Let Simplicity Serve Your Needs

There isn't a lot here yet the magic is intense.

Narrative.  Simplicity.  Choices.
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"What plant should I put here?", I'm asked often.  It's not the right question, in return I ask, "How do you want to live?"
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic The Vintaquarian.  Remember this trinity: Narrative.  Simplicity.  Choices.  What is your garden, today, answering?

Orange

When my father built a new house he let me, age 7, choose my carpet color.  Burnt Orange.  I had white walls & white furniture & white lamps.

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Loved growing up in that room with the light of Galveston Bay pulsating off the walls.

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A huge red bottle brush filled the window with hummingbirds.

Have never used Orange again.  Happy reigns when I catch glimpses of it.
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Garden & Be Well,     XO Tara
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Pic via Colorado Homes & Lifestyles.  A client, from Holland, already had orange accents in her garden when she hired me, hers is a Faded Burnt Orange.   Her garden is on tour this month, will try to get there for pics.  Since, obviously, pics of Orange are absent my arsenal!

Color: Bedroom Before + After

Last weekend, below, in my bedroom.

Color change.  Vintage linen ceiling & walls were too dark for north facing windows.

Now, Benjamin Moore Sundress walls & White Dove ceiling + trim.

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Calm, above/below.  And the template copied.

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 Ordered headboard & sofa, below, from Susanne Hudson.  Sent her the 2 pics above, she mailed fabric samples & asked dimensions.

Not quite 'after', above.  Still playing with art, lamps, pillows, tables, chests, etc.  A Sheraton sideboard with tv is opposite the bed.   Who knew a bedskirt & rug would be the most difficult to find?
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Chuck, top pic, has helped me for several years.  His job, appraiser, lost to the economy, along with most everything he owned.  Yesterday he closed on a house.  With hard work & a good attitude this man has done it.  Happy for him & so proud.
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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara
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Gregory's Paint & Flooring is my Benjamin Moore dealer.  Send all my clients there.  It's as if you've hired an experienced, trained assistant, that cares.  No, they have not paid for this infomercial!  I appreciate their service.

Choosing Color for a Fence & Fixing a View

May Day, yesterday, at one of my jobsites, below.

White fence?  Not happening.  Made the space smaller & became a focal point.  Detracting from the focal point of the home.

Now, above/below, a blend-into-the-background Benjamin Moore Alexandria Beige.

See the stop sign, roads, & home across the street?  Of course you do.  Ouch.
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Soon evergreens in a tapestry hedge, with fruit trees, will create a garden with grounds and no offensive views.
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Can it get better?  Yes, using existing evergreen shrubs needing to be moved anyway.
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Garden & Be Well,         XO Tara
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Pics sent from client.  Lucky children, my last May Day pole was in the 60's.

Proscenium Design is Your Desire

Porch, turkeys, garden, a new trinity.  This is my job, below.  Do you see what I've done?  

Designed the garden as a proscenium to life.  

What does that mean?

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Garden is fabulous, marvelous, incredible 24/7 with little effort and a stage set for what life tosses.

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Look at the top pic again.

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It's taken from inside the house.  A snapshot that looks like a photo shoot.

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Not an accident.

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This garden is ready for Garden & Gun.

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

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Pics sent from client last week.  She KNEW the turkey pic would THRILL me !!!!!!  Don't know Garden & Gun magazine?  You want to.

How Would You Solve This?

Quite nice color echo from purple furniture to loropetalum.

What would you do, below, with this 'pedestrian' landscape?  Very tight budget, of course.

Shutters as the budget allows.  More importantly, pruning the shrubs into espalier next to the house.  I'm thinking 10' tall at most.  Lush.
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Adore solutions costing 'zero'.
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Her solution to the improperly scaled window boxes is brilliant.  Remove the wood boxes, place a stone shelf on the iron brackets and place several terra cotta pots.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics taken in a client garden last week.

The Perfect Flower Stand

Something new learned from something old, below.

A flower stand must be so fabulous......it needs no flowers!
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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara
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Pic taken last weekend in Colonial Williamsburg, VA.  This is from Bassett Hall, home of Abby Rockefeller.
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Love the colors, slab of light, scale, calm, bricks with the redolence of .........     something I can't quite name.    A sweetness with harshness, a story.  

Keeping Quirky in a Landscape

A 1945 cottage guest room, using what the client has.

Its original landscape lost to history.   Awnings, below, will remain.  Delightfully quirky.

Quirkier are the azaleas, above, perhaps early 2000?
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Other parts of the landscape design will be 'done'.  These azaleas are pure Folk Art.  Adore having elements of a landscape design that don't look 'done'.
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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara
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Pics taken last week at client project.  Have seen these shingles used on homes from New York to Georgia.

American Farm House, Now

Farmhouse style with her own flair.

Between formal dining room & kitchen, below.

Few built-ins, below, in the kitchen.

And a surprise in the living room, below.

Braid rug.  Bold.  Been so long since I've seen one it was 'new' again.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics taken last weekend, same home/garden as previous post.

Front Porch Questions

Every element sings together on this front porch.

Field gathered furniture swathed in the came color.

Porch questions.  Is the porch so wonderful I must go inside and see the home?  Is the porch so wonderful I must see the garden?
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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara
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Pics taken last weekend, same garden as previous post.

Front Porch

Subtle, original.

 A desk on the front porch.

I must know you from the exterior of your home, before ever knocking on the door.
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Garden & Be Well,     XO Tara
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Pics from same home/garden as yesterday's post.

Glass Awning

Never in USA, but there must be some, only in Europe

have I seen glass awnings over a door.
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Garden & Be Well,             XO Tara
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Pic Slim Paley.  The glass awning I saw, in France, is a slide somewhere in the bowels of my archives.

Color on the Ceiling

"Paint the ceiling the same color as the walls", she said.  

Susanne Hudson has come onto my team many times thru the years, I trust her.  Painting the ceiling was out of my comfort zone.  Of course there was no other reply than, "Ok". 

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Benjamin Moore-HC Rockport Gray.

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Morning winter sun, above, reads blue.  As summer comes and the trees leaf , the ceiling is white in the mornings and greenish in the afternoon.  

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Walls & ceiling are the same color, above.  

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The ceiling never looks the same color as the walls.  

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

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Pic yesterday, had to verify a package delivery.  Exciting times, this is the 'before' pic.  Gave Susanne a heads-up last weekend about ordering a sofa for this room & slipcovering a pair of chairs.  You know I especially love how my garden colors the ceilings.

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Marc Chagall, "Color is all. When color is right, form is right. Color is everything, color is vibration like music; everything is vibration."

What is the narrative of your garden?

Cute kills.

Whimsey is for the intellect.
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Pure narrative.  Got any in your garden?  These cats, this narrative, melts me.
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Garden & Be Well,  XO Tara
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Pic Deborah Silver, Dirt Simple.  She designs & owns a nursery.  Take the link, enjoy her shop.  Are there even 10 such shops in USA?
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This pair of cats are also, subsidiary focal points.  Name it to claim it.  I've had to name a lot of things in this garden design world.

Details

Multiple meetings with the mason, iron monger & carpenter.

Each with decades of experience.

Attention to details.

Each layer, their own voice.

You see, above, a messy wax myrtle too close to the gate.  By design, it will be pruned into a tunnel of green.  We are awaiting a bit more growth to prune.

Perhaps by year 3 a tunnel of green engulfing both sides of the gate.
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Yes, an idea from childhood, The Secret Garden.  I can still remember my 3rd grade teacher reading it too us after lunch.
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Garden & Be Well,          XO Tara
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Pics at jobsite this month.  Same garden as previous several posts.
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Attention to detail?  Learned quickly studying historic gardens across Europe for 2 decades.
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. Details are not restrictions, they are liberations.

Exterior Color Trinity

Choose a color trinity for your exterior then overdose that theme.

Shades of lead, green, white.
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Lovely.
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Garden & Be Well,  XO Tara
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Pic Greige Design.

A Brick Trinity

  I have never liked the bricks on my house.  Red, that orange red.  Truly red bricks must be fired longer, and cost more.

4 sides brick, and backdrop focal point to every garden view.  When is the last time you looked at your home whilst walking the garden?
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Must find the correct 'white' to brush the bricks.
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Aside from 'aging' the bricks, the whitewash adds 'depth' & 'texture'.
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Sold, I adore trinities (and epiphanies): age, depth, texture.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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pic Better Homes & Gardens.
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If you want a garden that is a moat of grace around your home & life, contact me.
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Details about online design services.
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Learn action steps to creating your best garden & home when you hire me to speak to your group.
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Details about lecture titles here.
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I've written several garden books available on Amazon.

Boot Seat

I need this & know of dozens more who need it too.

The cliche, name it to claim it.
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A new thing for my eyes to scour for while junking/thrifting.
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I'm already anticipating colors to paint it.
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And how to redo the back door to place it.
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An old wood feed trough houses my garden boots now.  Charming but too small.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic saved to show a client, alas did not save provenance.

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If you want a garden that is a moat of grace around your home & life, contact me.
.
Details about online design services.
.
Learn action steps to creating your best garden & home when you hire me to speak to your group.
.
Details about lecture titles here.
.
I've written several garden books available on Amazon.

Trinity of Color Themes

Backdrop rustic hedge, with contrasting foliage, balances formality of furnishings & Chinoiserie.

Trinity of color themes: plantings, accessories, furnishings.
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Garden & Be Well,  XO Tara
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pic via Slim Paley.  It works for interiors/exteriors and will work for you.  After repetition & contrasts, 'copy' is the most potent Garden Design tool.
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If you want a garden that is a moat of grace around your home & life, contact me.
.
Details about online design services.
.
Learn action steps to creating your best garden & home when you hire me to speak to your group.
.
Details about lecture titles here.
.
I've written several garden books available on Amazon.

Design Tools

Trinities are often a good template.

If you don't have matching pots, make sure the rims are each the same height.
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Of course this is also a marvelous display of repetition.  Your most important Garden Design tool.
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Garden & Be Well,     XO Tara
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Pic Janelle McCulloch, Country Estates of Australia.  Visit Janelle's Library of Design.
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If you want a garden that is a moat of grace around your home & life, contact me.
.
Details about online design services.
.
Learn action steps to creating your best garden & home when you hire me to speak to your group.
.
Details about lecture titles here.
.
I've written several garden books available on Amazon.