses the name “Savyon” in various combinations in its
new project names to signify its credibility. Messages of credibility
are also often accentuated by headings or slogans that accompany
the project logo. For example, one of the slogans declares: “before
you buy an apartment make sure it has parents”, meaning that the
project is in the hands of a reliable developer that one can count
on to complete the building and handle any problem that arises to
customers’ satisfaction.
Here are some examples of project names in our study that
imply developer’s credibility (reference to the developer is in bold
letters):
 T. Maruani, I. Amit-Cohen / Landscape and Urban Planning 114 (2013) 92–101
Fig. 6. Occurence of themes in project names.
• Dankner in the Sharon – apartment buildings in the city of
Netanya;
• Asherman on the Park – apartment buildings in the city of Her-
zlyia;
• Rotem Shani towers – high-rise buildings in the city of Ra’anana;
• Luki Gates (written in English) – high-rise and apartment build-
ings in the city of Modi’in.
In many cases project names are polysemic, that is, they may
carry more than one meaning or message. In the list above, for
instance, the first two examples express both credibility and land-
scape (the rural Sharon region in the first, and the reference to the
park in the second). Similarly, the other two examples express both
credibility and prestige. Sometimes even the same word may be
interpreted in more than one way. For example, “Rasco’s Vineyards”
combines the credibility of the developer (Rasco) with heritage and
landscape values that are both embedded in “Vineyards.”
6. Results and discussion
Fig. 6 presents the occurrence of each of the four themes in
project names in our study.
Assuming that developers and advertisers know what their
prospective customers are looking for, we can conclude that the
priorities of the Israeli public in the year 2002, as reflected by these
results, are very clear, with prestige being the most appreciated
feature of housing projects out of the four identified themes, and
landscape ranking almost as high, second to prestige. Credibility, on
the other hand, ranks much lower, and heritage values rank least of
all. The combined occurrence of the two leading themes – prestige
and landscape – is three times greater than that of credibility and
heritage.
These findings are reinforced when examining mixed themes
in project names (Fig. 7). Again the combination of prestige and
landscape in one name was much more frequent than any other
combination.
However, heritage and credibility should not to be disregarded,
despite their inferiority compared to prestige and landscape values.
Fig. 7. Mixed themes in project names.
99
On the contrary, their symbolic presence in project names indi-
cates their significance over other possible values that were not
identified in our study. Heritage, particularly, probably ranked low
because a relative large proportion of the Israeli population con-
sists of immigrants who are not fully acquainted with local history
and do not share collective memory (see, for comparison, Eyles,
1987). Nonetheless, recently heritage values are gaining attention
in Israel (Amit-Cohen, 2005), and we expect to find their relative
value increasing in the coming years.
The demand for landscape features in housing projects has
already been established by previous research. However, the
present study is the first to quantitatively indicate the relative
importance of landscape compared to other values in the context of
the real estate market. Our findings match previous studies, which
highlight what Cséfalvay (2011) calls the “eagerness for prestige”.
Such eagerness is evident in various countries despite cultural and
geographical differences, and is reflected in many ways, includ-
ing: processes of gentrification (Mills, 1993), development of gated
communities (Cséfalvay, 2011; Polanska, 2010; Wu, 2010), imita-
tion of western architecture and style in eastern cultures (Cheng,
2001; Wu, 2010), the use of foreign language or foreign place names
(Vuolteenaho & Ainiala, 2009; Wu, 2010), and of course real estate
advertisements that address prospective buyers by creatively using
various symbols of prestige (Cheng, 2001; Collins & Kearns, 2008;
Eyles, 1987; Mills, 1993; Wu, 2010). Prestigious housing is a social
status marker, it is the dream that buyers aspire to pursue. In this
context landscape values are often used as symbols of prestige
(see e.g., Cheng, 2001; Collins & Kearns, 2008; Mills, 1993; Perkins,
1989; Wu, 2010). Landscape values are conceived as contributing
to leisure, well-being and the good life in general. In other words,
while the pursuit of prestige plays a leading role in the real estate
market, landscape values are also there, both for their own merits
as well as for their contribution to the prestigious image. Moreover,
based on continued observation of real estate advertisements over
the years, our impression is that this link is increasingly becoming
more obvious. Thus, for example, a project that is currently under
construction in the city of Ramat Gan, near Tel Aviv, is marketed
under the slogan “green prestige”.
Although the link between prestige and landscape values is very
clear from our findings in Israel, it is probably a much more univer-
sal phenomenon. Further research may reveal differences in the
relative importance of themes due to variability in geographical
location, local cultural conventions and preferences and shared
values, and the specific time phase. Interestingly enough, how-
ever, similar trends developed in diverse places at about the same
time, despite circumstantial differences. For example, in Israel pol-
icy shifts and consequent development patterns were triggered
mainly by mass immigration from former communist Soviet Union
countries (Maruani & Amit-Cohen, 2010), while in Helsinki, Finland,
similar market-led trends in place naming were due to economic
depression (Vuolteenaho & Ainiala, 2009). This similarity may be
the result of the involvement of private developers in both exam-
ples.
Moreover, the Israeli case, where – especially since the shifts
in land policy at the beginning of the 1990s – most local develop-
ment plans are initiated by private developers that are motivated by
profit-maximizing (Maruani & Amit-Cohen, 2011), bears significant
implications for open space planning in general and conservation
of natural landscapes in particular. Since the 1990s development
projects in Israel are increasingly responding to public demand
for landscape values by incorporating landscape and open space
amenities, which in many cases were expressed by constructing
a large park as the focal feature of the project (see for example,
Anon., 2005b; Petersburg, 2002; Stuzky-Beer, 2007; Yoels, 2003).
However, this trend also increases pressures on publicly shared nat-
ural landscape resources that attract development, such as forests,
100 T. Maruani, I. Amit-Cohen / Landscape and Urban Planning 114 (2013) 92–101
nature reserves and, most of all, the seaside (especially, though not
exclusively, in the TMR) (see also Maruani, 2011).
There is another point worth noticing. Attempts to quantita-
tively assess and evaluate the demand for landscapes and landscape
values in housing developments so far have relied on several meth-
ods, including: hedonic price method (Bengochea Morancho, 2003;
Geoghegan, 2002; Irwin, 2002; Jim & Chen, 2009, 2010; Poudyal,
Hodges, & Merret, 2009; Sander & Polasky, 2009; Tyrväinen
& Miettinen, 2000), contingent valuation (Chen & Jim, 2010;
Dachary-Bernard & Rambonilaza, 2009; Rambonilaza & Dachary-
Bernard, 2007; Sayadi, González-Roa, & Calatrava-Renquena, 2009;
Waltert, Schulz, & Schläpfer, 2011), attitude surveys and photo-
questionnaires (Austin, 2004; Jorgensen, Hitchmough, & Dunnett,
2007; Kaplan & Austin, 2004) or the Delphy method (Damigos &
Anyfantis, 2011). Although all these methods may yield quanti-
tative results as to the value attached by the public to landscape
features in proximity to a housing development, none of them is
accurate, due to biases that are inherent in each method. Conse-
quently, their results may be regarded as indicators of the relative
value of properties rather than accurate evaluations. Our study
offers a new innovative method for assessing the relative value of
landscapes in this context.
7. Conclusion and implications
The study presented above provided new insights in several
aspects. First and most of all, we gained initial quantitative infor-
mation as to the relative importance of landscape values in the
eyes of the Israeli public, based on the interpretation of develop-
ment project names. However, there is place for further research.
For example, a comparative analysis of other components in
project advertisements may provide additional evidence and val-
idate our preliminary findings. In addition, it will undoubtedly be
interesting to reveal differences between the Israeli public and
other cultural groups and societies in this matter, by replicating
this study in other places and cultures. Moreover, since values
and preferences may change with time it would be advisable
to repeat the study after a period of 15–20 years; this will cer-
tainly provide somewhat different findings, expressing possible
future shifts in the prevailing preferences of the studied popula-
tion.
Second, our study suggests an innovative method, based on
comparative semiotic analysis of real estate advertisements, to
effectively evaluate the importance of landscape values in relative
quantitative terms. This method has two main advantages com-
pared to customary methods like the hedonic pricing method or
contingent valuation. One is that data (i.e., advertisements) are
readily available and of low cost to collect in terms of time and
money invested. The other is the ease and efficiency of the analysis
process.
Third, this paper has demonstrated the use of commercial
advertisements as simple and accessible research means in gen-
eral. A systematic semiotic analysis and interpretation of their
components may yield qualitative and quantitative findings,
which eventually will lead to new understandings. The insights
regarding public preferences, as emerged from our study, sug-
gest practical implications for planners, planning institutions,
decision makers and developers. In the case of Israel, a small
densely populated country, where natural landscape resources
are increasingly threatened by market-responsive private devel-
opment initiatives, planning institutions must take care to protect
the public interest in the process of approving development plans,
by preserving scarce natural resources, while providing elsewhere
projects that respond to common demand for landscape val-
ues.
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