It's Your Peculiarities That Matter

Brunching a few years ago with Beloved and mom, at her club, glancing around I noticed something peculiar, inside the dining room, with its views overlooking the golf course, lake, and ubiquitous Texas mansions ringing the far side.  I asked Beloved to, "Look around, I'm the only one of my tribe here."  Poor man, he gave me that 'look', what-oddity-now?  He surveyed the room, looked at me, "You ARE the only one of your tribe."    I wasn't polished.  No botox, little make-up, natural hair, flowing linen dress, comfortable shoes, gardening fingernails & hands, real boobs, not fake, zero concern in showing their form or miles of cleavage.  In that room, that moment, I was peculiar.  I reeked of it.  It emanated in a cloud around me.  Peculiar.  Well done.



Pic, above, here.
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Hope you've already discovered Anne Morrow Lindbergh, ca. 1982 wasband's grandmother, Miss Louise, slipped me a volume when we met in the garden.  We were living in her garage apartment.  A 3 car garage overlooking 50 acres of woodland built in the teens of the last century.  A newlywed, somehow she sensed I was sinking.  She died soon after, and to this day, amongst many life gifts, hers remains top of the list.
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A bit more about Miss Louise here.  But this isn't about her, it's about you, and your peculiarities.  And, why historic garden design rules are meant to be followed.  Following the rules, liberates your peculiarities.  Counterintuitive, but a truth.
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It's inherent within historic garden design rules, this gift, of showcasing your peculiarities.
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The more you go inward, the more you outwardly connect.

 
Pic, above, here.

In the simplicity of following historic garden design rules, the depths of your peculiarities are in the spotlight.

 
Pic, above, here.
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Trust it.
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You know where to trust it from.  Your gut not your head.
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Garden & Be Well,   XOT

Beware Mirrors in the Garden

Lovely, and deadly, below.


Pic, above, here.

Beautiful concept, above/below, deadly in execution.  Birds see a fly-through.  Bang, dead.

 
Pic, above, here.

 
Pic, above, here.



Pic, above, here.

My previous home had windows on 2 walls of the kitchen, birds thought it was a fly through, my choice was to keep the windows 'dirty'.  It worked.
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Male hummingbirds are notorious to fight themselves in window reflections on your home, decals will help.
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Garden & Be Well,   XOT
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You realize clearly how I know this?  Been there done that, buried the birds.  Years have passed since it happened, I remember it like yesterday.  

Andy Warhol: Creating Atmosphere

Worthwhile or a fail.  For better, for worse.  Better than nothing.  Ok, accepted, it is what it is.
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Patio furniture is sold by patio furniture companies.  They arrange, style, stage, shoot, sell.  All good, and normal.
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How is it, patio furniture is purchased, and arranged in lockstep to the advertising?  Rooms To Go, exterior version.
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Buy me, we've done the thinking for you.  I buy a lot of things for that reason alone.
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Patio furniture much better than when I began my career in the 80's when every price point subdivision had the requisite white plastic table/chairs, Weber grill, and a mop on the patio.
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Comfort & function & aesthetics are sold in unison now, below, if you don't have the time to figure out your personal version.  Andy Warhol has a nice quote about atmosphere in NYC restaurants, and that's why people are happy to pay the prices, to get away from their lives, for a little while.   ("New York restaurants now have a new thing — they don’t sell their food, they sell their atmosphere. They say, “How dare you say we don’t have good food, when we never said we had good food. We have good atmosphere.” They caught on that what people really care about is changing their atmosphere for a couple of hours. That’s why they can get away with just selling their atmosphere with a minimum of actual food. Pretty soon when food prices go really up, they’ll be selling only atmosphere. If people are really all that hungry, they can bring food with them when they go out to dinner, but otherwise, instead of “going out to dinner” they’ll just be “going out to atmosphere.”)


 Now, buy atmosphere, plop it on your patio, voila, get away from your life, without leaving home.
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Want the look, below, but can't afford it?  Field gather, with a critical eye, chairs, tables, sofas, paint them all the same color.            



Pic, above, here.
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Am field gathering yard furnishings now for our ca. 1900 home.  Its atmosphere a delight to work with, quite controlling.
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Choose the aesthetic you want, keep a sure eye, have fun.  Buy classics, you won't have to buy again.  Once & done.
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Garden & Be Well,   XOT

Shade: Temporary

Temporary, simple, not without charm, functional.
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While awaiting a more perfect shade solution, perhaps this will suffice?


Pic, above, here.
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Moving into our ca. 1900 home 2 years ago this month, we have not chosen how to shade the back deck.  I don't want to lose views of the Milky Way, Beloved wants to follow an existing low roof line.
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Stalemate.
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In the meantime, the sun throbs.  Noon till sunset.
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This bit of whimsy, above, looking better as temps head to many 100f days.
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Stalemate serving no one.
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A pair of large patio umbrellas?
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Garden & Be Well,   XOT

Goldilocks Method for Your Porch

Goldilocks memos.  Just when I think I've grown beyond new ones arriving.  Pow !  Some old ones, below.
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First spring in Georgia, 35 years ago, I remember well cleaning the yellow pollen off the porch.  More than a little effort involved.  The next morning, this Galveston Bay, Texas girl learned yellow pollen is a season, not a day.  Got the memo.
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A few years later, moved into my starter home, an arbor, much anticipated, was finally built over the back patio.  This was the era of 10" hanging baskets lush with flowers, $3.88.  Bought more than a few.  Thrilled, hammering nails into the arbor, and hanging all those colorful baskets.  Watering.  Didn't anticipate that inconvenience.  Got the memo.
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Had the good fortune. from my 20's, to tour a lot of gardens with pretty porches, and give Garden Club lectures at homes with gorgeous porches.  A quick study, learning to copy beautiful ideas aligning with my amount of time/money.  If the porch was gorgeous because their maid & landscape crew were keeping it clean, fertilized, seasonal flowers replanted, watered, trimmed, blown, cushions washed, that would not transfer to my lifestyle.  Got the memo.



Pic, above, here.
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Gorgeous, above, but not for me.  Too much work.  And then the wind blows and the candles fall to the ground shattering, or the neighbor's dog wags his tail into them.  The curtains mildew.  Perfect for another's life, and an example of being fierce with your Goldilocks choices.
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Pretty/classic, below, and maybe for me.  Cushions an issue.  I don't want to 'have to have' cushions.  Much easier without cushions, been there/done that.  And, keeping the wicker 'clean'.  Probably easy enough to keep the patio/furniture blown weekly, hosing it down 1x-2x/year.  Goldilocks interested, below.



Pic, above, here.

Not much work for Goldilocks, below.  Maximum function, little caretaking.  Rockers have cushions, but they don't have-to-have-cushions.  Porch, below, a good ending point, or good starting point, depending upon your Goldilocks story.


Pic, above, here.
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Perhaps that's the best point about using the Goldilocks method, it's a lifehack moving you toward your own fabulous choices, working the best for you.  Not taking other's beautiful patio choices, without consideration for consequences.
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Garden & Be Well,   XOT
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In an earlier version of Goldilocks it's an old woman, not a young girl, and she runs away at the end of the story, only to be caught, and impaled on the steeple of St. Paul's Cathedral for her trespass.
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Ironically, working with a client now, her daughter, not a real gardener, but adores cooking, wanting an herb garden.  Mom, said, "I'll give you an herb garden, and have it planted for you."  Daughter said, "No, that's too much work, I want it in pots on the patio."  Daughter choosing the greater maintenance choice, least sustainable, and productive.  Her mom & I, very much considering daughter's age.  Those headstrong, know so much, 20's.  We lived them too!  What did we decide?  Not wanting to discourage a possible new gardener, daughter is getting her herb garden in large pots.  .  It's how we learned, making the wrong choices, while surely knowing they were the right choices.  Gardening is wildly counterintuitive.
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Truly, it is all my wrong garden choices making me an 'expert', not the college degree in horticulture.  More than wrong choices, bold & sure while making them.  Late last year, took my tribe to Susanne Hudson's garden, none had seen it or met her before.  Before leaving, we sat on the front porch, and then the garden stories began.  Laughter, unbelievable laughter.  We were sharing the 'smart' things we had done in our gardens leading up to finally having the garden's of our dreams.

The Outdoor Dining Table

Storms blew yesterday evening.  Six miles north/east 1" hail pounded.  Clouds circled tightly in a counter-clockwise direction.  Temps fell quickly,  Winds dropped branches from the ca. 1900 pecan trees,  Of course, dinner on the front porch.  
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Sited at its deepest point, the front porch table never gets wet, storms included.  Drama swirls, dinner progresses.  Just the 2 of us, vintage garden boy with 2 baskets, delectably white washed ca. 1941, remained as center piece.  With guests I make more of an effort.  The table holds 8 dear friends in a rectangle of love, 6 with people we don't know as well.  One length of the table seated with a church pew, older than our house.
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The ca. 1900 house remains its original white, much of the porch furniture is white, knowing vintage garden boy was remaining old white ironstone dinner plates were used.  All was good, until remembering recently seeing a table setting, below, by Carolyne Roehm.  Note to self, copy Carolyne.  
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Perfect table quickie, below, a fern.  Kimberley Queen, my choice.  She's not messy, doesn't drop bits/pieces of her fronds easily, and, she takes full baking sun or shade.
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A pair of vintage flower stands are already on the front porch, awaiting their Bunny Mellon green topiaries, and now, a few Kimberely Queens.  Further, Carolyne's centerpiece, below, said to keep a variety of 'urns' for the ferns/topiaries to quickly bring to table, in the antique chest just outside the front door.  Finally, things coming together after living in our home 2 years next month.


Pic, above, here.
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Have several white antique ironstone soup tureens, above.  None more than a few dollars, all with a crack or chip or missing handle of some sort.  With a Kimberely Queen fern, or forcing bulbs, who cares?
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Garden & Be Well,   XO T

Foyer in the Garden

The door is open, below, welcoming you into the foyer.


Pic, above, here.
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Perhaps a foyer is what your garden is missing?
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Garden & Be Well,    XO T
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Love seeing ferns growing in the palm trunk, above.  My parents lone, huge, palm in the front yard has asparagus fern & azaleas growing in/up its trunk.  Of course, her dog almost died biting into a pod off a sago palm in the backyard.  Sago palm, above, bottom right.  Love the wildwood/chaosy/rusticity, above.  It's Oscar de la Renta's garden, you know it drips slowly into a comfortable tropical refinement.  With a bit of searching online, the foyer table, above, must be on cross axis with a door at the house.  Must be !

Front Door: Color & Font

Rarely do I design commercial projects.  When I do commercial, it's most often for the owner of the business who has already hired me for their home, deciding later to strong arm me for their business.  Most of the commercial work has been small businesses, though I've done one the size of a college campus in a small town.  Never have I felt out of my element, curious that I don't seek commercial too.   Oddly, when first asked to do commercial I always say, No.  This type of 'No' is pure catnip to all who've made the request.  A rabbit hole for another day.
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Yesterday Pinterest got into my veins with several pics of commercial front doors.  Pinterest is my go-to quick time filler.  What's the harm of beauty, inspiration and a little sideways learning?
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Banner Pinterest day, yesterday, learned with a commercial storefront, a small business, all you need is Color & Font.  They draw the eye, then through the window/s, a focal point.  If you've read my blog any time at all, you know 'trinities' are magnetic sparkly pixie dust to me.
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Here's the golden nugget I can't translate.  Yet.
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If a small business only needs Color & Font to draw the eye, with delight, what is the equivalent pairing, for a residential front door?  And what is the residential focal point prong, creating a trinity, with the pairing of Color & Font.  At present I think the answer is fluid within a fixed realm.  Dynamic in a static setting.  Further, once deduced, I know there will be several templates within the residential front door design.
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Pure delight, a shiny new discovery to be made.
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About age 6, I remember vividly finding the old 'toy' clock Santa brought me 'years' earlier, in the back of my closet.  Surely, time to throw it away.  Before throwing it away, I HAD to know how the inner mechanism worked, to move the hands.  Went to the kitchen, got a steak knife, went back to my room, hacked into the back of the clock, and saw all its plastic moving parts, and figured out how it worked.  Which was a lot better than merely learning to tell time.  Fate wasn't kind, mom passed by my room, clock & steak knife in hand.  "What have you done?"    Yep, got in trouble.  Can you believe it?  I couldn't either, all I was doing was learning.
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Adore the phase of reaching toward discovery.  As much as discovery.  This time, you're in the mix.  Tell me, How does the pairing of Color & Font translate to you, for your residential front door?


Pic, above, here.

 
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Pic, above, here.
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Garden & Be Well,    XO T
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Yesterday also had another major quirk.  Two appointments attended required standing & saying the Pledge of Allegiance.  Voices & words rang strong & sure in both rooms.

Reactive vs. Proactive Gardening

In the macro, gardening is reactive.  Perhaps the genesis, in USA, is the bit of landscaping installed at new homes.  A lawn, and bushes, with a tree.  Lots of lawn to cut, bushes chosen typically grow 2 stories tall yet are sited at the home's foundation, serious pruning needed yearly once grown, and hopefully the tree wasn't sited where it will crack the drive or walkway.
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Reactive landscapes.
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Studying historic landscape across Europe for decades it only took the 1st tour to understand how deeply reactive USA landscaping is.  Gardens in Europe are proactive in the layers, described above, and often in layers unconsidered, in the macro, in USA.  More than proactive about plant choices, they're proactive almost as a civic duty to the community, their immediate neighbors, and in stewardship to whoever may live in their home next, also themselves.
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Personally, vegetable gardens nailed me as a reactive gardener in my 20's.  Still makes me smile at the thought of those-days.  What was I thinking?
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A few proactive choices for your potager & orchard.  No orchard?  No worries.  A single fruit tree, to my way of thinking, is an orchard.



Pic, above, here.

Best to begin with the expensive proactive choices, above/below.  Once seen, but not afforded, it's a joy discovering how other gardeners take inspiration, often surpassing expensive choices in aesthetics & function.

 
Pic, above, here.


 
Pic, above, here.


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Pic, above, here.


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Pic, above, here.
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Before the accoutrements, above, get your garden soil properly amended.  Earlier this month, went to a client's on a Tuesday, and they could not wait for one of our team to get to their small potager that Saturday.  I had taken pics and made a list for our man.  Priority soil.  Theirs was chunky red clay, and needs tilling with granite grit, or river sand.  Saw that potager yesterday.  Planted with vegetables and herbs, chunky red clay threaded with potting soil churned by her local garden center.  No good.  I'll be proactive before fall vegetables are planted, making sure their soil is amended properly.

Garden & Be Well,   XO T

Garden Design: Double Axis

"The Complete Book of Garden Magic", by Roy Biles is quite dear to my heart.  Discovered before internet cell phones it was a book I would hunt/gather from used book stores wherever I traveled.  Gifting them to the 'right' new owners.  Take the link, above, it can be at your front door in a few days.  Font, line drawings, earnestness, pacing, a man's soul, love it all.
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No other word for it Roy, Magic.
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Double axis, below, in 2 pics.
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Walking along the path, below.



Walking along the same path, below, in the opposite direction.



Same path, 2 different gardens, double axis.  Magic.
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How else to explain walking a path, yet it becomes a new path, merely walking it in the opposite direction?
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Came upon this double axis path, above, last week.  Think it thrilled me?
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How many of you notice these things?  More, how many of you does it excite?
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Garden & Be Well,   XOT
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Pics, above, from Ben Pentreath's blog.
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Double Axis, another of my garden design 'inventions'.  Name it to claim it.  Once I had the garden path epiphany, it had to have a name.  Have not heard/read about this particular Garden Design technique in a class, symposium, book.  Why?
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A lot going on in the Garden Design, above.  My life doesn't lend itself to so much 'tending' nor do I want so much down time as the garden, above.  Deer are also an issue in my garden.  Would definitely keep the gravel and hedging, perennials would be swapped for flowering shrubs.  Done.  Maybe 2-5 easy perennials kept.

When Nature is the Grander Focal Point

No matter the grandness of a Garden Design, below, Nature always outshines.
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More than fall color, the trees bathe the grand statue, owning it.  Makes me smile.
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Recognize the garden, below?  Versailles.
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Went to Versailles summer 1976 with my parents.  For dad just another NASA business trip, a bit more exotic than Huntsville, AL to work with Wernher von Braun, or at a base in California with the Department of Defense.  This trip was with the European Space Agency, ESA, Germany, Holland, Belgium, France for this trip.  ESA was working with NASA on the Space Shuttle payload avionics systems.  NASA, boring, but it was interesting to see the scaled mock-up of the Space Shuttle payload while in France.  With personal tour by its director, and the man dad was there to meet with.  We had been to dinner & a show at the Lido in Paris the night before, where the French Director of ESA sat across from me at the table.  A sexy man, very George C. Scott in Patton, he spoke perfect English, and kept my champagne glass full, every time he saw my parents heads turned.  Yes, liked this man.  I was 16, my first champagne.  George C. Scott wanted me to meet his son, Please come to our home tomorrow for dinner.  A little more to the story, but it was obvious my parents were out of their element.  They made 'excuses' and we exited Paris, without their hospitality.
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Those excuses made at the mock-up of the Space Shuttle payload.  George C. Scott trying his best to get me to his son.  Damn.  My experiences with NASA different from most.  My 1st job was at NASA, won't go into the rabbit hole now.


Pic, above, here.


 
Pic, above, here.

We stayed a couple of nites, while dad was working with ESA in Paris , within walking distance of Versailles, at the Trianon Palace hotel, above/below.



Pic, above, here.

After my daylong visit to Versailles, palace & gardens, I was exhausted.  Something happened to me in the gardens of Versailles.  Walking back to the Trianon, above,  there was a cool patch of woods, at right in photo, with a few wood framed chairs strapped with canvas.  No air-conditioning in the hotel, mom/me decided to sit/rest in the woods for a bit.  I sat, and next thing I remember is waking up about an hour later.  Sixteen years old, I was wildly embarrassed, napping in front of mom.


 
Pic, above, here.

We had a corner room at the Trianon, with views of the courtyard, and woods.  Our room had large windows facing the courtyard, not the tiny window, above.  The bathroom in our room, as Toddy in Victor/Victoria so well described was, A religious experience.
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Pic, above, me, Tara Lee Sayers, shot by my mom, summer 1976, in garden at Versailles.
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During my day, above, in the palace/gardens of  Versailles.  Until that day, had never experienced such moments of Being Alive.  Too young to know what the feelings were didn't stop me from their thrill.  Who knew, creating a garden, such as Versailles, was something one could do?
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There isn't a layer of Garden Design that isn't Alive to me, after several decades.  Never, to this day, once I'm within the 'work' of designing a garden do I not get lost to being on this Earth.
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When Joseph Campbell says those types of moments are Eternity here.  I know it to be true.
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Garden & Be Well,  XO T
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“Eternity isn't some later time. Eternity isn't even a long time. Eternity has nothing to do with time. Eternity is that dimension of here and now that all thinking in temporal terms cuts off.... the experience of eternity right here and now, in all things, whether thought of as good or as evil, is the function of life.”

― Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth

Prune an Arch Into It

Prune an arch into it, below.
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Pruned arches were a take away from all my historic garden design study tours across Europe for decades.  Especially nice is using the 'pruned arch', not only 'saving' an existing 'bad' landscape, but saving the plant too.
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Often, mid-century, & newer, subdivision homes are completed with a front foundation planting of green meatballs, and a larger 'something' at left/right corners.  Those corner 'somethings' lend themselves for pruning an arch into.  Not always, but often enough.
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Whether designing on site, or long distance, the moment pruning an arch is mentioned, the light bulb moment with my client is pure joy to experience.  What had been a problem, gains an easy, pretty, functional solution, and likely saving the plant/s from execution.  


Pic,above, here.
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More than the pruned arch, above, this lone garden pic is a Garden Design class.
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Ceiling, walls, floor, stone set into gravel, furniture in the garden, contrasting foliage color/texture, pot cluster subsidiary focal point at the focal point of the door, pruning, flow, mystery. scale, timelessness, invitation, simplicity,
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Am designing a family cemetery plot now.  At its entry a pair of Japanese maples 'Bloodgood', pruned into an arch.    'Pruning', a layer of the design.
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Garden & Be Well,    XO T
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First putting pencil to paper with the cemetery plot, tougher than expected.  I know the family, designed their backyard.  Surviving spouse wants the plot to look like their backyard.  Much.  Tougher.