Monday, September 14, 2015

Bill Blass: How to Edit a Landscape

Bill Blass said, "A woman with a closet full of clothes, but nothing to wear does not know herself very well."
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That sailed a ship.  If you have a lot of plants but not a pretty garden, you do not know yourself very well.
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Editing landscapes is inherent to every good garden you see.
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Arne Maynard's work, below, at an old estate.  Of course it's gorgeous.  And edited.  HARD.


Look at those pleached crab apple trees!  What an entrance! Renovated garden for a manor house in Oxfordshire - Arne Maynard Garden Design:

Pic from Arne Maynard.
Hard to edit our closets, it's harder to edit a garden.  Garden editing may require heavy equipment.



Pic from Arne Maynard.


 In our new garden, above/below, yesterday.  Editing.  Chinese holly were not emotionally tough to remove.  The 2 oak trees were emotionally difficult to remove but had to go, they were growing into the magnolia, that will remain.  Boxwood hedge will remain, would not have designed it into its place, but zero heart to remove it.  Told you editing was hard.



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All the pretty neo-new gardens you see?  Edited.  Hard editing.
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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara
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Small recompense, the editing will be composted.
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Will find it amusing, in the future, when someone says, "I adore this boxwood hedge here."  You know it will happen, and more than once.  


2 comments:

Jean Campbell said...

An established garden always has trees that just came up in a hedgerow, shrubs that outgrew their usefulness, perennials that died or overgrew. It is more of a challenge than a blank slate yet there are wonderful pluses, like a fully grown Magnolia or tree-like Camellia that are only available to mere mortals by default.

michele@Portlandia Vintage said...

Aiy! I miss the original look. Afraid the revised garden is a bit scary looking with all those overly trimmed bushes. Seems a bit outdated.