The concept of historic gardens has gradually expanded to encompass a broader range of landscape meanings. UNESCO's cultural landscape categories have significantly influenced land policy improvements in the context of globalization, with historic gardens being classified as Category 1 cultural landscapes. The other categories are organically evolved landscapes (Category 2) and associative cultural landscapes (Category 3). While existing studies have primarily focused on each of these categories individually, it remains unclear how to characterize a cultural landscape when all three categories coexist and influence each other, as seen in complex cases such as the Chengde Mountain Resort (CMR). Furthermore, strategies for improving sustainable land management based on this understanding are still lacking. This study uses landscape mapping to collect data, digitally reconstruct, and characterize cultural landscapes in the CMR based on four environmental factors: topography, accessibility, visibility, and land use changes. Based on this, we illustrate the evolution of the CMR through reconstruction, capturing four phases detailed in 144 scenes. From this, we identify six distinct groups of scenes with six targeted indicators, each reflecting specific spatial attributes of Category 1. Additionally, statistical and comparative analyses of land use changes illuminate various landscape dynamics of these scenes that correspond to Categories 2 and 3. The discussion presents a systematic sustainable pathway to characterize the interdependencies among UNESCO’s three cultural landscape categories. Based on these findings, this research proposes a three-level management model that connects dynamic authenticity and modern functionality, offering insights for urban policymakers navigating pluralistic cultural landscapes.

Although there have been numerous studies on the heritage attributes, characteristics, and values of the historic garden as a special category of cultural heritage, the question is why a comprehensive review combining mainstream historic garden conservation with ways of understanding the garden in a landscape context has not been conducted. Landscape is an integrative concept that combines physical features and the diversity of functions with social and ecological processes throughout the scales of time and space. Therefore, this landscape context means applying the landscape approach to explore the organic connection between the scale of evolution and the architectonic elements in relation to each other. To elaborate, instead of viewing the garden as an object in one specific temporal-spatial frame, such an approach focuses on the evolution of the site in order to identify persistent structures and other values. The method used in this study involved paper coding as qualitative analysis combined with bibliometric visualization software. We reviewed 162 studies to explore the interconnections between the historic garden and landscape approach. The result is that there are three correspondences between landscape approaches and different stages of the historic garden’s conservation and development: studies identifying the historic garden’s characteristics using landscape mapping, studies demonstrating historic gardens’ conservation based on landscape planning, and studies exploring the potential of development and reuse through landscape design. Finally, we discuss the research gaps and outline an action framework for the conservation and development of heritage gardens in a landscape context.