Showing posts with label subsidiary focal points. Show all posts
Showing posts with label subsidiary focal points. Show all posts

Monday, March 12, 2012

Kitchen Lighting

Leaving at dusk last month I could see, from beyond the Ancient Orhcard, these lights, below, on.

 Retro fitted lighting ca. 1880.  The light bulbs mimic gas.
I'm a Landscape Designer & demand every view into your home be fabulous.
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Lighting, window treatments, furniture, art & etc.
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If I can see it from the garden it is within my domain.
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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara
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Pic taken at a jobsite last month.  The primitive piece next to the marble island is called a biscuit board.  Never seen one till here.  Wish I had the type of camera to have shot from the garden, past the Ancient Orchard, across the Lawn & into her windows.  Susanne Hudson is helping with interiors.

Wednesday, March 7, 2012

Hammock Humor

Perusing last night, above.  Laughter, amusement, delighted arrogance Puppet Barbuda style.  In reality the hammocks I see are hanging from rusted metal frames, in landscapes devoid of charm, a bare patch of earth below with weeds spreading from the muck, no fringe, a mildew factory, on view from windows inside the home, with not a table in sight for a book & glass of wine, and every mosquito from miles around just waiting for you to alight to gorge on your blood and give you the disease of the day.
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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara
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Pic from Janelle McCulloch, & thank you for picturing the answer, "What were they thinking?"

Monday, July 25, 2011

How To Edit Design

Focal Points: use 1 per area.

 Too much stuff?  Site subsidiary focal points away from main focal point.  Focal points & subsidiary focal points should 'Just Touch' foliage.
 Obelisk and ornamental grasses great combo.  A subsidiary focal point becoming a focal point when the grasses are herbacious.
Adore the siting of Mary's ball.  You'll not see it if you're walking and looking in another direction.
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Garden & Be Well,        XO Tara
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Editing is one of the hardest things to do in a Landscape Design.  Mary is the queen of editing.  Her work puts her into contact with lots of FREE good garden 'stuff'.  Yes, same fabulous Mary as previous posts.

Saturday, July 23, 2011

Landscape Design: Subsidiary Focal Points

At woodland's edge, below, a tiny vegetable garden.  Perfect siting for her red leaf Japanese maple.
 Too pretty, rusted urn, to not use, below, but the garden already has a main focal point here, the roundabout (yesterday's pics), it's discreetly tucked into a 'shrub clump'.  A subsidiary focal point.
 Leaving yesterday's roundabout, below, a path.  Peaking thru the garden, above, notice her USA flag.
With its curve this path has my interest.  Eyes, mind & feet are pulled.
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Yes, I'm going to walk you thru more of Mary's garden next post.
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Garden & Be Well,      XO Tara
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Adore the concept, SHRUB CLUMP.  Of course it's from Gertrude Jekyll.  It's difficult to read her in bed at night.  She's always exciting.  Graham Stuart Thomas, same thing.
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Mary didn't know I was coming to her garden, she is at the beach with grandchildren.  Nothing is styled, and why historical landscape design concepts keep working.  Note arrived from Mary yesterday, she's 71.  Important for you to know this.  She is the gardener.

Thursday, May 19, 2011

Most People Are Afraid Of This.

Carl Jung, "Our lives are about getting the outside to match the inside."Tucked in a woodland, on a mossy stone, unseen by most.
Are you brave enough to put what resonates in your heart into your garden?
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Same garden as the previous posts.
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It's odd, I design landscapes but often feel like I liberate adults into their imagination.

Friday, May 6, 2011

How To Create Hidden Assets

The rule is 1 focal point per area. How to break the rule? Subsidiary Focal Points.
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In the Tea Olive Terrace, above.
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Tucked quietly in a corner, often overlooked.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic taken last week in my garden. A perverse delight, creating subsidiary focal points to be overlooked.

Saturday, January 8, 2011

Something To Make You Smile


Last year when I designed her landscape her kitchen was sheet rock. Last week, below, still unfinished it's already fabulous. Sheepishly, she said, "I know it's ridiculous but it makes me happy to look at my new chandeliers."


A wise observation. Over a decade ago, in Penny McHenry's garden, I realized the same thing about things that made me smile. Her garden, tastefully, had many.

Near my front door, above, the cat. I bought the cat for no other reason than it made me smile.



Go ahead, give yourself permission. Choose things that make you smile.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

Wednesday, November 3, 2010

Squire Mushroom vs Wine Bottle Girl

"James Gillray's etching 'Delicious Weather', 1808, mocks the middle-class villa owner, satirized elsewhere as the newly rich 'Squire Mushroom', for his attempts to make an elegant landscape in a 2-acre garden." J Fearnley-Whittingstall
Who caters to the man, above? TESTOSTERONE ON WHEELS MOW-BLOW-GO & COMMODIFY EVERYTHING I TOUCH IN YOUR LANDSCAPE PHILOSOPHY.
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Poppets, PUPPET BARBUDA, has been buying clothes, before reading/seeing the above, she declared her style: French, early 19th century, white wig, leggings, & dare I say, a bit of modest cleavage.
From the Dining Room, above. Seen only when standing near, not while seated. Solution? A floral arrangement of wine bottles & accouterments, softly lit from below. A cornucopia to Wine Bottle Girl's theme.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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How could I resist mixing these topics? The difference between 'Squire Mushroom' & 'Wine Bottle Girl' ? Wine Bottle Girl lives Cole Porter's, "It must be FUN". Poppets, she has zero time-energy-will to impress. PUPPET BARBUDA finds Squire Mushroom & his minions tiresome, to the point of harmful, to her beloved industry.
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Top pic & quote taken from, THE GARDEN An English Love Affair One Thousand Years of Gardening, by Jane Fearnley-Whittingstall.

Saturday, August 28, 2010

Subsidary Focal Point

In most landscapes she, below, would be a focal point on axis with a main view. In this Italianate garden she's a subsidiary focal point. A surprise, lovingly tucked in.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Remember, the landscape design rule: 1 Focal Point/area.
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Pic taken in Athens, Ga this month in the same garden as previous post.

Saturday, June 26, 2010

Surprises Tucked In

Adirondack chairs as focal points. Easy. Unless, perhaps, you've put too much junk in your garden?
Oakleaf Hydrangea blossom stealing the spotlight.


Tucked in, above, I adore old watering cans.
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A little surprise, tucked in, seen when you sit in my adirondack chair. Placement matters, poppets. Sometimes 2" matters.
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Don't create the gravest of garden cliches; all your baubles fighting to be seen AT ONCE. Ugh.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic taken this month in my garden. Again, you realize I do not like styled pics? When a design is good no need to style your pictures. Bottom pic: shot pea gravel, gray Cherokee flagstone edging & oakleaf hydrangea spilling over. Aaaaaah, love it. Calms me. Ha, whatever works, right?
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cliche: trite, hackneyed, desperate...............

Wednesday, June 23, 2010

Repetition

Puppet Barbuda took awhile to trust repetition, a landscape design tool. Wasted years. Puppet Barbuda was stubborn. Still is.
Puppet Barbuda was too smart to COPY !!!!!
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Alas, years in the wilderness, and Puppet Barbuda DID NOT recreate a new wheel.
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REPETITION, if it works in one landscape it will work in your landscape. Each time repetition repeats....................IT'S NEW & UNIQUE at each repeat.
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Of course poppets you must adjust for plant zone, money, maintenance, & time. Ironically, copying $$$ landscapes rewards you, often, with better results than the original.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics from Susanne Hudson's garden last month.

Tuesday, June 15, 2010

An Exception

Landscape Design Rule: 1 Focal Point per Area Faux bois bench.
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Oversized hanging candle lantern.
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Blooming Hydrangea in a pot.
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Gravel path.
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Breaking Landscape Design Rules creates fabulous landscapes.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic taken almost 2 weeks ago in Susanne Hudson's garden. I spent 5 nites with her while creating our garden for the annual Penny McHenry Hydrangea Festival. Oh yes, dahlings, will be posting those pics soon.
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I've taken dozens of pics of this gorgeous faux bois bench. Each awful. Finally. Ah, finally. Got it !!
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Yes, broken landscape design rule, above, but don't overlook the fabulous landscape design: canopy trees, understory trees, walls of shrubs, color theme, sense of mystery, sense of surprise.

Friday, June 11, 2010

Brown Choices

Brown, below, is a landscape design choice. Is it on your radar?
Leaf Litter Mulch is a choice.


Leaf Litter Mulch? Love it.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Preparing my garden for a tour, 4 years ago, I realized the standard set by local garden designers (Ryan Gainey & etc.), which I was happily copying, wasn't for me, anymore. Instead I went 180 degrees to my Mentors, all women. Each with Leaf Litter Mulch. A choice made in the afternoon. By dark, sooooooooooo tired, still working in my garden, I glanced up to see my garden and began to cry. Why? It was the missing element, Leaf Litter Mulch, I had the garden I had always wanted.
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Pics from Susanne Hudson's garden last week.

Monday, June 7, 2010

Subsidiary Focal Point

Perfectly placed, Donkey, below, is nibbling
the ivy.

I asked Susanne if she placed Donkey at the ivy tendril. She had no clue what I meant.
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A cute donkey cart? My famous words about Cute Kills? Well, dahlings, there is an exception to every rule.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic taken in Susanne Hudson's garden last week.

Thursday, June 3, 2010

Accidental Seasons

Like? Me too. Pulled from the basement, below, my grandmother's wheel barrow. No time, yet, to fill it with terra cotta pots & 'style' its placement.

Today, above, with hydrangeas. In spring, below, with Chinese snowball.

Chinese snowball petals swirling, below, onto unfurling hydrangea foliage.

In the snow, below.

When sasanqua's bloom in fall another wheelbarrow pic. Had no idea it would become a seasonal attraction. Still pondering where I'll place it once it's filled with terra cotta pots. I adore this type of pondering. Priceless.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Susanne Hudson created the top wheelbarrow.

Saturday, May 29, 2010

Incipient Calm

A petty bourgeois comfort. I know. Hydrangeas & Blue/White China say, "Keep Calm & Carry On", ha, without words.
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Exterior painting, 5 weeks, completed. You know how they left my garden.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic taken in my garden earlier this week. H. macrophylla 'Penny Mac' shown. Dug from Penny's garden by the Queen of Hydrangea Heaven herself. Decades of blue blossoms in her garden & years in mine. 2 years ago, severe drought, they turned pink due to poor aluminum uptake. Plenty of rains since last fall, hmm, still pink.

Wednesday, May 26, 2010

Painted 'Copper' Gutters

My back door, below. Notice the downspout? It's round, by choice. Better aesthetics.
Gutters are aluminum painted to look like copper. Sherwin-Williams, Best Bronze.


The woman? A Christine Sibley piece. Bought from the 2nd's table when Christine was alive. Ooooh, I miss her gardens, zoo, gallery, 2nd's table, antics, and her.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics taken yesterday morning. Painters finally finished the exterior. Susanne Hudson, interior decorator & color specialist, was hired to choose colors.

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Hidden on Purpose

Hidden in the trees, below, a gift from COLLEGE BOY.
A sundial I haven't noticed in years. It's placed 'off exhibit' knowing it's easy to have too much STUFF in my garden.
With Chinese Snowball petals falling

my sundial decided to be seen, if only momentarily. Sweet surprise.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics taken last week. Happy I made the choice to have a landscape wanting to delight & entertain me. You know the EM Forster choices in life. Music, books, walks, a cup of hot tea, pets, garden, friends & etc.

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

SUBSIDIARY FOCAL POINT

Tucked into a boxwood, below, hidden from most views. Meow. Bamboo rake bought for aesthetics.

A neighbor, retired NAVY, taught me how to do the rake/gravel thing.
A new pleasure, dragging a bamboo rake thru gravel. Aaaah, the sound, the feel of rake thru gravel, new body movements, making swirls, curves, lines, intersections, mindlessness; but not.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara

Friday, February 12, 2010

WOMEN'S KNOCKERS

A century ago, in Turkey, these hands were the women's knockers of a household. Attached to a door possessing a much larger knocker. You know, the man's knocker.
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Knocker sounds let a household know who should answer the door.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic taken in Birmingham, AL this week. Stay tuned, more from this delicious location, above, soon.