Showing posts with label Path. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Path. Show all posts

Friday, November 12, 2010

Southern Living Magazine: Clear Winner

When I design landscapes I must see pictures of gardens you like, and dislike.Women, men, widowed, single, divorced, all ages, starter home, mansion, city, country, heterosexual, bisexual, gay, lesbian, whatever, this garden is the clear winner.
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Yesterday's client, yep ! Saved this pic since its debut.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic taken of Southern Living magazine photo at my jobsite yesterday.
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Why does this garden resonate? Good Design: canopy trees, understory trees, evergreen walls, groundcover flooring, layers of green (contrasting in texture/color), hi density & low density. Paths, seating, water, sky, intuitively low maintenance plantings.
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Do you know why hi & low density are potent? Pollinators............

Thursday, November 4, 2010

Landscape Design Patterns Inside Your Home

Art, furniture, architecture, lamps, even rugs inspire landscape design patterns. Particularly scrumptious, below.The curves she had led me in a NEW direction; pattern in a mass planting of evergreen groundcover, below.
Wine Bottle pattern, above, pure subtlety with green bottles, I'm thinking yellow/gold wine bottles instead. I want the pattern to be seen.
How the Wine Bottle patterns look in concept, above.
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Her frontyard meadow is ripe for the central pattern in the carpet, top pic. Expanse of meadow with pathways radiating.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Yes, Poppets, Landscape Design is this easy.

Tuesday, November 2, 2010

Wine Bottle Edging

She let go. And isn't it fun when a woman let's go?She lined a garden path DRAMATICALLY with wine bottles. (Poppets, she did it herself, no hired labor. Unwittingly, she copied curves from a table in her foyer, above.)
Adoring genius, I copied her lead. Concept plan, above, new curving paths will be Wine Bottle Edged & capped with her signature curve.
Her home is historic, the garden revitalized. Curving flourishes with the Wine Bottle Edging are subtle up close, DRAMATIC when viewed from the house.

Bare soil, above, will be filled-in with evergreen groundcover.
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Gravel terrace at the tennis court, above, becomes a landing for her party tent (she's a fundraiser for the Humane Society). Under the tented area the gravel will be checker boarded with 18" concrete squares. Did I mention she loves to sail? Lakes of mondo in the gravel will be home to old wood boats, sails flying from their masts. The little Williamsburg building at the tennis court will be enlarged, creating a 'boathouse', complete with dock. In addition to storage it will be the Bar during parties.
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Stay tuned, there's more.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics taken last week, same home/garden as previous post.

Saturday, September 11, 2010

Same Spot: 2 Views

Shooting pic, below, in a tiny garden. Feet remain stationary, below,

& shooting a pic in the opposite direction.
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Double Axis never ceases to amaze. Being on the same line with night & day views.
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Can you do this in your garden?
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics taken last month in the same antebellum garden as the previous post.

Saturday, September 4, 2010

Double Axis

Looking along a path, below, in one direction. Looking along the same path, below, in its opposite direction.
DOUBLE AXIS. (Same garden as yesterday's post.)
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Double Axis, my landscape design invention (la-ti-da). I noticed the best gardens have beautiful axis, and when you turn around they are beautiful along the opposite axis, DOUBLE AXIS.
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So, dear poppets, it's not merely good enough to have a beautiful view. You must have a beautiful view in 2 directions along the same line.
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Of course you can throw a roundabout into your Double Axis and create a Double Double Axis. Life is good when these are your musings.

Thursday, September 2, 2010

Create Seductive Doorways

Invite people thru your garden with doorways. Use a pair of pots, pair of vertical stones, pair of plinths, pair evergreen shrubs, arbor & etc. Drama of a step, narrowing to the path, above, less than 3' wide, lines of boxwood creating a hallway. Focal point on axis, creating a foyer and
beyond is another fabulous living room.
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Doorway, top pic, leads from the terrace in yesterday's post.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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It is this simple. Doorway, landing, hallway, foyer, living room. Gorgeous & low maintenance too.

Saturday, August 21, 2010

Enfilade

More windows than shown, below, view the patio. From the windows, thru the patio, across the lawn, and into
the woods. A complete view, an enfilade.
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Imagine, sitting on your couch, enjoying views of the patio, lawn & woodland.
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Nice, indeed.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics taken last week in Athens.

Friday, July 30, 2010

Tuteur & Drama

Cone shapes draw the eye in landscapes. Charming tuteur, below, buta subtle color.
Imagine if each tuteur were bright yellow or red. Changes the garden, yes?
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic from the same garden as yesterday's post. My client made these tuteurs. Notice the drama of tuteurs in pots. The Anna Belle hydrangeas are a victory in this drought & hi temps & sun.

Tuesday, June 22, 2010

Transition

Closer to the house the landscaping is more formal. Near the back of the property, below, the landscape transitions into natural woodland.
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Gravel drive & path drift/mingle with leaf litter mulch. No stone or brick edging, 'soldiers'. Not even tree limb edging.
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Landscapes are stories. Work the drama.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic taken in Susanne Hudson's garden last month.

Tuesday, June 15, 2010

An Exception

Landscape Design Rule: 1 Focal Point per Area Faux bois bench.
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Oversized hanging candle lantern.
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Blooming Hydrangea in a pot.
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Gravel path.
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Breaking Landscape Design Rules creates fabulous landscapes.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic taken almost 2 weeks ago in Susanne Hudson's garden. I spent 5 nites with her while creating our garden for the annual Penny McHenry Hydrangea Festival. Oh yes, dahlings, will be posting those pics soon.
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I've taken dozens of pics of this gorgeous faux bois bench. Each awful. Finally. Ah, finally. Got it !!
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Yes, broken landscape design rule, above, but don't overlook the fabulous landscape design: canopy trees, understory trees, walls of shrubs, color theme, sense of mystery, sense of surprise.

Monday, June 14, 2010

Don't Overbuild II

Same slope/drainage issue, different garden, as the last post, below. I created this path, above, over 20 years ago. Stone & gravel were under $150.00 and all the labor was done by ME!
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The day I created this path COLLEGE BOY said, "All the gravel is going to wash across the garden with the first rain."
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Hey COLLEGE BOY, "2 decades & counting, when exactly is the gravel going to wash away?"
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Gravel path with slight slope, drainage issue. Path terraced, shot pea gravel poured, stones dug into slope with 2" buried in soil, stones angled slightly into slope.
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Shot pea gravel loaded at quarry into the back of my pick-up truck. Parked at the curb & shoveled gravel into my double-wheeled wheelbarrow.
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Stepped off the length of this path, counting steps, and bought chunky field stone to match number of steps. Chose only stones I could carry in my arms. Each of the stones you see, above, I carried one-by-one from my truck at the curb to the backyard (easier than the wheelbarrow routine) & dug into the slope.

Saturday, June 12, 2010

Don't Overbuild

Solving a slight drainage issue easily, affordably, without pooling water, without breeding mosquitoes & will last over a century, below. Path was terraced, #89 granite gravel poured, slope dug into with stone laid (dug in about 1"-2" at each base) angled into the slope.
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Unskilled labor required at each phase, above. Easily woman powered, or man.
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Water, now, follows the path. As does the eye & foot.
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Too often I am at a new client's landscape and discover French drains already installed. And already NOT WORKING. Excepting mosquito production. And They Are UGLY & Expensive.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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New path, above, in Jeri Farmer's garden. Not all areas, obviously, can be solved with the method above. Some areas, alas, do need a French drain. Dahlings, I don't want you oversold by a contractor wanting your money instead of the right thing for your landscape. Studying gardens in Europe I saw this same method used countless times in many countries. Built one in my garden 2 decades ago. Will find pic and post it soon. It's fabulous!!!

Thursday, June 10, 2010

Checkerboard Flooring

Checkerboard flooring, below, in shade. Grass won't grow.
12" X 12" concrete squares.


Gorgeous all year. Affordable, low-maintenance, unskilled labor, rain water only. Add crocus, scilla, blue grape hyacinths.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Yesterday's client's office has a black/white checkerboard floor. Soon the garden outside her windows will have checkerboard flooring too.
Pic taken last week in Susanne Hudson's garden. She installed the checkerboard flooring herself. 18" X 18" concrete squares? Too heavy. Unskilled labor & woman powered.

Wednesday, June 2, 2010

At The Gate


From the Tea Olive Terrace, below, looking into my backyard. At the same gate, in my backyard, below, looking into the Tea Olive Terrace.

Double Axis: 2 views fabulous. A fabulous view in 1 direction must be fabulous in the opposite direction.
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There are no exits in a garden, only entries.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics taken last week in my garden. See the template? A Trinity of the Ages: Path, Gate, Boxwood. Ramped up: painted gate, gravel path, blooming hydrangeas.

Monday, May 10, 2010

A Landscape Design

Think this is unkempt? A landscape design, above, an illusion of country. Nature. Not one leaf is unconsidered. The dirt path? Part of the landscape design.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Took pic in England.
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Living with a manicured lawn yet love the garden above? Yes? Life is too short not to have a garden nurturing your spirit.

Tuesday, April 20, 2010

A Garden View

This is the view, below,
from the library, below. It's upstairs facing the morning sun.
Decadence, below, as azalea blossoms caress both sides of my body. Alas, they're pruned after blooming; opening the path wider. No matter, by then the hydrangeas will be blooming.


Downstairs, below, kitchen views pour into the Woodland Walk too.



A WATTLE, below, runs the length of the Woodland Walk.

Subtle, above. Would you know a WATTLE was there if I didn't tell you? Not quite 3' high it's prunings & fallen limbs from my garden. A natural fence preventing leaves from blowing into the Woodland Walk once it's blown.
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Other parts of my tiny garden are quite formal. It's of utmost importance I overdose this theme of my Woodland Walk.
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The best landscapes are all about contrasts.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Learned about wattles from mentor, Mary Kistner. They were used on the apple orchard in upstate New York where she grew up in the early 20th century. Have been designing WATTLES into gardens ever since. They don't photograph well & verbally/written they seem repulsive, however, I've never had a client see a WATTLE without getting quite excited about creating their own.

Saturday, April 17, 2010

TOOLS: Paths, Repetition, Axis & Entries

Your landscape cannot have too many entries. Install paths first, THEN your plants. Flagstone path fading into woodchip path, above, amplifies the effect of moving from one garden room to another.
Repetition of plant materials, color, pots, & paths create architecture of landscapes.


Double axis. Path, below, leads from backyard to frontyard.

Above, look close. It's same path as top pic, taken from opposite direction. DOUBLE AXIS.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Notes: pics taken yesterday in my garden. I prefer SCRUFFY landscape styling for my personal garden. Once blooms, above, fade hand pruning begins. Paths become more prominent. Is this important? Why? Landscapes with the average American paid maintenance crew have a neat but depressing, & property lowering, gas blown & electric pruned look.
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The look of cheap unskilled labor. Time is money hence gas/electric landscape style prevails. Sadly, a look considered the proper American standard. Alexis de Tocqueville, circa 1831, was all too correct about Americans.
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Why sad? The look promotes sales not landscaping. Selling lawns needing chemicals & regular mowing, annuals needing replanting 2X/year, 10' plants designed under 3' windows needing major regular pruning, plants/lawns needing an irrigation system, & the promise of a no care landscape for $25/week. What a deal, $25 bucks for a space many times larger than a home's interior with a $75/week maid.
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Why not choose a landscape design: requiring no chemicals, no irrigation system, no annuals, less pruning, 50%-75% less mowing, and shades your home in summer/blocks winter winds (major hvac savings) while improving property value?
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I feel like Alice Waters must have felt decades ago. Like her, I won't quit.

Tuesday, April 6, 2010

WHICH DIRECTION?

This crabapple, below, doesn't have a bad direction. Here, above/below, in Susanne Hudson's backyard.
Looking thru the gate, below, is a view from the frontyard.

Blossoms, below, each had honeybees. Wish you could hear this tree.



Classic Design Recipe, below. Path, gate, arbor, light, picket fence, color theme, bench, potted boxwood, leaf litter mulch, Tara Turf, focal point on axis. (Note: treat this as any good recipe. It works everytime & is unique everytime.)



Crabapple viewed, below, from the front porch. She fills the horizon.

Notice winter's bare branches? I adore the frisson.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics taken last Friday. My favorite direction is from the library, early morning. Alas, we were hard at work on our book project.

Saturday, March 6, 2010

FORMAL + PSO

Deep winter dormant, I still know what this garden looks like. And why it works.
Formal hardscape: hedges & lines contrasted with chaos of plantings + informal tree trunks.
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Italians have cone shaped shrubs, with scruffy PSO's, behind evergreen hedges. (My favorite!)
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French gardens are quite rigid with evergreen hedging enclosing, oh let's say, tulips.
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Ah, the English. Evergreen hedges exploding with herbaceous borders & flowering shrubs.
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Take this style, evergreen hedge +lines + backfill plantings. Make it your own.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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PSO? Plant Shape Only!! Yes, more pics I took recently at Wing Haven.
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My garden began as mostly English. Now, it's Italian + English.

Monday, March 1, 2010

SPRING IS EASY

This garden, below, gets it right. How do you know?
The bones (evergreen structure, axis, focal point, hardscape) hold together in deepest winter, above.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Top pic from Wing Haven. Bottom pic I took last week at Wing Haven, Charlotte, NC.