Front Porch: Chain Rail

Lunch, below, this week.  Every home seen from the chair I sat in was a century old and white clapboard.  

Front porch columns each have iron rings, below, for chains lost to history, I've already designed their replacement.

With their 'swag' to mach the arch, below.

Will copy a pair of the columns, deeper into the garden, as entry to a garden room with enfilade from the front sidewalk.
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Repetition.
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Notice the power lines, bottom pics?  The bane of my existence for a mature camellia I wish to keep and limb-up into a tree.  They will contact the power company to see what can be done.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics same garden as yesterday's post.

Central Hall: Front & Back Foyers

Built in 1900, they're the 3rd owners of this home.

Beautiful & tough hardware, below, on the door is original.

Aside from the scope of the land, an acre, a few large camellias & trees the grounds/garden do not exist.  A  30 acre Pecan Orchard in a state of Chekhov-meadow-reverie flows from the back garden .  Did I mention the entire length of the driveway abuts the Funeral Home parking lot?
Central hall, below.

She adores, and showed me a pic of  P. Allen Smith's front garden at his cottage.  Indeed, perfect, but I'll add heavy doses of Loutrell Briggs at Mrs. Whaley's Charleston, SC garden too.

We walked the grounds, had lunch on the front porch, walked the grounds again.  Her husband was able to come for the 2nd round of walking the grounds, and lunch too.  He loved my idea of Bahama shutters at the pavilion, and asked if they could be 3/4 vs. full length.  Fabulous.  Yes.  Love teamwork, makes me better.  A lawyer, he likes doing carpentry.  As I left he was already heading to Craigslist to begin the shutter search.
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Back door foyer, above.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics taken yesterday on the job.  I helped with their Macon, GA garden a couple of years ago, it's in Southern Living this year.  Who knew a move to Jackson, GA was in their future?  You will be seeing more of this home.  She did every ounce of the interior decorating from colors to furniture to art to rugs to knocking out walls.....

Let Simplicity Serve Your Needs

There isn't a lot here yet the magic is intense.

Narrative.  Simplicity.  Choices.
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"What plant should I put here?", I'm asked often.  It's not the right question, in return I ask, "How do you want to live?"
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic The Vintaquarian.  Remember this trinity: Narrative.  Simplicity.  Choices.  What is your garden, today, answering?

Orange

When my father built a new house he let me, age 7, choose my carpet color.  Burnt Orange.  I had white walls & white furniture & white lamps.

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Loved growing up in that room with the light of Galveston Bay pulsating off the walls.

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A huge red bottle brush filled the window with hummingbirds.

Have never used Orange again.  Happy reigns when I catch glimpses of it.
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Garden & Be Well,     XO Tara
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Pic via Colorado Homes & Lifestyles.  A client, from Holland, already had orange accents in her garden when she hired me, hers is a Faded Burnt Orange.   Her garden is on tour this month, will try to get there for pics.  Since, obviously, pics of Orange are absent my arsenal!

Framed Views & Historic Hedge

Every home should have numerous framed views.

This historic hedge, rare in USA, has a Friendship Gate pruned into it between neighbors.

They had dinner & shared champagne last nite celebrating Cinco de Mayo.
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What makes a historic hedge, aside from age?  A mix of plants: pass along plants, bird seeded plants, wind seeded plants, no invasive plants, tiered layers, something coming into bloom throughout the year.  If next to meadow, historic hedges are maximum pollinator habitat.  No watering, no chemicals, no fertilizer, hi density, low density, poof-viola, maximum pollinator habitat.
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Garden & Be Well,       XO Tara
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Pics taken yesterday.

Nicky Haslam Said "...

Generously stuffed with bons mots.

"Flowers play an essential role, partly to enliven the rooms and partly from the sheer pleasure of thinking up new ways to utilize anything growing in the immediate surroundings.  I love massed, untidy bouquets of things in season, and try to keep the room's color scheme in mind so that the arrangement doesn't shriek, ", Look at me."  "  Nicky Haslam.
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Great theme for a garden party, Please Come to a Garden Tea & let us be Massed and Untidy on the Tea Olive Terrace.  (Which friend could possibly refuse this invite?)
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Garden & Be Well,  XO Tara
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Odd week, days beginning in the tub, oodles of epsom salts & hot water.  Why move a huge English urn + plinth?  Whatever.  Have enjoyed the morning soaks with Nicky.

Color: Bedroom Before + After

Last weekend, below, in my bedroom.

Color change.  Vintage linen ceiling & walls were too dark for north facing windows.

Now, Benjamin Moore Sundress walls & White Dove ceiling + trim.

via

Calm, above/below.  And the template copied.

via

 Ordered headboard & sofa, below, from Susanne Hudson.  Sent her the 2 pics above, she mailed fabric samples & asked dimensions.

Not quite 'after', above.  Still playing with art, lamps, pillows, tables, chests, etc.  A Sheraton sideboard with tv is opposite the bed.   Who knew a bedskirt & rug would be the most difficult to find?
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Chuck, top pic, has helped me for several years.  His job, appraiser, lost to the economy, along with most everything he owned.  Yesterday he closed on a house.  With hard work & a good attitude this man has done it.  Happy for him & so proud.
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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara
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Gregory's Paint & Flooring is my Benjamin Moore dealer.  Send all my clients there.  It's as if you've hired an experienced, trained assistant, that cares.  No, they have not paid for this infomercial!  I appreciate their service.

Choosing Color for a Fence & Fixing a View

May Day, yesterday, at one of my jobsites, below.

White fence?  Not happening.  Made the space smaller & became a focal point.  Detracting from the focal point of the home.

Now, above/below, a blend-into-the-background Benjamin Moore Alexandria Beige.

See the stop sign, roads, & home across the street?  Of course you do.  Ouch.
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Soon evergreens in a tapestry hedge, with fruit trees, will create a garden with grounds and no offensive views.
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Can it get better?  Yes, using existing evergreen shrubs needing to be moved anyway.
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Garden & Be Well,         XO Tara
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Pics sent from client.  Lucky children, my last May Day pole was in the 60's.

Potting Table: A Template

 Outside my Conservatory is a space asking, just last week, for a potting table.  This, below, is the template.  

No different than putting interior rooms together.
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Perhaps once/twice/year will need to use it for potting.
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Will style it with ivy topiaries for the house.  A pair of lamps.
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Zinc top with Benjamin Moore Alexandria beige legs.
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Now, on mission at the thrift stores.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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pic via Habitually Chic.  Of course there is a slight slope to the space, need to cut/fill the area.

Proscenium Design is Your Desire

Porch, turkeys, garden, a new trinity.  This is my job, below.  Do you see what I've done?  

Designed the garden as a proscenium to life.  

What does that mean?

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Garden is fabulous, marvelous, incredible 24/7 with little effort and a stage set for what life tosses.

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Look at the top pic again.

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It's taken from inside the house.  A snapshot that looks like a photo shoot.

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Not an accident.

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This garden is ready for Garden & Gun.

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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

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Pics sent from client last week.  She KNEW the turkey pic would THRILL me !!!!!!  Don't know Garden & Gun magazine?  You want to.

Interior Shutters

Too much sun, she sent me a link to exterior shade cloth.  

Too expensive for something to degrade in weather, look merely satisfactory when new, pass quickly to tacky, even faster to dreadful, and finally get-rid-of-it.  Why spend the money?  Worse, why waste the time?
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Perhaps, interior top down/bottom up Duette shades inside.  No go.  Her cats would shred them she said.
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Shutters?  Hers would have to be bi-fold due to space.
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She hasn't responded!
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic Cote de Texas.

Abby Aldrich Rockefeller: Williamsburg, VA

A perfect distance from the house.  The Tea House.  

Abby Aldrich Rockefeller's home in Williamsburg, VA.  She spent April/October here yearly.

The scale is exquisite.

Knowing a bit about the depth of her philanthropy the scale and sweetness of her home speak much of her character.
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Her gardens are intelligent, potent in simplicity, narrative, formality, rusticity, line, axis, Nature.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics taken earlier this month while I was lecturing in Colonial Williamsburg, VA.