DESIGNING A B&B LANDSCAPE: COPYING KEW

Ric the Inn Keeper from Highlands, NC is ready to landscape his B&B. I'll drive up in March.

He has grassy areas and wooded.
I see Kew gardens at his B&B. Timeless, inviting, low maintenance, sustainable, serene.

Canopy & understory trees, shrubs, focal point bench, TaraTurf.

Contrasting: oval trees, weeping, conical, crooked, evergreen, deciduous, green foliage, yellow....

Ric, I want these pictures from Kew in your head before I arrive. I know you want more color. We'll place viburnum, rhododendron, mountain laurel, peony, antique roses, hydrangea, lenten rose, iris, on axis with views from the B&B.

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TaraTurf is fescue, moss, clover, crocus, dwarf daffodils, whatever the wind blows in. Are you that brave?

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I took the pics last month at the Royal Botanic Garden, Kew.

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Garden & Be Well, XO T

PETERSHAM NURSERIES & VEGETABLE GARDENS

How landscapes intersect with a home fascinate me. Petersham Nurseries in England occasionally opens the private garden of Petersham House, below. Does your nursery understand the relationship of house & landscape? Petersham's vegetable garden. A seduction. Peter Rabbit feelings, I want to nibble this garden.

Simplicity. Narrow beds to work in easily. Brick path for foot and wheelbarrow. Soil I want to roll in, smell & feel on my skin.

Tree branches & twine ALWAYS trump

store bought stakes & cheap green plastic ties.

If people saw what I did with their trash they would offer to BUY it back.

. No branches? Field gather from neighbor's prunings.

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This peak at Petersham House, landscape & vegetable garden make me want more. I want to see inside Petersham House.

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Does your landscape do that? Ask yourself, Are people salivating to see inside my home because of my landscape?

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photos from Petersham Nursery. Thank you Pigtown*Design for introducing me to them.

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

ATTACHING VINES TO YOUR HOUSE

Gertrude Jekyll, Englishwoman & world's 1st landscape designer, said, When I design a landscape the first thing I consider is what to put on the house. Fascinating. College degree, uncountable lectures attended and not one person ever, ever, mentioned what to put on a house. I design with vines and espaliered woody shrubs on homes.

You can vaguely see the wires on the house, below. Vines with outward growth add a dimension of lushness & softness.

In winter, the wires are barely visible. Entirely cloaked in summer.

Run galvanized wire in horizontal lines 2' apart.

I use masonry screws for brick walls & a jackhammer drill. Copper wire doesn't carry the load of galvanized wire.

Woody shrubs espaliered against a home need no wires or trellising. Use espaliered shrubs for low maintenance.

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I took the pics last month in England at Wisley, Royal Hort. Society.

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

PLINTH: QUESTIONS & FANTASIES

Waking at 2am last night I dwelled upon this man. His PLINTH entertained me. He's Edwardian, placed in an English Park surrounded by homes older than he is. Pedastals and bases are plinths. Made of stacked bricks, limestone, marble, &tc.
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Questions about this plinth:
* Did the sculptor choose it?
* Did a committee choose it?
* How was its height, length, width decided upon?
* Who chose the material and why?
* Who placed the plinth/statue within the park?
* How was the location on the plinth chosen to place the statue's foot?
* Who decided which direction to face the statue?

What I do know:
* The sculptor lived in a house facing the park.
* The sculptor is famous (sorry, didn't get pic of the plaque).
* The sculptor left the statue, in his will, to the park.

What I want to know:
* Which house the sculptor lived in.
* Where was the statue placed at his home?
* What type of plinth was it on?
* Is this the original plinth?
* Did the sculptor leave precise directions for placing the statue, plinth in his will?

What I fantasized about this man:
* He was given to me.
* Placing him in my landscape.
* Cutting plinth lower to properly scale it for my tiny garden.
* Getting rid of his plinth and putting his lovely foot on a local granite boulder.
* He looked great in front of the bay window.
* He looked great in the hedge in my backyard on axis with summerhouse.
* He looked great on axis from my office window.
* Fell asleep before I placed him.


Lovely thoughts of a man's PLINTH.
Ha, what do you think about at 2am?
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Took the pic last month in England.
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Garden & Be Well, XO T

LANDSCAPE SWAG

Normally CUTE KILLS in a landscape. When I began designing landscapes the rules were restrictive to my novice mind. CUTE KILLS is a Tara Rule. What is cute? A flag with a pink bunny rabbit at Easter perhaps? Cute steals the eye & mind. Landscapes of intelligence & wit expand the eye & mind. How can you tell the difference? Take a picture. Is the landscape timeless? Can you tell which decade the landscape occupies? What is the correct answer? "NO". Somehow, this SWAG works. Rules followed: contrasting foliage size, contrasting foliage color, contrasting barren dry gravel 'lawn' around a center pool of water plants.

More Rules Followed: Focal point statue on axis, focal point bench on axis, enfilade created (view thru to a view), hedges create a garden room, creating sound with water feature, creating sound with feet on gravel, KISS (keep it simple Sweetie), shades of green create serenity.

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I took these pics a couple of years ago in England. They could have been taken yesterday or 1910.

LANDSCAPE CAUGHT MY IMAGINATION

This little garden found on Aesthetes Lament stole my heart. A centuries old style. Do you see only a woman standing in gravel? Ha!

Gravel is cheaper than stone, doesn't require skilled labor and lasts as long as a stone terrace. Creating a planting bed in gravel is simple, place cobblestones as edging and presto---a planting bed.

The bed, below, is lush and has stakes ready for tall blooms and twine ready for, most likely, clematis.

A solid urn is a wise choice atop the brick column. Who wants to water a pot that high? Do you want to climb a ladder and replant a pot up there?

An iron gate contrasts materials, shapes and has a keyhole view to another garden room. Ooooooh mystery, I must go thru that gate. Does your garden have mystery? No disgusting foundation planting ruins the front of this home. Obama should have included, Americans cling to their foundation plantings as a source of security. Lushness is espaliered on the house. Easier to maintain espalier 'whatever' than foundation plantings.

A pair of iron clamming baskets frame the sitting man. (Made that up, don't know what those iron baskets are.) Without plants they will hold the design-decorating together.

I want to smell this garden, hear the gravel crunch, meander thru the gate and ask to use the toilet (the English look at you funny when you ask for the restroom) then I can see inside the house. Assuming I'm on a garden tour of course.

Cecil Beaton's eye, the photographer, is knowing. Movie-set designer, gardener and writer he adored decadent amounts of fresh flowers in his home, cut from his garden.

He wrote, Here was the garden at its best & I lay in bed & saw the Picasso & Hockney engravings framed on my side wall, & the pictures were alliterated with the reflections from outside the window of roses blowing in the breeze, & the green marvel of the garden beyond."
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Photo from National Portrait Gallery

EVERGREEN HEDGES & GARDEN ROOMS

Evergreen hedges are the bones of a landscape. No down time. Behind the hedge is a secret garden room.

FORMULA: TREES (ceiling), SHRUBS (walls), MEADOW (rug), FOCAL POINT (art)
*Big leaves next to small leaves.
*Green leaves next to yellow leaves.
*Oval shapes next to flat shapes.
*Tara Turf, meadow, mix of what's there and keep what blows in.
*Focal point, think, Is it so wonderful it will be fought over at my estate sale?

Landscapes are about contrasting everything for greater impact. Use as little as possible for the biggest impact. "Elegance is refusal" anon.
Behind the winged statue, above, is this charming garden room, below.

The same garden, below, contrasting purple foliage with green foliage.

Garden room, below, behind the hedge, above. Photo, below, framed with the purple foliage, above.

Sustainability isn't boring or new & needs little maintenance.

FROST'S GARDEN CENTRE, ENGLAND LAST MONTH

Enjoy Frosts Garden Centre in Oxfordshire. We stopped for lunch and investigating on the way to Kew. Frosts sells everything to create a landscape. Everything.

Instant fantasies about this man? Like how dirty he is? Me too. See a gate in your color in your landscape? Clematis & sweetpeas on the willow wall? Hydrangeas, roses, foxgloves, Dianthus 'Bath Pink' in front?

Corner seat, below, was on sale. Confederate jasmine caressing its roof, cryptomeria 'Yoshino' gracing the right corner, a camellia barely touching the left. A Prunus mume tree blooming......... I can't stop designing.

What's a landscape without fabulous pots? Below, a book with prices and other pieces for special order. Pages laminated. Easy concept. Rarely done in my town. Why?

Lead colored containers, below, are better against a red brick wall than the terra cotta color.

Frosts, below, does it all. They subcontract with Shires, and other businesses, to complete theirs.

The cafe has a separate dining area for private groups to reserve.

It's frustrating to design a landscape for DIY and have no single place to refer you for pots, gates, soil amendments, mulch, plants, patio furnishings, focal points, pond supplies.

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Locally, Buck Jones, Land Art's and Wilkerson Mill Gardens give discounts to my design clients. You must have a copy of my plan. Each nursery run with passion, intellect, dedication.

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Great nurseries, above, but you'll still need garage sales and flea markets to personalize your landscape. Dumpster diving, TJMax and rock rescues are also in the best landscapes.
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Garden & Be Well XO Tara

MY TRIP to WHICHFORD POTTERY in Nr SHIPSTON-ON-STOUR, WARWICKSHIRE, ENGLAND

Determined driving barely got us to Whichford Pottery before dark last month. England is dark at 5pm in winter. Found on a flier, who knew what it would be like? Arriving to this, we knew the rest would be fantasy. Below, pots in pots. How long before I do this?

The artists shop, below. Several artists work at this pottery, founded 1976 by Jim Keeling.

A mix of buildings, centuries old, comprise the pottery, below. I couldn't investigate fast enough.

Seeing the vista of pots, below, made me ache. A heart & lust ache. How to get them home?

AN ENGLISH WOMAN MADE LOVE WITH AN ITALIAN URN.

She gave birth to this man, below. He gave freely, willing us to know clay.

A front-end loader brings in clay, below. I wanted to strip & swim in it.

Three types of clay, from different areas of England, make the frost proof pots.

Wet clay goes thru this machine,below, moisture dripping. Oh, the smell of God's good earth.

After the machine, above, clay goes into the machine, below. Extruded from the front it's cut off with a large improvised cheese cutter. Then covered with plastic & cured for a couple of weeks.

FILLING BROKEN POTS WITH BROKEN POTS AND THEY'RE PRETTY. And the garden creates another metaphor.

A talker & lover this cat had me. This pottery had me. It still does.

Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

EDWARDIAN LUST

After lecturing last week in England it was off for the backroads, hedgerows, B&Bs, tiny villages and gardens. I was in the Midlands/Cotswolds/London areas. The garden above is Edwardian. I lust after these landscapes. This is a side view of the home, now a Trust Property. Notice the expert use of espaliered plants. A winter garden and gorgeous. The dormant plants provide summer's glory. The bench is a destination. The round gutter contrasts the many squares. Gravel crunches underfoot. A romantic, functional landscape.