Landscapes have multiple functions relating to natural preservation and cultural inheritance, which are fundamental factors for tourist development. Particularly in villages, rural tourism is primarily based on the rural landscape. However, peri-urban villages face complex conflicts of urbanization and ruralism, in which landscapes are dynamic and need synergistic plans and management. Thus, this research contributes to a better understanding of comprehensive landscape planning integrating natural and cultural dimensions in peri-urban villages. Taking as a comparison studies in two peri-urban villages, Heshu village and Pu’an village in the Yangtze River Delta in China, the research mainly adopted qualitative methods of document analysis, in-depth interviews and field observation. We found that local features and interactions with nature are both stressed in the village landscape plans but with different strategies. Firstly, Heshu village’s landscape plan intends to reproduce eight scenes described in famous local poetry, while Pu’an village’s plan intends to develop local traditional customs of bulrush craft. Secondly, the detailed landscape design of green-way and blue-way systems in Heshu village is people-oriented, while landscape design in Pu’an village is experience-oriented in relation to creative tourism. Finally, it is essential to consider both the interests of local villagers and tourists in the process of identifying, preserving and enhancing the locality of rural landscapes.

Previous planning for rural revival in towns has emphasized construction and government-led policies. However, we argue that the dilemmas of peri-metropolitan rural areas, such as Desakota in China, are far more complex faced with rural super village and hollowed village transformations. Rural revival planning needs to coordinate with the development of urbanized and rural areas towards multifunctional goals and plans as a whole. Therefore, we selected the town master plan of Lijia, a typical peri-metropolitan village in China, as a case study. Through a historical–interpretative approach involving analysis of planning policies, questionnaires, and in-depth interviews with the key stakeholders involved, we structured the process and mechanism of rural revival in Lijia into three phases: resource identification, capitalization, and financialization. In different phases, different stakeholders adopt different roles. The government takes a leading role in resource identification and capitalization, while firms take a leading role in the process of financialization. “Market-dominant and government-guided” planning stimulates villagers to participate in rural revival. We highlight the importance of multifunctional land-use in terms of rural revival in the master planning of peri-metropolitan villages and provide a practical reference for uniting multiple stakeholders, including governments, firms, and villagers.

Most cases of multifunctional peri-urban agriculture offer diverse economic and ecological benefits, while a few involve cultural dimensions. In China, a “cultural turn” in the construction plan of beautiful villages has occurred. Through the analysis of policy and focus-group interviews, this research analyzes a case study of rural planning in the Pu’an village, a peri-urban village near Changzhou city in the Yangtze River Delta, China. Particular attention is given to investigating the process of identifying the local cultural symbol of a multifunctional plant, the bulrush. Combining natural landscape and cultural resources, rural planning explores the multifunctional agricultural services based on the bulrush-central creative industry in Pu’an village. The research introduces the framework of “bulrush + creative industry,” which includes one core industry and two extended industries. The core industry is a creative processing industry, and the two extended ones are the creative planting industry and the creative tourist industry. Highlighting the participation of local villagers and outsiders or urban tourist, as well as the creative class and entrepreneurs, the research emphasizes the revival of local rural culture, especially in peri-urban villages. Finally, this paper contributes to exploring a new area of cultural dynamics for the sustainable development of peri-urban agriculture, combined with creative rural experience and ruralism.