In order to explore and identify possible links between both disciplines, this research proposes a methodology grounded in a set of concepts that suggest a certain correspondence between design and geography. Thus, it becomes necessary to probe these words—the meanings they assume in each discipline—tracing their suggestive lexical connections and, through a reflective exercise, rearticulating and resignifying them so as to generate a new conception from a transdisciplinary perspective.

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Crossing Words

Layer – Scale – Relief – Surface – Atmosphere – Movement

Layer

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The notion of a layer, understood as a fragment of a system, allows one to understand from both disciplines how parts (layers) interact to constitute a totality or systemic logic. Within this sequential interplay, each layer functions as an indispensable element for the operation of the whole.  

In graphic design, the idea of layers emerges in diverse contexts: in projective exercises that require systemic interconnected thinking, or in the construction of an infographic where layers of reading are generated through specific graphic codes. Each association and interrelation functions as a stratum or layer that produces cohesion.

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The reading units that follow a hierarchy also function as visual layers, implying a reading order in which various elements succeed one another, ordering the sequence of reading and suggesting a pathway for legibility and coherence.

The concept of layer is equally relevant in cartography, a visual representation that clearly links both disciplines.

A map is a graphic translation of the Earth’s geography: a three-dimensional space projected onto a two-dimensional surface. This process involves translating geographic layers into graphic layers, visual codes that enable us to fix an image of the world at scale.

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​The only way to interpret and read a cartography requires understanding it as a system of graphic nomenclatures, where the Earth has been dissected into minimal units to configure its representation. Reading these layers of information involves dissecting perception into its smallest units, in order to articulate the total visualization of the map. From this perspective, the notion of graphic layer as a representation of the geographic layer suggests a holistic vision: design itself may be conceived as a layer within cartography —and therefore geography— and vice versa. So both notions of layers follow each other, as if their reciprocal link thus forms a unit within a larger system. If “the holon is neither the whole nor the parts, but the integration of both realities,” the aim is to generate this integration of disciplines that appear unrelated, yet reveal themselves to be connected and converge within a single system through the notion of layer.