Elements of Simplicity in Garden Design

Plain?  No, totally designed.

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 Embellishment?  Why?  What is that about?  Lack of confidence, knowledge of the wrong sort, arrogance against Providence?

 Tara Turf.  Gravel from the local river.

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Century old bricks made in Milledgeville, GA, an hour's drive.

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I designed the buttress copying an antebellum cotton warehouse seen near Atlanta.

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The walled garden was the client's idea.  

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It was my good fortune to design & site it.

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Oddly, with total confidence.

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Whence does that come?  Truly, a subdivision child ca. 1960, living in a subdivision still.

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Degreed in USA horticulture, not taught how to  design a good garden to save anyone's soul.  Much less my own.

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Off I went, $20 bills stuffed singly & slowly, somehow paying for 2+ decades of studying the best historic gardens across Europe.

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With this project, 300 acres, I learned what the real focus of those decades had been. 

Garden design working with land & home.

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More, mind/body/spirit.

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Land & home, team members with the garden design.  Literally, the best performers with the most talent.

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That college degree in horticulture?  Training to work against the land, ignore every gift of Providence.

Doubt any of my college professors could give a concise sentence about the style of Henry Repton.  In, "Observations on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening, Repton wrote:

“The perfection of landscape gardening consists in the four following requisites. First, it must display the natural beauties and hide the defects of every situation. Secondly, it should give the appearance of extent and freedom by carefully disguising or hiding the boundary. Thirdly, it must studiously conceal every interference of art. However expensive by which the natural scenery is improved; making the whole appear the production of nature only; and fourthly, all objects of mere convenience or comfort, if incapable of being made ornamental, or of becoming proper parts of the general scenery, must be removed or concealed”.

The garden views, above/below, totally designed.  Providence reigns, human arrogance replaced with a pride in unveiling Nature's gifts.

Henry would know this garden.
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Beyond the Tara Turf, above, is my best design work.  Views across a Natural pasture into woodland.  .
Curiously, this type of gardening is perfect for the starter home on a postage stamp with little budget.  Instead, that type of home is built with an expensive landscape.  Lawn with mowing/chemicals/fertilizers, bushes needing regular pruning & mulching, nothing to shade the house reducing hvac, nor fruit trees to feed the household, certainly not any focal points on axis with the house to feed the spirit.
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Truth, with your full intellect, if you demand more from your landscape you will have it.
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By the time anyone hires me, that choice has been made.  Incredible to work for people who have engaged with their own lives.  Same, when I lecture.  Every chair filled with people who have engaged with their life.  They aren't there for me, nor am I, we are there for the same reason as Henry.
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Garden & Be Well,  XO Tara
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Pics taken at a jobsite earlier this year.
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The capitalized words? Used in the vintage sense.  Underlined sentence at the top?  Describing myself on the front end.  This has not been a boring ride !
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For a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, become my client, local/on-line.

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Award winning speaker, hire me for your group, local/out-of-state.

                                                                                 .

Books by Tara Dillard, Amazon

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Tara Dillard & Associates Design: farm to city pied-a-terre.

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Construction by Award Winning

Shaefer Heard Construction, licensed home-builder, renovation - new construction.  Heard's Landscaping a unit of SHC.  3 decades of service.

New Science: Farms Help Prevent Allergies from Birth

Science Daily amalgamates headlines.  

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Recently....children raised on dairy farms have fewer allergies, even in the womb, than other children. 

 "A study by researchers at Sahlgrenska Academy, University of Gothenburg, monitored children until the age of three to examine maturation of the immune system in relation to allergic disease. All of the children lived in rural areas of the Västra Götaland Region, half of them on farms that produced milk."

Lower risk of allergy

The study found that children on dairy farms ran a much lower risk of developing allergies than the other children.

"Our study also demonstrated for the first time that delayed maturation of the immune system, specifically B-cells, is a risk factor for development of allergies," says Anna-Carin Lundell, one of the researchers.

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And.

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Children raised on farms with livestock are healthier, "It is extremely exciting that we can now see that not only allergic diseases, but also more classic inflammatory diseases appear to depend on the environment we are exposed to early in our lives," relates Vivi Schlünssen, Associate Professor in Public Health at Aarhus University.

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NYT article, so long ago I cut/pasted it into a file with real tape/paper, reported a study indicating plants emit wavelengths we absorb thru our skin and can increase white blood cell counts in those with cancer.  No ridiculous Nature blah-blah- is so pretty it makes me happy and healthy stuff.  Science, proving plants affect our health.

LISTEN
	Solitude by Alexander Pope Happy the man, whose wish and care A few paternal acres bound, Content to breathe his native air               In his own ground. Whose herds with milk, whose fields with bread, Whose flocks supply him with attire; Whose trees in summer yield him shade,               In winter, fire. Blest, who can unconcernedly find Hours, days, and years slide soft away In health of body, peace of mind;               Quiet by day. Sound sleep by night; study and ease Together mixed, sweet recreation, And innocence, which most does please               With meditation. Thus let me live, unseen, unknown; Thus unlamented let me die, Steal from the world, and not a stone               Tell where I lie. "Solitude" by Alexander Pope. Public Domain. (buy now) The Poetry Foundation National broadcasts of The Writer's Almanac are supported by The Poetry Foundation The Writer's Almanac is produced by Prairie Home Productions and presented by American Public Media.

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Native American Indian quote from a Joseph Campbell interview with Bill Moyers said the White man, once he strings his telephone lines across the lands will cease to live and merely survive.

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Headlines, with true science, backing up my ancestor, I have two great-great grandmothers who were 100% Cherokee.

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

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Pics taken in Jamaica.  

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For a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, become my client, local/on-line.

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Award winning speaker, hire me for your group, local/out-of-state.

                                                                                 .

Books by Tara Dillard, Amazon

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Tara Dillard & Associates Design: farm to city pied-a-terre.

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Construction by Award Winning

Shaefer Heard Construction, licensed home-builder, renovation - new construction.  Heard's Landscaping a unit of SHC.  3 decades of service.

Friendship is to Bare Witness

No time for cooking she finessed a curried chicken salad over arugula, added fresh fruit and a poppy seed vinaigrette.

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Beautifully served & delicious it's in her DNA along with interiors & gardens.

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She's the friend you don't speak with for months then conversation picks up mid-sentence.

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The friend warping time, hours are minutes.

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The friend knowing every terrible thing about you & loves you more.

In her new home for a year, I hadn't seen it yet.

Her grown child has a life-threatening illness.  Her choices, hard.  She never chooses the easy road.

For a decade I have watched, listened.  Of course we've done a lot of laughing.  How else to get thru?

 First is was her house she surrendered, then a series of other abodes.  Each smaller.  Every time more antiques sold.



Never has she lived without beauty, love, or laughter.  Nor tightly bound to them, tears, frustration, fear.

This is her smallest home yet.  A masters class in which pieces of furniture, art, books to keep.  What is needed, useful, beautiful.

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We have no less fun, or love, than in that huge 1st home.

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Instead, more.

This time she's landed with a roof top garden.  

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Not a garden of her own.

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She's not had a garden of her own for a long time.

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She's never complained

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Hard choices, hard truths, rich living.

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We grieve together, some.  Mostly, we are enriched & grow love in our friendship.  

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As friend, it has been my job to bare witness.

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In return, she's watched my hard choices, ugly truths.

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We speak plain to each other.  True grit.

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Mostly, we laugh.  And love one another.  No matter what.

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

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Pics at my friend's home.  Sun was hot on my legs/toes and felt like the best hot steam sauna ever.

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For a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, become my client, local/on-line.

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Award winning speaker, hire me for your group, local/out-of-state.

                                                                                 .

Books by Tara Dillard, Amazon

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Tara Dillard & Associates Design: farm to city pied-a-terre.

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Construction by Award Winning

Shaefer Heard Construction, licensed home-builder, renovation - new construction.  Heard's Landscaping a unit of SHC.  3 decades of service.

Three Best Mistakes to Make in Your Landscape

Choose to make garden mistakes on the side of too simple, too little, too plain.

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Better to want more later than dig-up, move plantings, replace a now-thought-cheap/tacky-bench, regret the shape-style-color-of.....

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Long term, cute in a garden grates.  Whimsy is better.

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Be wary of 'words' in a garden.  They hold thoughts hostage that should flow randomly, Cole Porter's, Don't Fence Me In.

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Of course there are exceptions to all of the above.  Indeed.

This morning, above/below, Tomato & Hydrangea.  Perfect name for a spiked tea & scones cafe.

Feeding cats & chickens, assessing what the night wrought & will it rain today.

Tomato still in its peat pot with cellophane wrap & tags.  Awaiting a much larger pot & bamboo cane trellis.  Perhaps this weekend?  Hydrangea blossoms hanging lower, petal margins crispier, will I cut to dry or leave to enjoy from the windows?

Calm.  Boring is good.  Idle chit-chat in the head.

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Something new to learn about Social Media.  Facebook cannot control pictures during war.  Images seen cannot be unseen, merely absorbed into a safe, prayerful, place.

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Again, my Garden working for me.

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Have you watched the award winning foreign film, Burnt by the Sun ?    "The film depicts the story of a senior Red Army officer and his family during the Great Purge of the late 1930s in the Stalinist Soviet Union. Like a tragedy bySophocles, Burnt by the Sun takes place over the course of one day."  Wikipedia

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Oddly, it's beautiful. 

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Glad it taught my heart to assimilate what I saw yesterday within mundane ubiquity of beauty in a tomato & hydrangea.  The gift of choices, health to act upon them, perhaps a dinner party in late summer honoring the last of the tomatoes.  With dried hydrangeas in a vase.

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This is freedom.

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Garden & Be Well,  XO Tara

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Pics taken in my garden this morning.

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 For a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, become my client, local/on-line.

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Award winning speaker, hire me for your group, local/out-of-state.

                                                                                 .

Books by Tara Dillard, Amazon

.

Tara Dillard & Associates Design: farm to city pied-a-terre.

.

Construction by Award Winning

Shaefer Heard Construction, licensed home-builder, renovation - new construction.  Heard's Landscaping a unit of SHC.  3 decades of service.

Most Wanted in the Garden

This is what I want, below, from my garden.  Every day, to look out from the windows of my home and think, "Oh WOW."

More, I want to walk in my garden, any day of the year, and take a roll of gorgeous 36.

View from the street, above, thru my tiny orchard to little cottage.

Oakleaf hydrangeas, above, drying in the garage next to my car.

Attention to detail, inside/outside.

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Everyday clients change the scope of their project, it may rain for 30 minutes delaying a dirt delivery 2 days, a supplier does not have what they promised,  mis-communication with a subcontractor,  an employee forgets a tool or gas/oil mix for equipment thus stopping the work totally.

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All expected, & normal, business.  

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And why I crave the beauty/solace of my garden & home.

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A realm of grace feeding the spirit.

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  What do you want from your garden?

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

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Pics from my home/garden this year.

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 For a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, become my client, local/on-line.

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Award winning speaker, hire me for your group, local/out-of-state.

                                                                                 .

Books by Tara Dillard, Amazon

.

Tara Dillard & Associates Design: farm to city pied-a-terre.

.

Construction by Award Winning

Shaefer Heard Construction, licensed home-builder, renovation - new construction.  Heard's Landscaping a unit of SHC.  3 decades of service.

Vanishing Threshold: Get Yours

With Garden Design do you know the most important Demarcation Points?

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With the Demarcation Points, above, I'm rolling in wet sand as the waves roll up.

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(A child of Cape Canaveral & Galveston you understand my happy metaphor.)

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The Romans, bce, never built a home without a vanishing threshold.

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Amazing, a horticulture degree obtained, decades of seminars attended, libraries of books read, and not 1 source referenced vanishing threshold.

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Then my epiphany, in Italy of course.

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House & garden are 'one'.

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You see it here, above.

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From the garden, above, you see vanishing threshold looking into the window.

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Nicky Haslam always knew about vanishing threshold.  Study his book, Folly de Grandeur.  

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Next?

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Create yours.  A lifetime of joy, and grace, melding the strength of your intellect against this desirable challenge awaits.

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Biggest irony of vanishing threshold?  Increases property value, reduces HVAC, and maximizes pollinator habit up to 80%.  Needs no irrigation, fertilizers or chemicals.  While cutting in half the amount of maintenance. 

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Beginning to understand the lack of education about vanishing threshold?

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As garden centers & mow-blow-go companies are structured, now, not much money to be made.

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Those companies are dependent upon your turf needing chemicals/fertilizers/irrigation/maintenance.

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And etc. etc. etc. as Yul Brynner said so well.

Garden & Be Well,  XO Tara

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pic via Jennings & Gates.

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Visit my Vanishing Threshold board on Pinterest.

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 For a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, become my client, local/on-line.

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Award winning speaker, hire me for your group, local/out-of-state.

                                                                                 .

Books by Tara Dillard, Amazon

.

Tara Dillard & Associates Design: farm to city pied-a-terre.

.

Construction by Award Winning

Shaefer Heard Construction, licensed home-builder, renovation - new construction.  Heard's Landscaping a unit of SHC.  3 decades of service.:

Does Your Landscape Describe You?

Beside the front porch, below, is the mudroom entrance.

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 I feel the welcome & delight in each detail.

The wreath is in honor of the Penny McHenry Hydrangea Festival & this home/garden are on the tour.
Been in Southern Living magazine too.

As if the bench still-life were not enough, the little wall, below, along the path is 'done' too.

Precociously my Tara Dillard garden design rule, "I must know who you are from the garden before ever entering your home.", is wowza answered here.

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Today, seriously look around your garden & home's exterior.  Do they tell me who you are?

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

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For a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, become my client, local/on-line.

.

Award winning speaker, hire me for your group, local/out-of-state.

                                                                                 .

Books by Tara Dillard, Amazon

.

Tara Dillard & Associates Design: farm to city pied-a-terre.

.

Construction by Award Winning:

Shaefer Heard Construction, licensed home-builder, renovation - new construction.  Heard's Landscaping a unit of SHC.  3 decades of service.

Front Porch: Color, Shutters, Narrative

In a subdivision, below, without the trees you would see neighbor's houses from the front porch.

Whenever you see the gardener, dressed up/down, she's arrayed in black/white.  With a bit of bling too, but you knew that from her front porch.

The shutters are bi-fold doors from a closet.  Ick to fab !

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Color, seating, flow, layers, texture, invitation, relaxation, all ages, conversation, dining, narrative.

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Which shouts loudest?

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I adore the narrative, above.

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

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For a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, become my client, local/on-line.

.

Award winning speaker, hire me for your group, local/out-of-state.

                                                                                 .

Books by Tara Dillard, Amazon

.

Tara Dillard & Associates Design: farm to city pied-a-terre.

.

Construction by Award Winning:

Shaefer Heard Construction, licensed home-builder, renovation - new construction.  Heard's Landscaping a unit of SHC.  3 decades of service.

Front Porch: Formal + Informal

Design Rule: Contrast.

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A touch of the Queen + Ellie Mae Clampett.

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Urn on Plinth + Galvanized Buckets hanging with ropes.

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Your garden must tell me who you are before stepping inside your home.

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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara

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Pic taken this month.  Jeri Farmer's lovely home/garden was on the Penny McHenry Hydrangea Festival Garden Tour.  Jeri & Susanne refreshed the garden this year and time/money were both running short yet pots were still needed for the ferns.  Of course Susanne said, "Put them in galvanized buckets."

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For a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, become my client, local/on-line.

.

Award winning speaker, hire me for your group, local/out-of-state.

                                                                                 .

Books by Tara Dillard, Amazon

.

Tara Dillard & Associates Design: farm to city pied-a-terre.

.

Construction by Award Winning:

Shaefer Heard Construction, licensed home-builder, renovation - new construction.  Heard's Landscaping a unit of SHC.  3 decades of service.

Design Deeply: Connecting Dots

Some of my best work, below.  

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See the connected dots in the garden, below?

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Those who understand hire me to design their acreage or townhome.

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Or, hire me to lecture across the USA.

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Some offer book contracts or ask for magazine content.

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 The best?  People who share appreciation of their epiphanies with my work, tell their stories, enriching my knowledge.

View, above, from client's Music Room.

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What type of Garden Design is this?

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Why do Garden Centers abhor this type of garden?

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What are the tough choices made?

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What type of ecosystem are you looking at?

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What is the relationship, and why, between the ground layer & tree layer?

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How does this ecosystem keep other layers on this property thriving?

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How many other layers would that be?

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Why would a PhD professor at UGA Ag school want his students to intern here?

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Why did Historic Williamsburg, after my lecture there last year, pick up many of the layers shown, above, for their topics in this year's symposium?

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What is the relationship between government laws & this type of garden?

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Took me decades to connect the dots, including myriad trips across the globe studying historic landscapes.

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What else is in this garden?

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Answers in previous posts.

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Did you realize my stories connect these dots?

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The teacher appears when the student is ready.

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Ironically, with this client,  land-plants-livestock-wildlife-weather-buildings-roads taught us.

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We listened.

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And we share.

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Don't live on acreage?  No worries, many layers are HOA approved & adaptable.

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What does this type of Gardening have to do with property value & HVAC bills?

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Yes, have taught at the local college for years.  Atlanta Botanical Garden too!

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I don't believe in spoon feeding knowledge, passionately sharing yes.

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Tasha Tudor believed in, "Take joy."  Here, it's "Take Knowledge."

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Both are there, always.  All you have to do is 'take'.

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Life conspired, teaching me, take both, everyday.

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

 For a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, become my client, local/on-line.

.

Award winning speaker, hire me for your group, local/out-of-state.

                                                                                 .

Books by Tara Dillard, Amazon

.

Tara Dillard & Associates Design: farm to city pied-a-terre.

.

Construction by Award Winning:

Shaefer Heard Construction, licensed home-builder, renovation - new construction.  Heard's Landscaping a unit of SHC.  3 decades of service.