A Lawn Rule: Before & After

Came for the art show, a first visit, earlier this month.  He, we hadn't met before, asked a few garden questions.  Within moments, "Your lawn is in charge & you must be in charge of your lawn", I said.

I described a typical Victorian shape, for their Victorian home, rectangular with the corners worn away leaving an oval of turf.  Corners filled in with stone.

Earlier this week he sends me these pics, above/below.

I know, without asking, more pics will arrive.
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Loving what he's done and can't wait for the 'corners' to be filled.
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And I'm sure he remembers my comment about a focal point on axis with the front window, at right, above.
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Garden & Be Well,  XO Tara
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Top pic mine.  Is your lawn in charge?  

Side Porch

The kitchen has a door to the side porch. 

Kitchen door, above.
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Garden & Be Well,       XO Tara
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Amazing how few homes have a side door & porch.  Same home as previous post.  Painting by Christine Shockley.

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.

Driveway Design

A driveway.

Sound of gravel.
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Tapestry hedge.
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Oh my this is good.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic Whimble.

Front Porch Simplicity

When the competition is an old Pecan Orchard I know to go simple, below.

Soon the tea olive, above, will engulf the end of the porch.  And then be pruned into a tunnel, for the pure life necessity of leaving the porch at its tiniest entry.  Silent Partner doesn't think this is needed.  He has his reasons, I have mine.  200 acres and I am particularly interested in this square foot.

My competition, above.  Fields, Pecan Orchard & Home, a perfect trinity.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics taken this month at jobsite of several recent posts.  Leaving the Pecan Orchard alone includes creating Tara Turf, siting daffodils, boxwood & historic brick path, keeping fence at the road and saying 'no' to foundation plantings.
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Another fabulous Landscape Design making me unemployable to the largest landscape design/build/maintain companies across USA.  Planned obsolescence of irrigation, keeping fence, no foundation shrubs, no zoysia, no annuals.
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MATH on what 'those' companies would lose in installation & a single decade of maintenance with my design.  New fence, irrigation system & rows-upon-rows-upon-rows of green meatball shrubs. Lawn: 2 acres sod, mowing, irrigation, pre-emergents, fertilizer, edging.  Shrubs: several prunings yearly, mulch in the beds, pre-emergents, fertilizing, replanting annuals 2/year.
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Minimum annuals charge is $500/season by the best firm (of course I use the best, Simply Flowers, & of course they are needed in many commercial, and residential situations.)  Monthly maintenance $500.  Fence $4000, irrigation $4000, mulch 350/year, chemicals/fertilizer 200/year, &  foundation shrubs $5000, 2 acres zoysia sod $52,800.
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$141,300.00 for a decade of traditional USA Landscape Design.  My Landscape Design, above, $50/month maintenance fee, no foundation plantings, no irrigation, no chemicals, no mulch, little pruning, no sod, little mowing, keep fence, no fertilizer, no annuals, $6,000 for a decade.  (A kind woman, I give away the concrete foundation expense of the brick path, mine are in dirt.  Otherwise add another $5000)
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$135,300.00 difference. 
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Has the math sunk in?  
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My work/style is not meant to save money, yet it does.  It's historic Italian.  Enfilade from the interior of the home, pollinator habitat, a thanks to Providence, a joy to look at and live within.  When away on vacation my gardens are carried in the heart with a yearning to know everything while gone & return soon.  If you can leave at all.
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Chill Pill Urban Ag!  There are other ways in this industry to make money.  Ask Silent Partner !  Thank you for letting me be on your Outreach team.

Poverty Cycle Into the Music Room

The library across the hall, previous post, is moody with northeastern light.  The music room, below, hums in southeastern light.

Eastern light, below, in the mirror, southern light, window above.

The garden view, below, is one of my proudest achievements.

I took the garden, a century old, to its Southern roots in time & place.  Using the Poverty Cycle.  Looking in the window, below, seen, above.

Tara Turf to the foundation, granite curbstone step instead of green-meatball-foundation-plantings, drifts of daffodils as-if-they-were-always-there.
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Plenty of areas to play & show off in this garden, and I have, but without using the Poverty Cycle the garden would lack soul, character, integrity, & have too-much-uneducated-ego.  Of course you've deduced, this is my ego, above.  This is a portion of the front porch, hence, double ego!
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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara
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Pics taken last week at jobsite.  Same garden as previous several posts.
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Ego for doing-the-right-thing makes me unemployable to the largest design/install companies across USA.  Why?  It's all about sales.  Are you beginning to understand the prevalence of green meatballs & foundation plantings and, and, and?
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Oh my, a little Puppet Barbuda this morning.  Uneducated ego?  Testosterone-on-wheels-mow-blow-go-commodify-all-I-touch-get in fast-get out fast-sign my contract-pay me every month.  Sad, you'll pay later in lower house value, higher HVAC, increase maintenance expenses, poison  ground water with fertilizer, destroy pollinator habitat, and worse, harm your spirit with ugliness.  

Rustic Simplicity

Simplicity is a choice.  

Rustic simplicity is a bold choice few Americans take.
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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara
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pics My French Country Home.

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.

Foundation Planting

Starter home to million plus, Americans love their foundation plantings.  Why?  Rows of green meatballs planted by the builder, pruned ad nauseam for decades showing off the enabling co-dependent relationship serving neither party. 

And the confidence of this driveway.  More than function, a feature.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic My French Country Home.
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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.
.
Learn action steps to creating your best garden & home when you hire me to speak to your group.
.
Details about lecture titles here.
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I've written several garden books available on Amazon.

Front Door Narrative

Contrasts are a potent tool in the garden.

This mirror & curving lines of the light fixture balance the squares of the front door.  Exactly what I would have chosen.  And the scale of the frontdoor handle is pure sweetness.
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This frontdoor starts the narrative of the interior.
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Every front door has a narrative.  Whether the owner thinks so or not.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic via Cote de Texas.  If the door were palladian then a square/rectangular mirror would be best.  Do not forget to use 'contrast' in your quiver of tools.
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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.

Front Door: Create Your World

Your front door must create its own world.  What does this mean?  Block views that are not part of your world.  Do you see the neighbor's garage & parking court, below?  It is there.

Kitchen view, below.

2 decades of a holly hedge were shaded into sparseness & removed.  Anise, shade loving shrub, will be planted this week.
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At the end of the day,  it is understood, we must all create our own world.
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Garden & Be Well,      XO Tara
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Pics taken at jobsite last week.  This client fascinates, she does not like blooming shrubs in her garden.  Layers & swaths of evergreens in mixed textures.  Quite smart, low maintenance, gorgeous all year.  She does have a sweet perennial garden.  We are adding evergreen ground cover at her front door zone, large boxwoods with square stone edging for each, a low brick wall with stone cap behind her perennial garden.  And she's choosing a historic garden gate for my carpenter, Magic Man, to make a pair.
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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.

Choosing the Best Urns

Urns that don't need planting are the best.

Rustic invitation leading to greater simplicity at the house.  My favorite template.
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What is the USA fascination with lawn to the street?
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Garden & Be Well,      XO Tara
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Pic via Old Long Island  
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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.

Front Door Pendant Light

Endangered object, below.

Sweetly scaled pendant light.
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A front door is always a focal point.  When architecture & materials are already good why compete?  Beware 'too large' exterior lighting at your front door.
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Garden & Be Well,      XO Tara
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pic via DIY Home Staging Tips.  You'll love the link, it's the best tips of Home Staging for 2012.  Of course, too many decades of USA homes lack good materials/architecture, mine is one, so you want to consider the possibility of large exterior lighting.  Then, beware of lipstick-on-a-pig.
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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.

Rustic Light Post

Function, a certain elegance, and a craftsman who obviously cared.

Antique junk shop with vendor stalls this building, below, started life in the late 19th century as a horse/carriage business.

Of course I bought some things, but seeing the antique light post is the real treasure.

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Garden & Be Well,          XO Tara

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Was trying to find the antique car museum in Houston, TX.  

High, and Large, Foyer Window

A good solution for the multi-story foyer with tall window over the front door.

A ridiculous space, it still needs attention.  Doing nothing looks undone.  Doing something looks forced, and dusty.
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From the garden most views into these windows look 'vacant'.
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Yes, this urn is 'just right'.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic via Belgian Pearls

Vanishing Threshold

Living in Dallas, TX during college I preferred my bike to my car.  Turtle Creek was enchanting.

From the street the homes were so inviting.
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Warm, glowing, rich in spirit, loving, or so it seemed to an introverted coed.
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Perhaps this is the heart of Vanishing Threshold.
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Wanting beauty, a home, loving environment.
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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara
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Pic taken at jobsite last week.  Isn't 'yearning' wonderful?  Adore its action steps.

Curb Appeal: Color, Pots, Lights

Pair of pots, pair of lights, pair of sidelights, black front door.

                                                       Works in myriad situations.

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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara

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Pics taken at a client last week.  KISS.  Keep it simple sweetie.

                                    

Choosing Correct Shutters

These windows, original 1945 leaded glass, face east.  And a busy street.

Need maximum lite & privacy.  Historically.

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Front parlor.

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You know what the budget is.  Thrifting.

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Does it pay to have sneered haughtily down the nose chip on fabulously beautiful shoulder being too good for most everything on the planet in one's 20's?  Especially these mini-shutters.

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Not hung & not painted what was once disgusting to my spirit is already fabulous & meeting every demand of the site.

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If money were available for custom plantation shutters?  Not vernacular to this piece of Americana.

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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara

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French cafe table & ironstone tureen from Scott's, bistro chairs from estate sale, lamps & shutters thrifted.