Details of a Garden Room

Rescued sink, "champagne is on ice in the conservatory", & stand made from leftover structural pieces, century old rescued pine. Rescued culvert, above, has a new life, & the rescued chest, windows, shutter.

How calm the shutter looks, above, hiding the sink. Carpet, #89 granite gravel.

Nap, above, on the daybed in the Garden Room? Notice its pot feet? Having a chandelier & lamps is of utter importance.

Chandelier, for sale, alas borrowed from Le Jardin Blanc, hanging from the tin roof. Ugh, we had to buy the roof. Curtains? Jute erosion control fabric. Bedding borrowed from Susanne Hudson's home, & mine.

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Hydrangea welcome, above. After all it's the garden Susanne Hudson & I created for the Penny McHenry Hydrangea Festival on the grounds of Le Jardin Blanc.

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

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You will not believe what this Garden Room looks like. Can't wait to show you the money shot, soon poppets ! Alert, this garden room built solely with the labor of 1 man & 2 women. None labeled 'young' in contemporary culture. Ha, young in what we create. Please, let us create a Garden Room for YOU. It's all we wanna do. Oh dear, this snippet is turning into the lines of a country song......... ta-ta before it gets worse.

Repetition

Puppet Barbuda took awhile to trust repetition, a landscape design tool. Wasted years. Puppet Barbuda was stubborn. Still is.

Puppet Barbuda was too smart to COPY !!!!!

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Alas, years in the wilderness, and Puppet Barbuda DID NOT recreate a new wheel.

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REPETITION, if it works in one landscape it will work in your landscape. Each time repetition repeats....................IT'S NEW & UNIQUE at each repeat.

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Of course poppets you must adjust for plant zone, money, maintenance, & time. Ironically, copying $$$ landscapes rewards you, often, with better results than the original.

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

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Pics from Susanne Hudson's garden last month.

Draperies in the Landscape

Last Sunday, below. Considered draperies for your landscape?
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Took the pic in Susanne Hudson's garden.

DO IT YOURSELF & WOMEN

Often I will look deeply into my client's eyes, and say, "YOU do this, don't let the crew do it."

Picking up acorns, pulling branches together after a storm to use in a wattle, planting a pot or a few perennials & etc.

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One client's husband refuses to let her garden in the frontyard. He thinks it looks, "low class."
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How could society create such a man? Gardening is luxury. For women wanting to garden.

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Manly help is hired, above, for things I cannot do.

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Why is gardening potent to gardeners? Oxytocin & endorphins.

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Yesterday I stained a pair of cedar adirondack chairs bought at the Smith/Hawken going-out-of-business sale last fall. Several hours on a sunny, warm winter's day.

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Ha, got my oxytocin & endorphins along with a pair of newly stained adirondacks.

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This is exactly why I tell my women clients, new to gardening, DO IT YOURSELF. Not an admonishment, A GIFT.

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

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Top pic, taken in January while hammering, with a spot of tea, the tile around my old tub. Theories about what was behind the tile wall & under the tub were discarded once I began hammering. Yes, called a man. Bottom pic, taken in December when my frontyard became a gravel terrace.

SMALL CONTENTMENTS

Wallpaper, 24 years old & still adored.The urge, energy & creativity to bring flowers inside, below, was absent for years. Blooms outside these windows every day, all year, no effort. Of course I must tolerate birds, butterflies or honeybees everyday too. Camellias, blooming outside, below. The brown? Dormant hydrangeas. The green? Azaleas. (Tara's Trinity of the Southern Garden: Azaleas, Camellias & Hydrangeas.)

Old wicker from an estate sale around the corner 3 years ago.

The cloche had been in the garden over 5 years, until hellebores were cut last week.

After 20 years, my house was painted. A decorator, Susanne Hudson, hired to help with colors & interior design.

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I'm basking in the joy, serenity & energy my new spaces are giving me.

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Above, When stamens drop, I'm taken out of time. (Lucky me, I think some people need cocaine to feel like this. As the Sea Witch in Little Mermaid says, "...Poor unfortunate souls........")

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What mentors have shared with me the most? Small contentments.

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

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That fabulous cloche? TJMaxx, $9.99!

PRICING

Once, this house had the grandest view of Stone Mountain. Owning most of the land in the view too. Recently sold, its estate sale is on now. Multi-colored marble, below.

Iron security gating INSIDE the mansion, below.

Grand rooms, multiple bars, this house was built for entertaining. Now, carpets pulled up, tables

loaded with trinkets, the good stuff was leaving in several trucks as I arrived.

In the garden, above, a mailbox post completely grown thru a tree.

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Hunting old garden tools finding few. Bought 2 old swing blades. $3 each, a common price for the average old tool. Was hoping to get a better deal. Will be creating tool bouquets for my interior & exterior.

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

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Pics taken Thursday.

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A clam rake I found in Hogansville, GA last summer set me back $12. But it's hardly average!

CALLANWOLDE & FREDERICK LAW OLMSTEAD

Circa 1920, a dowager survives demolition, 1971, in a neighborhood Olmstead designed. Ceiling of trees outside, ceilings inside, below. Proof, again, of what survives landscape design: TREES & MEADOW. Please, dahlings, you must begin your garden with TREES & MEADOW.

I lectured at Callanwolde, (Dekalb Federation of Garden Clubs was host), this week. All original, below.

I realized I was taking Callanwolde for granted. I've lectured & attended many events here thru the decades.

The courtyard was enclosed, above. A little fetish of mine, enjoying the styling of refreshments garden clubs provide. Charm straight from the heart.

Front terrace, above.
Hand-painted silk panels in the dining room, above.

Hand carved front door, above.

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Garden clubs weave a tapestry of nurturing around their communities. Most members don't realize the potency of their actions.

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Many Garden Club meetings I've sat thru, waiting to speak. Learning who has died, been sick, had a baby, moved out/in, crime issues, new fundraising plans to benefit xyz, holiday plans & more.

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Garden Clubs are the last bastion of civility in our neighborhoods.

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If I were to get a Phd in horticulture, Garden Clubs & Society, would be my topic. That's my soap box & I'm staying on it!

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

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Took the pics this week at Callanwolde.

THRIFTING A GARDEN TABLE

"I can't afford....", begins many sentences pertaining to landscaping. I don't buy it for a moment. Monet's garden had it, Vita's, & all of Charleston, SC, THE POVERTY CYCLE. With it they created world class gardens. But I'm not posting about that epiphany today. Besides, ask yourself, "Do I have less intelligence than them?". Ha, my point exactly.
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Solid wood, below, great for a covered porch. I'm seeing it painted to match your shutters or your front door. Perhaps it's painted white and central to a collection of antique wicker? Table, above, my local thrift store this week, $25.
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Do you know where your local thrift store is?
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara