Mass Market Annuals?

Mass market annuals are one of the least sustainable-eco-green things produced.

Insecticides, fungicides, weed-killers, water, electricity, heating, plastic, gasoline, trucks, soil, labor.
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Compare to a packet of self-seeding annuals or the vignette, above.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic same garden as previous post.  I was a professional grower for years.  We grew from plugs, seeds, cuttings.  Mostly plugs.  Adored doing the hydrangea cuttings late each summer.
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Mass market annuals do have their place & when needed I always put Jenny Hardgrave's company, Simply Flowers on the plan.

Perfect Front Porch

Of course the patina of the rooster is white.  It's her theme.

To the left of their front door, below.

To the right of their front door, below.

Mary Poppins said it best, "Practically perfect in every way."
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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara
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Pic same garden as previous post.

Basement Door is now the Dowager's Porch

It's common to see a basement door with lawn.  And nothing else.

Mother-in-law Suite doesn't aptly describe this rendition.

Common furnishings, off the shelf shutters, a simple arbor, concrete pavers & voila !

Color theme was chosen and leveraged with punches of yellow.

Boxwoods, liriope, hollies prettier AND easier to maintain than ubiquitous lawn.  Notice, above, the garbage can?

Between driveway & Dowager's Porch is a tiny foyer, above.  Gravel, above, pure brilliance.
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Most basement doors are the throw-away-zone.  Worse, the criminal zone.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics taken last weekend at the Penny McHenry Hydrangea Festival.  This garden belongs to Jeri Farmer, co-founder of the PMHF with Susanne Hudson.  Susanne helps Jeri with her Garden Design.  

Where to Start

Don't know where to begin your Garden Design?

Begin with a table outside.  You must eat.
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Then, begin with layers of green: trees, shrubs, groundcovers.  Each suited for your zone-sun-shade-parched-moist areas.
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With the greens add focal points on axis from window views.
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You've just created a garden in vanishing threshold with your home.
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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara
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Pic via Bumble at Home.   Truly, keep it this simple.

Keeping Plain, Plain

There is no 'architecture' at my home.  I've created my own.  The humble cottage.

Instead of lipstick-on-a-pig with the front door.  I've left it as modest as the day it was built.

With only a hint of character.
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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara
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Pics taken last week in my garden.  Before the garden I can remember disliking my home so much I would cry coming back from any vacation.  This is my starter home, here 5 years then off to something 'better'.  That was almost 3 decades ago.  If away for a night I cannot wait to get back and see what has transpired in the garden.

In Relationship

If your secondary subsidiary focal points

are 'animals' make sure they are in

relationship to their surroundings.
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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara
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For many years I maintained a small  townhome back garden for a client.  She had a little rabbit that I would move each week, as if it were nibbling her flowers.  Her garden was always done on Fridays, her area of town has the BEST estate sales.  These cats are at my front door, pics taken this month.

Using Words in the Garden

Be wary of words in a garden.  

Welcome?  Don't have it in a 'word', say it with your front door, paint color, light fixture, door mat, plants, & etc.
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Let 'words' in your garden be subsidiary focal points, amplified in the song of your garden.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic taken near my front door last week.  A Christine Sibley piece.  Of course bought long before she died.  The ivy 'Gold Heart' is not aggressive.

Mosquito Position

Once established,

your garden shouldn't be in need of watering cans.

Pots, yes.  Shrubs/groundcovers/trees/bulbs?  No.
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Perfect reason to only have the Queens Pot.
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Pots so wonderful they remain empty.
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These watering cans have assumed the mosquito position in my potager.
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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara
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Pics taken in my garden last week.  

The Well Placed Chair

Decrepit, sets the timeline at any spot across the last few decades. 

A narrative.  Timelessness.

The Well Placed Chair must suit the theme you've chosen & leverage it.
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You must have at least a pair of chairs for The Well Placed Chair rule !
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Paint them the color of your front door, trim or shutters or an accent color threading thru all your interior art works.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics taken last weekend in my garden.  Oakleaf hydrangeas are incredible this year.  The Well Placed Chair rule was an epiphany after touring Sir Walter Scott's garden.

You Must be Able to Parse

A view, below, from the swing.

The swing, below, from the chair, above.

Virginia sweetspire, a native, below.

Hydrangea 'Penny Mac', below. She's opening pink, after decades of blue, due to drought/aluminum uptake not ph.

You should be able to do this in your mature garden.
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Parse the photo angles.
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Garden & Be Well,  XO Tara
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pics taken in my garden yesterday.

Perhaps the Right Choice is....

What do you need to get rid of?  When Susanne Hudson came to choose colors for my interior she also moved furniture.  Then, literally, she picked up and threw out my sisal rug.  This was at least a decade overdue.

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1-2 times each month I do the same thing with clients.

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Mostly it's pots or their entire patio 'set'.  

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Today, look around your garden, what are you not seeing anymore?  

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If I came to your garden what would I throw out?

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Garden & Be Well,       XO Tara

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Pic, lost provenance.

Water & Creativity

 Excellent reading venue, below.  Have recently been bathing with Wendell Berry, Nicky Haslam & a woman who's been living The Dirty Life.

Tub views are a concern.  Behind the draperies, below, the shower.  

More views soon.  Decisions finally made for the large blank wall, alas, men needed for execution.  

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Found a huge vintage Eastlake mirror, huge, $30, it will reflect a garden view.  Timing, it had just arrived into my favorite junk shop.  

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Through the decades, as I've stepped out of the shower, complete visions of the current Garden Design appear in my mind.  As if by Messenger, the Muse.

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A better drug than the $30 score.

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Do you do this too?  Create a garden & home to leverage your thoughts.  Ideas to spur action steps.

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

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Pics , my bathroom