Covered Screened Porch

She recently screened in her covered porch, below.

 Fluffing the decor was required.  Of course.

 Top pics are to the left of the screen door, and, below

to the right.  Now you know where you are.  The previous posting's focal point.
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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara
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Jeri Farmer uses majority white for her theme, with blues, and blacks & POPS of pink.  Every part of her exterior is HAPPY.  She has a life just like anyone else.  She chose HAPPY.

Bust On Plinth

From this direction, below, it's obvious

 she's on axis

with the screen door, above.
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This is Landscape Design.
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Garden & Be Well,        XO Tara
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Pics taken last weekend in Jeri Farmer's garden.  Her garden has been in Southern Living magazine (a current rag but have heard rumors they're going back to what made them thrive.)  She's Susanne Hudson's partner at Le Jardin Blanc.  Arbor, bust, door not perfect geometry but Faux Geometry.  Whatever.  Get your axis. 

Lipstick On A Cinder Block

Ivy growing inside this Historic Register home, below, is a bit too much romance for even my love of rustic gardens.

 Already see, above, what  piqued my interest?

 Something new in cinder block fashion. 

No intentions of grandeur.  Yet attaining the level of folk art. 
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Garden & Be Well,      XO Tara
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Wrenching to see this beautiful Historic Register home in dishabille.  Shot pics last weekend.  Lipstick On A Cinder Block, sounds like a good book title.

Front Porch: Furniture & Fabric

The old glider, below, newly upholstered. 

 Good design creates these moments, below.

How did the sun know to hit the dark green magnolia foliage making it match the yellows of the cushion, above?
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Color is huge in the garden: plants, stone, furniture, house paint, brick, flowers, door hardware & lighting, weather, time of day.
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Green - Brown - White is a top TRINITY.  Zillion shades of each.  Unique everytime.
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Garden & Be Well,     XO Tara
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Pics taken on Susanne Hudson's front porch.  Was there last weekend creating a garden for the Penny McHenry Hydrangea Festival.    Be wary of patterned fabrics in your garden.  Patterns on Susanne's porch are accents.  Notice, too, the comfy seating area?  Great for conversation & cool gin/tonic's on hot Southern evenings.

Hydrangea 'Queen of Pearls' on the Front Porch

Front porch garden. 

Hydrangea 'Queen of Pearls', still in its 3 gallon pot, slipped into a tall classic iron urn.
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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara
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A Dirr selection from McCorkle Nurseries.  Susanne Hudson's front porch.  Queen of Pearls was a no brainer with her green-brown-white trinity of colors.

Double Islands

Need double islands?  These did their job.  Clusters of people, conversation, laughter, good food. 

 Between kitchen & family room, below.

 Butler's pantry, below, anchoring opposite end of double islands.

This kitchen worked perfectly.  Designed to entertain & fundraise. 
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Work takes me into beautiful homes & gardens, country clubs too.  This event was a portion of pro bono I do each year.  Typically I work pro bono with my county Extension Service helping with school grounds.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Yes, more of the garden I lectured at 2 weekends ago.  Knew you would want to see the double islands.  Wish you had been there.  Plenty of wine & canapes.   

Lush & Sparse: Design Tool

Welcome.

A front door with spare elegance, above.  Near the front door, below, billowing lushness.

 Off to the other side of the front door, below, more lushness. 

 And a path, below, leading

 to a door

 not far from the front door

yet light years away in language.
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Landscape Design is about contrasts.  This home has a gardener with a sure vision.
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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara
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Pics taken 2 weekends ago while lecturing.  No other time than full blazing afternoon sun to get the pictures.  So few gardens use the potency of spare with lush.   

Deeply Covered Porch

A covered porch for the entire family or quiet solitude to fill your spiritual well, below.  Several rooms flow into this porch.

 Looking out, above, looking in, below.

Perhaps a door to a guest suite, below?

A fireplace.  Simply a fireplace, below.  Be wary of a huge monument fireplace.  Too often they are  life sucking spectres.

I told the owner how I adored her porch & she smiled saying the entire house began with this porch.  The architect working outward from here.

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Love a woman with priorities.

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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara

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pics taken 2 weekends ago.  I lectured in her porte cochere.  Wish I hadn't been in such a hurry, needed more pics of this porch. 

Designing Out-Of-Town

Slept away last nite, below, planning a garden.

 Sweet chaos on the mantel, below,

in the bedroom.
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Can't tell you where I was.
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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara
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Pics taken this morning.  In a public career there is always a percentage to remain, private. 

How To Increase The Drama

Subtle drama, ego in check.  Pair of stone columns, iron gate, half-round stone steps & on axis a Japanese maple.  Not a gaudy statue or etc.

 Do you see the opportunity to increase the subtle drama, below?

Remove the pinestraw bed & let the turf flow to the stone wall.
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Small tweek HUGE impact.
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Garden & Be Well,  XO Tara
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Pic taken last weekend at my lecture venue.

Retaining Wall Lust

Have your eyes & brain accepted this, below? 

 Aside from lust pure astonishment.  This retaining wall is hidden away in the family parking court.  That murdering Roman thing with stone building slaves ca. 1 BCE, then the poverty cycle with the bricks.  Later, much later.  But here it all is, in narrative.  Mine.

 Another chapter to the story, below, at the end of the retaining wall.  Tuscan hillside, fieldstone steps are Jane Austen rusticities.

Framing my lust, below,  relative to the house.  Steps & hillside look as if they were there, leftover from some ancient Roman volcano.  Vesuvius, 79 ad?

 She, the owner, waylayed me.  Oh no, ick.   Grabbing my right arm in both her hands saying, "I'm taking you to the Bellsouth room."  I had no time for this, so deeply involved in my lust for the retaining wall, fieldstone steps, & garden.  Outwardly nice, inwardly thinking how to get away.  Get back to her garden. 

 She marched straight here, above, my arm still in her hands.  "Isn't this the greatest spot?  I love looking at it and go to the bench often, have you ever seen steps like this,  &....."

 My attitude went 180.  Couldn't get enough of her.  That bench?  Of course I hadn't seen it from terrace level.  The bench overlooks the 18th hole of a PGA yearly stop.  

Portion of the Bellsouth room, above.  We paid it 'no mind' as Neil Diamond would sing.  I was in girl-crush as we walked the rest of her house & grounds spilling life stories, work, men, spirit. 
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Garden & Be Well,     XO Tara
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Pics taken at my lecture venue last weekend.  Love how conversations flow with women amongst my tribe.  How did EM Forster know us so well?

Wickedly Neo-Unprepossessing

Across Europe the best gardens, with attenuated home of course, invite you thru a neo-unprepopressing entry.

 Arriving, above, I knew it was a carriage house or guest cottage.  How?  They told me I would lecture in the porte-cochere.  Executed to perfection, below right. 

 Whoever owned the estate HAD ME at the curb. 

 In the porte-cochere, above.

The bench is a metaphor for the house and garden.  Detailed, quality, elegant, enduring, comfortable, welcoming.
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Garden & Be Well,      XO Tara
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Did my 4 lectures in 2 days last weekend in the porte-cochere, at Sugarloaf Country Club Garden Tour & Boat Show.  This house & garden donated proceeds to Mothers & Daughters Against Cancer.  Of course I have more pics for you.