A Pair of Landscapes: Exactly Alike Yet Opposites

Within constraints of sacred vs. profane the world takes away so much of our life, why give it more?  Merely targeting industrialized residential landscapes ca. 1945 to present, in USA. 
.
This pair of landscapes, below, are opposites in style, yet both have style centuries older than industrialized landscapes.  What style is that?  Agrarian/pastoral.  More, both landscapes focus on the house and its inhabitants/guests, as proscenium and star.  A sweet pairing, life is the focus, not life maintaining the landscape. 
.   

Pic, above, here.
.
Top pic appears modern, bottom pic appears historic.  More, their style, appropriated to other sites, becomes new again, unique.
.
Ambition and aspiration are both of great value.  Yet how they are mixed, and their changing percentages given across our life, even a day, show in our material lives.  Ambition and aspiration should be in the landscape, with aspiration weighted heaviest, they've made the best landscapes for centuries across continents and cultures. 
.
Industrialized landscapes stop at mere ambition.  Agrarian/pastoral landscapes, even with a bit of industrialization tossed in, have ambition, but their aspirations are greater. 
.
What does this mean?  'Ambition is what we want to achieve and aspiration is who we want to become.' 
.   
 
Pic, above, here.

 
Pic, above, here.
.
Seeing agrarian/pastoral landscapes as a child, there were a few, compared to thousands of industrialized, I saw generosity of spirit, welcoming arms, a rich conversation, fun, intelligence, secrets, home, love.


Pic, above, here.
.
Hedges, trees, & a meadow/gravel terrace is the trinity for agrarian/pastoral, and the new modern industrialized landscape.  Be like Iris, know how you can get away with anything.       

 
Pic, above, here.
.
Grief, when it comes, I take into the garden.  At least I know what the garden will do.  A new grief?  Never know what it will do.
.
 
Pic, above, here.
.
Your landscape should tell me who you are from the curb.  If I see a photo of your patio, it must be so fabulous I have to go inside your home, and wander the garden.

 
Pic, above, here.
.
Gardens have always been places of light and love, to me, from earliest childhood, and respite from the darkness & hate that comes in measure to all.

 
Pic, above, here.
.
Perhaps it was not being able to have children, I never had to give her, above, up.  Ever.  No worries if you've never gardened this passionately, there is no age limit to start. 
.
Get dirty?  When I garden there are bruises, blood, time ceases yet expands, hunger doesn't exist, epiphanies arrive, grief has a place to harbor for awhile, forgiveness is given but feels like a bestowal.....
.
Garden & Be Well,   XOT

Overdose your Theme: Wicker Weakness

Overflow wicker, above, yet they're used at least 1/month.

Vintage wicker, above/below, glass topper for the sagging table top, below.  Adore the chipping paint.

Small wicker baskets, below, perfect for quick trips with keys, sunglasses, cell phone.

White willow English wicker basket, above, for Laskett.  Yes, he is moody.  What can I do, we're in love.

Tucked in the bedroom, above.  Mahogany Sheraton buffet arrived this color, & marked down 2x at the antique shop.
.

Tool Bouquet over my fireplace.....
.
Overdose Your Theme is merely an excuse for,  Wicker Weakness.
.
At Lowe's this week the cashier asked, "Can I feel your basket?".  Girlfriend has Wicker Weakness too.  Along with great taste, it was a handmade Amish basket that day.
.
Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
.
Most of the wicker came from Thift Stores or yard sales.
.

If you want a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, and causes you to tap the brake pedal, as you look in the rear view mirror heading out, become my client, local or on-line.

.

Award winning speaker, hire me to speak to your group, local or out-of-state.

                                                                                 .

Garden books by Tara Dillard, Amazon

Phoebe Howard: Bedroom Views

Birdhouse view, below.

Thru the years about 30% of my clients have had views into the tree tops.
.
Good fortune, indeed.  Hardly possible to 'fake' a tree top view from level ground & zero trees.
.
If the chair, above, is the only seating in the room I would have Howard back to fix its direction !
.
Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara
.
Pic Phoebe Howard.
.

If you want a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, and causes you to tap the brake pedal, as you look in the rear view mirror heading out, become my client, local or on-line.

.

Award winning speaker, hire me to speak to your group, local or out-of-state.

                                                                                 .
                                                          Garden books by Tara Dillard, Amazon.

Double Axis: Consider Both Directions

Outside, at the tiered fountain looking into the window, I wonder if the wreath is double sided.

Double Axis, if a view is pretty in 1 direction it must be pretty in the opposite direction.

.

Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara

,

Pic Habitually Chic.

.

If you want a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, and causes you to tap the brake pedal, as you look in the rear view mirror heading out, become my client, local or on-line.

.
Award winning speaker, hire me to speak to your group, local or out-of-state.
.
Garden books by Tara Dillard, Amazon.

Work in the Barn

Left open with intention.

Come inside.

Unfinished & mostly empty, the old barn has pulled us inside for over 2 years.  Structural & mice & wind & electric & rain & heating & flooring issues are done.
.
The completed list is a definition for 'beloved'.
.
Big plans.  Of course you will be kept in the loop.  And I'm sure, one day, invited.
.
Garden & Be Well,      XO Tara
.
Pics taken at jobsite this week.  Incomplete, the power of intention is already producing results from this space of grace.  Often I design the Poverty Cycle into plans.  This barn is literally historically from America's poverty cycle.  Top pic is instructive.  Do I include that much integrity of personal character from the hand-heart-mind that built this barn?  A rich thought, humbled by a barn.          

On the Porch with Drapes

Nothing was here, below, a few days ago.  

The porch, below, when we began.

The corner 'before', above, and 'after', below.

Lamp, above, seen from the garden, below.

Porch 'before', below, viewed from the garden.

 Of course you want to look in the window, above.

 Garden & Be Well,     XO Tara
.
Pics of Porch Garden I created with Susanne Hudson at the Penny McHenry Hydrangea Festival earlier this month.

What To Do With A Bad View

Of course the dining room, below, has an awkward view. 

Swag of curtain, below, in the downstairs window is the dining room.

Same swag of curtain, below, in the dining room.

Do you see the triple air-conditioners?  Do you see the industrial generator?  Do you see anything fussy to maintain?
.
No.
.
Garden & Be Well,  XO Tara
.
Pics taken at jobsite last week.  Dining room opens into central hall of previous 3 posts.

Wire Chairs & Color Echoes

Those chairs !

Echoing in titillation the color of the square planter, blue stone terrace & into the distance with the door.

.

Even the gardener is color echoed with the landscape.

.

Do not underestimate that last bit.  Monet had his gardeners wear blue shirts.

.

Of course the white blossoms & silver foliage echo pop.

.

Garden & Be Well,          XO Tara

.

Found the pic last weekend via Dirt Simple.  Layers of green, canopy & understory trees, shrub walls, flooring & etc of perfection.  This garden has been loved into being with a sure hand.

This Landscape Never Has Chores

Under the Chinese snowball Saturday.

I don't have to do any garden chores.  Ever.  Have you noticed?
.
Sure, the petals will have to be blown when they brown.  How can that be a chore?
.
It's an act of grace.  And thanks.
.
Garden & Be Well,     XO Tara
.
When you have good garden accidents you know you've done it right. 

Well Placed Chair

The potager is hidden from view, above, but the chair hints at the mystery destination.
.
Have sat here many times thru the years and in all seasons.  Having a bowl of cereal or lunch or perhaps talking on the phone.
.
And to think, I placed the chair there for aesthetics.  Instead, it's lifestyle.
.
Discovered the Well Placed Chair phenomena while studying gardens across Europe.
.
Copy, it's a fabulous rule of Landscape Design.
.
Garden & Be Well,     XO Tara
.
Pic taken in my sweet garden last week.  Especially proud of this garden room because its backdrop is the rest of my subdivision.  And we don't want to see REALITY do we?

Small Lives Large With Axis + Focal Point

On axis with the doors, below, this tiny space lives large.  It has the potential for 3 more potent axis.

Purring at the formal lines + rusticity of plantings.
.
At first I looked too quickly, thinking it was metal chairs.  No.  It's a bike & chair. 
.
Don't you want to go inside? 
.
That is Vanishing Threshold!
.
Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara
.
Don't forget the Landscape Design rule: COPY
.
Pics via Modern Country, taken by Shootfactory

American Windsor Chair

This isn't a chair for the dinner table, below.

 It sits for conversation, reading, napping, cradling a kitten, a scotch.

 Originally, below, at our family house on Lake Rabun.

It was,below, in my music room,

Now, below, it's in the kitchen, aka Garden Room, where I look across my rooms, enfilade, into the garden.

New floors, above, arrived at Christmas.  French doors will go in soon, leading to the Conservatory.
.
Notice, you did not see the 25 year old linoleum, disgusting, that went out the door.
.
Would NEVER have put the American Windsor on linoleum.  Seemed disrespectful.
.
Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
.
Needing patience.  Have waited a quarter century for these changes and somehow the homestretch is the toughest.

Landscape Design: What Era Will You Choose?

Whitlow House ca. 1830.  Keeping the views,

 and the house rustic are intentional.  Wanting places of repose,

outside of time.

.

Garden & Be Well,          XO Tara

.

Pics taken at a project last week.  Landscape Design is about designing elements of TIME & PLACE.  Received a delightful comment about my home/garden this month, "You've really created your own little world, haven't you?"

.

Beer In The Garden

I adore working men in the garden.At the end of the day this wonderful man, above, earned his beer.

.

Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

.

Pic from Penny McHenry Hydrangea Festival in Douglasville, GA. It's tomorrow & Sunday. You do realize there is NO pun intended with the top sentence?

Bedrooms On The Lake

Off the master bedroom, below.

And,
off a guest room.

.

Yes, I've been lucky and stayed here.

.

Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

.

Pics from same garden as previous posts.

Seating On A Deck

Pair of matched chairs. Works every time. If it's wood in her garden it's painted her special green.Directly below this deck, pathway to her rescue run. She rescues & fosters dogs.
From this portion of her deck, below,
you can see her wooded frontyard or the backyard & lake.

.

Seating areas are throughout: garden, porch, deck, dock, woodland.

.

Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

.

Same garden as previous post.

Chinoiserie & Design

Wisteria 'Amethyst Falls' at my front door today. A tiny area, yet interesting, and welcoming. (Without moving my feet these pics are a scan from left to right.) Peeking beyond the Wisteria, below, urn/plinth on axis with my bay window.
Filtered thru Wisteria foliage, above, the gravel terrace with large flagstones leading to the frontdoor.
The little Pot Cluster, above, and adirondack chair.
Classic Landscape Design, above, and pollinator habitat. (High & low density, canopy/understory, walls, floor, contrasting foliage textures/colors.)
Landscape Design's Pulitzer Prize, above. Beauty, privacy, low maintenance, organic, all season interest, pollinator habitat, fragrance, fantasy within reality, a place to sit, a spot viewed on axis from within the house.

.

Take the camera view a bit to the right you'll see neighbor's homes, their cars, their landscaping, the street. Honestly, who wants to live that way? Seeing neighbor's stuff? It's not my realm. The pics above ARE my realm.

.

Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

.

Puppet Barbuda apologizes for bluntness in her captions today. Puppet Barbuda is zealous in details of landscape design/pollinator habitat. Puppet Barbuda disdains the ridiculosity of pretty garden pictures focusing on 'a plant', 'how to dig a hole', 'plant them 2.5432" apart'. Information providing you nothing about putting a beautiful garden together. When Puppet Barbuda reads interior design books/blogs/magazines they don't tell her how to produce the fabric on the couch, how to dye it, cut it, sew it, staple it & etc.....they appreciate she has a BRAIN.