SPO: HOME, GARDEN, TEA

SPO's home was under construction when I drew her landscape design several months ago. I knew from descriptions it was going to be scrumptious. A small house is what she, & her husband CAPE COD, wanted with great details, antiques, art, books and a garden. Look at the tea she served. Cava, ha, isn't she wonderful? County restrictions & certificate of occupancy played a role in the initial landscape. A dastardly lawn HAD to go in. Soon much of the lawn will be flowering shrubs, groundcovers, understory blooming trees, paths, rosemary, lavender & more wildflowers.

SPO's first wildflower meadow, above.

Lawn now but just you wait, hydrangeas, azaleas, viburnum, mondo, jasmine, tea olive, cryptomeria, gardenia, camellia, forsythia, & etc......

SPO sourced most of the materials for the house. The working shutters are on all sides of the house. The living room, above, with 2 pair French doors leading to the back porch and, below, a door from the master bedroom to the back porch.

Well chosen downspout, below, it's round. The stones are faux. On site, from 3', you can't tell they are faux.

The kitchen, family room, master bedroom, upstairs office, & porch, below, overlook an amphitheater with a mature woodland backdrop. You would not believe the birdsong.

Natural terracing, below, forms the amphitheatre. Faux stone tops the retaining walls.

Textured blocks, below, even cheaper than the faux stone, comprise the retaining walls. Not seen, why spend more?

A delight in the carriage house, the Cadillac. SPO & CAPE COD drive for pancakes each Saturday in the Caddy. Yes, I've asked them to stop by & pick me up some Saturday.

SPO adores cooking and found her kitchen online at Yestertec Kitchen Works. Simple, compact, functional and charming.

The oven, below, is in the cabinet under the stove.

And the armoir, below, is not a pantry.

It's a cooking center, below. Delightful, just close the doors and it's a clean look.

In the library, below. Moving into this house they decided to forgo cable. And are loving the change in their lives.

Between kitchen and living room, below, the desk. The house is one room deep in these rooms and full of natural light. And views, views, views.

Keeping it small, below, SPO knew to go high with the living room ceiling.

SPO & I dreamed, before she moved in, about having a tea party on the back porch, below. Alas, dear ones, we were weak. Do you know how forsakenly hot/humid it was?

SPO & CAPE COD have successfully down-sized from their large home yet already feel the difference in living larger, richer, simpler, lives.

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Enjoying the cava, conversation, house, garden and scones with fresh fruit/jam it was difficult to comprehend they have only been in their home for 3 months. It felt like E. M. Forster. The solidness of Howard's End. A place to fill the spirit.

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You'll be getting more of SPO & CAPE COD because I didn't get any pics of their corgi, who really owns the place. And of course, as the garden goes in.

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Garden & Be Well, XO T

SHOOTING HYDRANGEAS & LOVING LEGS

How did the hydrangeas KNOW where to grow? This is not a 'styled' picture. It's viewed thru my kitchen & bedroom windows.
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When it comes to focal points, just-let-it-touch. What bench, statue, urn, birdbath isn't improved with a hint of foliage just touching?
Shooting hydrangeas and seeing the table legs from a new angle, below. The legs have a slight curve from top to bottom, reeking of the 1950's. Aside from being a diminutive rectangular shape, perfection, I had to have those legs.

And the glass top with more hydrangea blossoms underneath. A hydrangea carpet!!!

And the blue/white ginger jar? It's a traditional Chinese wedding gift. The writing says, 'Double Happiness'. Of course I didn't know that when I bought it at the thrift store for $3.
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Notes: Square or rectangular patio tables are the best, round tables aren't as flexible in usage. A pair of square tables can be used separately or pulled together for larger gatherings. If you find an old iron patio table, as above, don't worry that it doesn't have chairs. Find comfortable chairs or benches of wood or metal and paint them all the same color. The French have been doing this for centuries. Place an arbor over your table with a ceiling fan to keep mosquitoes away. ENJOY.

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

BIRTHDAY PICNIC IN THE EVENING GARDEN

He said, It's late but please come to LOLA's birthday picnic. Bring something healthy for about 15. I met LOLA last month lecturing for the Extension Service. Instant GIRL CRUSH.LOLA was growing TARA TURF before we met! Historically correct for her older home. A mix of fescue-moss-clover-what the wind blows in. Never needs water, fertilizer or chemicals. Honeybees love it.

LOLA chose the paint for her bricks and created her own interiors. How to get you the fragrance of this magnolia?

Vanishing Threshold, above, dictates views into a window are pretty in both directions. No backsides of pictures, clocks, or TV.

Do you like still life's too?

About here, above, I thought to myself, This is probably rude leaving the party to wander & take pics without asking. Ha, did I stop?

I knew LOLA wouldn't have paper plates. Or paper napkins.

Gazpacho in the pitcher, Mario Bitalli asparagus (sauteed with garlic/parsley/citrus), fruit salad, cucumber salad, field pea salad.... Wine & beer & tea were in the copper farmhouse sink cradled in ice.

Set into a slight hill the house is crowned with a hardwood canopy of oaks. Captured light, above.

Vanishing Threshold, house & garden, each a seduction of comfort.

LOLA added French doors.

The back garden has 3 terraces.

LOLA really nailed her pot clusters, above. She overdosed, with 3!

Standing at the French doors looking into the garden. A designer planned the garden; contractors put in the stone. LOLA and darling TOM are doing the plantings & maintenance. Exactly the hand-heart-eye a paid maintenance crew cannot provide. The word for it? Charm.

What is a house & garden without a Queen? CHESSIE was in control. She also sweetly gave away a personal tidbit. She's a Daddy's Girl.

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LOLA & TOM live from the center of their home to the property line. And that darlings is Vanishing Threshold.

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Stop here if you don't partake of good gossip.

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LOLA & TOM were married last year in Italy. LOLA invited her 2 best friends. And that is how darling TOM honeymooned with 3 women at a villa in Italy.

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You bet I'll keep up with this interesting crew.

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

SLEEPING WITH FARROW & BALL

Falling asleep the past 2 nights reading the new Farrow & Ball color chart. Exhausting delight. Imagining color combos with shutters, patio furnishings, trim, frontdoors, arbors & etc. THEY, yesterday's client, have a new house in an old neighborhood.

Shutters in their breakfast room are usually closed due to the view of the carriage house, below. Solution? I designed a pair of French doors, iron balcony and jasmine 'Madison' to climb and soften.

Their covered porch, below, exposed to the neighbors. Behind the chairs I've designed shutters, sconces, sofa table, pair of lamps, and an ottoman for the chairs. The floor will be stained 2 tones darker than the house trim and a sisal rug will be placed.

The stacked wood wall, below, has got to go. Until then it will be stained the trim color of the house.

A stone wall will be built with a modest column for an urn. Across the street, below, is the type of stone wall their landscape needs.

Changing the subject, below, yesterday's lunch on the well-placed chair. Remember what the chair looked like 4 days ago?

Yes, snow, 4 days ago. Atlanta has crazy weather. It was zone 7, now zone 8.

Bought the footstool, below, with thoughts of paint & recovering. It's been in my garage for years.

Brought it into the house yesterday and discovered a note pinned to its bottom.

Horse hair and excelsior stuffing, maybe original? I googled the names on the note and found one of them. Will sleep again with Farrow & Ball deciding on a color.

I have a footstool fetish. Anyone else?

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Why the disparate mix of topics? They all happened yesterday. Are your days this sublimely variable? Tears yesterday also. I found a disc of pictures, several years old. Pictures taken in Penny's garden, Hydrangea Heaven. Friend, mentor, travel companion, compatriot in crime, lecture partner, and too long gone from this Earth.

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

LUSH PATIO TEMPLATE

Does your patio, or deck, answer the question:
IS THIS PATIO SO WONDERFUL I MUST SEE THE LANDSCAPE AND IS THIS PATIO SO WONDERFUL I MUST SEE INSIDE THE HOUSE?

If you're not answering YES the patio isn't finished.
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PATIO-DECK TEMPLATE: Lush plantings, privacy, easy to move furnishings, comfort, color choices for furnishings-home-accents to match interior design, lighting choices, detailing choices on house for 3-D effects, above, it's the shutters, large pots, area for conversation-reading-napping, area for eating, outdoor ceiling fans. Is the patio an extension of the room/s it is viewed from?

The template doesn't waver for the value of your real estate. Starter home or Madoff golf course community, the template remains the same.

Thank you Cote de Texas for posting this picture, from Ernesto Buch, on your blog

Garden & Be Well XO T

SHOOTING HIPPIE CHICK

Hippie Chick is the real deal. Dusting it up in the 1960's she's still advocating for nature, children, reading, fixing government, pollution.... She's one of those rare people with children that has left a chunk of land, major chunk, to a preserve. Hippie Chick is wicked fun. We share secrets but that's another blog.

Shooting her porch was easy though it had a huge problem. The light fixture and screen door shout 1970's yuck. Shooting to avoid ugliness, the offending door/light fixture are to the left.

Hippie Chick has other porches. We've sat and gossiped on the others but not here. Why? There to design we start working the moment my foot hits her property.

I'll find the pics of her backyard we did last year. It has a new cistern, clothesline and vegetable garden.......... Will get shots of her new frontdoor/light fixture soon.