Foyer & Front Porch

Foyer, below, with garden light.

Window, above, from the front porch, below.

It's my job, vanishing threshold, getting it right.
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This project  uses my entire team: interior decorator, general contractor, foreman, crew team & equipment, carpenter + team, mason+team, pruner+team & of course the homeowner.  We are 3 centuries of experience.
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With no weak links.  Communication flows.  Every ego wanting to know what is not right or not working, how else to get it right?
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And we all love getting dirty.  Homeowner too.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic taken at jobsite yesterday.

Contrast

Contrast shapes.

Shrubs, trees & flowers.
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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara
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Pic My French Country Home.  What is better than contrasting foxgloves with mophead hydrangeas?  Several Italian cypress are going in a garden today.  The gravel courtyard is round and the nearby crape myrtles arc in silhouette.
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Hosta, fern & hellebore are my shade trinity and contrast to extreme.  Tara's Trinity of the Southern Garden: Azalea, Camellia, Hydrangea.  Contrast AND keeps something in bloom every day of the year in your garden.

Potent Across Genres

Ranking with simplicity, and copying is 

repetition.
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Hodge Podge Lodge is easy, repetition engages the intellect.
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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara
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30 years of clients and they all say, "It must be affordable & easy to maintain."  Repetition is a potent tool in your arsenal of skills.
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Pic Paris Through My Lens.

Use a Plinth

Not the bird.

The plinth is divine.
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When the perfect focal point is not the right height, use a plinth.
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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara
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Pic Content in a Cottage.   Waiting at airports or restaurants Content in a Cottage is my go-to on the cell phone.  Love her pics and links.

The Best Time To Design

Design your garden for deep winter.

It will be pretty all year.
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Garden & Be Well,      XO Tara
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Pic Belgian Pearls.
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Rosemary Verey wrote the best garden design book, The Garden In Winter.

Exterior Color Trinity

Choose a color trinity for your exterior then overdose that theme.

Shades of lead, green, white.
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Lovely.
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Garden & Be Well,  XO Tara
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Pic Greige Design.

Consider Everything

Really?

You think we don't see the grill killing the views?
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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara
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I can hear the lovely terra cotta pots from here, "How dare they put that thing with us."
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Pic Cote de Texas.

The Camera Test

It's not often we get to see inside, below,

and go outside the same room, below, a century earlier.

Did you know this is how to test your garden?  Take pics in black/white, is the year obvious?  It shouldn't be.
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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara
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pics Ottoline Divine.

Rustic Simplicity

Simplicity is a choice.  

Rustic simplicity is a bold choice few Americans take.
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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara
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pics My French Country Home.

Tubs & Tours

Janelle McCulloch has put a garden tour together.  I've already been to most of the gardens but her trip may be worth the hotels alone.

One goal for the year has been, 'more baths'.  So you know the hotel room above is, 'yes, please'.

Have already more than quadrupled last years tally.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Top pic Janelle McCulloch.  Bottom pic, my tub, 'Daisy'.
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Take a peak at Janelle's garden tour, here.
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If you want a garden that is a moat of grace around your home & life, contact me.
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Details about online design services.
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Learn action steps to creating your best garden & home when you hire me to speak to your group.
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Details about lecture titles here.
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I've written several garden books available on Amazon.

The Creative's Office

 Don't you adore looking at the office's of creative women?  Seeing, somehow, a helpful narrative.

I travel miles & eras from the view in my office, creating new ideas from all-that-I-am.  Knowing, there are many layers of  'no'  getting to the layer of fabulous.
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Garden & Be Well,      XO Tara
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Pic Daisy Garnett's office.
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If you want a garden that is a moat of grace around your home & life, contact me.
.
Details about online design services.
.
Learn action steps to creating your best garden & home when you hire me to speak to your group.
.
Details about lecture titles here.
.
I've written several garden books available on Amazon.

A Brick Trinity

  I have never liked the bricks on my house.  Red, that orange red.  Truly red bricks must be fired longer, and cost more.

4 sides brick, and backdrop focal point to every garden view.  When is the last time you looked at your home whilst walking the garden?
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Must find the correct 'white' to brush the bricks.
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Aside from 'aging' the bricks, the whitewash adds 'depth' & 'texture'.
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Sold, I adore trinities (and epiphanies): age, depth, texture.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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pic Better Homes & Gardens.
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If you want a garden that is a moat of grace around your home & life, contact me.
.
Details about online design services.
.
Learn action steps to creating your best garden & home when you hire me to speak to your group.
.
Details about lecture titles here.
.
I've written several garden books available on Amazon.