It’s tour season and two of my favorite tours–the San Francisco Designer Showcase and the Garden Conservancy Tours happen this month.  The Showcase House runs through May 28 and the Garden Conservancy Tours run in May and June in the East Bay, Marin, Santa Cruz and Mendocino.

This Saturday, May 12, take your mom to the Garden Conservancy tour happening in the East Bay. One of the four featured gardens is landscape designer Keeyla Meadows‘s garden in Albany.  Full disclosure–Keeyla is a friend and also designed my garden.  She’s a multi-faceted artist and her garden is always a delight to visit.  Look at these beautiful blooms planted in colorful pots or in front of fabulous sculpture all made by Keeyla.  Think Monet meets Gaudi.

Find out more about Keeyla’s garden and the tour in this recent SF Gate article. I’ll be working as a docent in Keeyla’s garden Saturday. Hope to see you there!

Also, deer don’t like them.  They don’t appeal to gophers.  And the foxes and wild turkeys seem to leave them alone as well. Which means they’re perfect for our garden on the edge of open space.  We planted eleven different varieties of daffodils  (poets would call some jonquils, others paper whites or narcissus)–specifically Avalanche, Barrett Browning, Carlton, Cornish King, Ice Follies, Las Vegas, Ma Bell, Merels Favourite, Pink Charm, Pipet, and Thalia. They all had staggered bloom times.  But on those weeks where they were pretty much all in bloom, every time I opened the front door it felt like I was being serenaded with the Hallelujah Chorus.  (Did you know that Handel’s “Messiah” was originally performed in April?)

Daffodils belong to the genus narcissus which gets its name from the Greek god Narcissus.  According to legend, Narcissus was so taken with the image of himself as he gazed into a river that he drowned trying to capture his reflection.  The reflected image of daffodils growing along stream banks inspired the association with Narcissus.

We planted them along the dry stream bed in our garden where except for a few exceptionally rainy days no treacherous reflections are cast.  We planted them on a sunny day in December when my family had just started to gather for Christmas.  Though the sun was out it was still cold and it took some gumption to get out there and plant All Those Bulbs (we put 100 tulip bulbs in the back pots safely out of reach from the deer as well.) But once we got started the work was pretty easy and fun.  And boy was there a big payoff.  I’m thinking this will be an annual Christmas tradition.  Some daffodils will return but to ensure we always have plenty I’ll want to plant more.

Here you can see our daughter Claire planting daffodils  (now that they’ve bloomed, I’m thinking the elegant white on white Thalia?) near the leafless variegated dogwood draped with Christmas garland.

And here’s the rest of the planting crew — our pregnant daughter-in-law Lori, Claire, landscaper Keeyla Meadows, son Will and M.J. Right after we planted the bulbs we scurried off to a matinee performance of The Christmas Revels that happened to feature a daffodil as a magical symbol of healing and rebirth!

It’s an act of faith to plant anything but especially homely little bulbs in the dead of winter.  But look what our faith hath wrought!

Happy Weekend All!

What a wonderful spring we’re having here in Northern California. I’ve been working on my garden removing the things that didn’t survive the deer or early frosts and then shopping for and planting more of what seems to thrive. The temperature is just warm enough to feel rejuvenating as I work outside and the light is so cinematic it deserves some kind of award.  Best Seasonal Glow–or something to that effect.

Last week, my landscape designer and friend Keeyla Meadows lended some expert help. Together we shopped at the wholesale nursery for more grevilleas and hellebores and added a white rhododendron and some daphne–fingers crossed that it survives since daphne can be so temperamental.  Then we spent a day placing and planting before the rains started up again.  At the end of that very full day of digging, watering, fertilizing and cleanup we sat down for a cup of tea in the twilight.  A large bird flew by and landed in a nearby eucalyptus tree directly across from where we were sitting. It immediately started to “whoo hooo” so we thought we knew what we were looking at but to confirm I fished out an old pair of binoculars.  Sure enough there was a great horned owl (“uncommon but widespread” says my Sibley Field Guide to Western Birds) challenging us to blink first.

According to “Birds–A Spiritual Field Guide “ (yes, I have ALL the bird books) the owl can be seen as either an omen of something terrible to come–think spooky Halloween creature–or a symbol of wisdom. Either way it seemed quite mystical to have it appear and communicate with us at that moment. We chose to think of “our” owl as a wise messenger blessing our clever efforts to outsmart the deer and anticipate the rain.

Usually this time of year is when I produce a post about my favorite set designs from the previous year’s movies.  Alas, I’ve been immersed in novel revisions or garden plans the past few weeks and didn’t take the time to put one together but if the Academy Awards show peaked your interest in seeing some of the nominated films here’s my 2 Cents on 2015 movie design.  Of the films nominated for Best Art Direction I was rooting for The Martian. I wasn’t up for seeing either The Revenant or Mad Max: Fury Road on the big screen but the rest of my family did and raved about Max’s visuals so I’m not surprised it won. Of the films I saw I absolutely loved the sinister modern house in Ex Machina (read about the mostly Norwegian locations here and here)

And the beautiful color palette of Brooklyn.

How fitting that the female leads of these two films also wore some of my favorite Oscar gowns.

To quote my backyard visitor–Whoo hooo!  What were your favorite movie sets from last year?  How about Oscar fashions?  I’d love to hear.

Now that we’ve returned to whatever we call Not Daylight Savings Time and the days are growing short, I’m reflecting on what we’ve done around here over the past year. Counting my blessings, I’m grateful for the beautiful garden that greets me every time I come home. Some of you may be dreaming up some spring garden plans of your own.  If so, I thought I’d share some photos of our garden design and installation to help you plan for garden projects you might want to tackle when we turn our clocks forward again.

Let’s start with the foundation of the garden design – the dirt and the rocks.

The good news was that our existing soil wasn’t terrible.  It still needed some amendments but we weren’t working with impacted clay that needed extensive re-working.  A landscaping crew cleared out the few struggling plants from a long-defunct garden, leveled the existing soil and spread a new layer of soil over the area to be landscaped. Time to add some larger rocks to contain and shape the garden.

Buying Rocks

In early April I met up with our landscape designer Keeyla Meadows at American Soil & Stone in Richmond, CA.  American Soil sells dirt and rocks and a few other things but mostly lots of dirt and rocks in every size.  We were there for the big rocks.

Keeyla had in mind some beautiful brown and black birdbath basalt boulders.  These sculptural beauties are quarried in Washington in such a way that one side often forms a bowl.  The bowls hold rain (or irrigation) water which attracts birds—thus their name. The idea was to put a  number of them in the front yard and then connect them with a dry stream bed of smaller rocks—preferably some black Mexican river rock to bring out the black veining in the basalt.

Alas, we couldn’t find river rock black enough to match the basalt so we decided to keep hunting for the smaller rocks but selected nine basalt boulders and some less-expensive granite boulders to use in and around the rock walls of the driveway.

Boulders selected and order placed, we were on our way out of the stone yard when Keeyla’s toe caught on a palette of rock causing her to trip and fall and break her elbow! The next few hours were spent in the emergency room.  Ugh.  Keeyla was headed for surgery and would be out of commission for a few weeks.

Installing the Rocks

A month or so later, Keeyla was on the mend (though she would be in a sling or in physical therapy through most of the project, poor thing!) and we set dates for the rocks to be delivered and a crane to show up to move them into place.  There was some question as to whether we’d need a big or a little crane.  Thank goodness we could get away with a little one, because cranes don’t come cheap.

The day the crane arrived was very operatic – cold and windy with swirling fog.   Ominously, it seemed like a day when someone could end up in the emergency room again. (Thankfully, no one did.) Look at the front wheels of the truck levitating–so sorry I didn’t have a little boy still at home to watch this equipment in action.

A crew loaded each rock into a sling attached to the arm of the crane. Keeyla took her place as “the rock whisperer” and guided every boulder into place, carefully turning it in its sling until it was sitting just where she wanted it.

The guys worked with hand tools to do further fine tuning.

By the end of the day we had our own little bird-friendly druid circle in the front and a rebuilt driveway area that was decidedly more interesting.

Tinkering with Rocks

Once the big rocks were in, the crew could lay down the stream bed. Since our first trip to American Soil we’d continued to look for other blacker river rock—but to no avail. We revisited  American Soil and decided that their latest batch of Mexican river rock looked blacker, more suitable. We had a basket delivered and the landscaping crew commenced to lay out the stream under Keeyla’s direction. (By now some plants were in place as well.)

But it was clear once they were down that the color of the river rock was going to be a problem.  It wasn’t only that it wasn’t as black as the basalt veining, it was actually quite BLUE out there in the wild.  The crew left for the day and I kept checking on the color.  I told myself that the rocks were very beautiful on their own and their grey-blue color did highlight the Bay view beyond the garden.

But as much as I tried to embrace the gray rocks, it was clear they were wrong.  The blue cast was such a strong contrast that you lost the zen beauty of the basalt.  And so, another trip to American Soil where this time we found a mix of brown and tan rocks in various sizes that coordinated with the brown color of the basalt.  Keeyla sprinkled some little black pebbles between the river rocks to highlight the basalt veining. Here are some before and after shots.  Rock on!

Next up – The Plants

The poet Nikki Giovanni once said that she spent a lot of time learning about bird watching.  Placing these birdbath basalt rocks in my new garden has made me want to do the same. We’ve created our own little aviary hammam out front and when I’m around I try to sit very still so I don’t frighten the winged skinny-dippers away.  Just wish I knew their names.  I’d like to be a better hostess. Any suggestions for beginner bird watching guides?

My friend Jana says putting in a new garden is like giving birth.  Painful and messy at the time but you quickly forget all that once your new pride and joy has arrived.  This has been an intense mother of a week with soil, rock and plant deliveries arriving almost daily and several professional crews on site to place and plant the new arrivals. More about that soon, along with my report on this year’s San Francisco Decorator Showcase. In the meantime, have a good weekend all!

]]> http://thingselemental.com/2015/04/digging-life/feed/ 3 http://thingselemental.com/2015/04/friday-things-the-good-fences-edition/ http://thingselemental.com/2015/04/friday-things-the-good-fences-edition/#comments Sat, 18 Apr 2015 02:15:50 +0000 kathryn http://thingselemental.com/?p=4719 The garden project continues in full swing.  So full that I’ve hardly looked at anything this week that didn’t have petals or leaves. Except maybe the dirt surrounding our house–specifically, the dirt that surrounds my house vs. the dirt that surrounds my neighbors’ house.

Our property is bordered on three sides by open space owned by the utility company.  The other side includes a raised berm that runs between our driveway and the home of some sweet elderly neighbors who have lived there for thirty years.  When selecting plants for the garden, we discussed the general plan for the space on our side of the shared berm. Our intention was to add more deer-resistant plants like the rhododendrons that line their side of the berm. (Our side consisted of bare dirt and an overgrown phormium on its last stick-like legs.) The neighbors agreed to the plan but then I inadvertently (truly) deviated from it by purchasing an especially pretty red maple while shopping for the back yard plants and planted it on what I thought was our side of the property line. That red maple has turned into one especially pretty red flag.

The neighbors had some concerns. (Again, have I mentioned they’re lovely people?) They thought the tree might be on their property and weren’t interested in maintaining it long term–even if their long term isn’t so long.  I understood where they were coming from but thought that I’d planted it on our side and furthermore fully intend to care for it. We consulted the parcel map but it was hard to determine where the line fell.  The property is oddly shaped with a triangular bit that extends over towards the neighbors’ house.  All well and good if you know where any point of the triangle exists, but just by looking at the map it’s hard to make that out. Using a VERY long tape measurer and measuring from the back (we think) of our property, M.J. laid out a possible borderline but things were iffy enough that both sides agreed it was best to hire a surveyor to settle the matter.

In the meantime we rebuilt the shabby little plywood fence at the edge of another border and painted it a neutral gray to disappear behind the plants about to be planted.  It’s a low fence–only three feet high.  But it serves as a screen to block the view of the large cement blocks that anchor a transmission tower that stands in the utility company open space. Clearly this little fence would do nothing to stop that tower from tumbling down in the case of an earthquake or prevent trespassers from leaping stepping over it. But it quietly suggests that the massive tower footings and strangers (there’s no hope for the deer) belong on the other side of the fence. Guess we have some border issues as well.

This week when I bought the rest of the new plants I purchased two especially pretty red rhododendrons as a peace offering to the neighbors. We’ll plant them on the to-be-determined border in front of their kitchen window where before there was only dirt and if we have to we’ll adjust the maple placement to make sure it’s definitely on our side of the line. We’re doing our best to make everyone happy with their lots in life.

Besides plants and dirt, here are a few other things that caught my attention this week:

Martha Stewart’s favorite clematis (and check out that garden structure to support them!)

Thinking a Calder-like mobile in the new garden could be cool.

Could these be the ultimate oatmeal raisin cookies?

Have you settled on your work uniform?

How one casting agent changed pop culture.

Happy Weekend All!

Let me introduce you to my new pink dogwood tree—isn’t she a beauty? She went into the back garden yesterday along with a bunch of climbing vines and two fruit trees–a Kieffer lime and a “Panache” fig (classy, huh?)  I spent a few peaceful moments last night watering everything in, grateful to have some new living things to nurture.  Then I looked out into the open space beyond our fence to the area that technically belongs to PG&E but has plantings from a previous owner that we’ve now supplemented with some shimmering pittosporum. I laughed when I saw a large potted cactus I inherited when we bought the house now draped in leftover Christmas garland and transplanted in the field of Mexican salvia.  Welcome to the beginnings of my goofy, glorious garden.

Whether you’re celebrating Passover or Easter or Spring in all it’s glory this weekend, I hope you, too, find a quiet moment to marvel at new life and unexpected juxtapositions.

Here are a few other marvelous things that caught my attention this week.

This temple went up in flames for all the right reasons.

How to make an attractive city.

A trippy light to offset seasonal affective disorder.

Frogs at the Passover Table.

For your Easter Basket, a classy set of cards.

The story behind the annual Peeps Diorama contest.

Happy Passover and Easter Weekend All!

Last week a landscape crew ripped out most of the tired plantings and removed all the rocks that made up an ornamental dry stream bed in the upper garden.  What’s left is a whole lot of dirt potential.

“Things gonna look worse before they look better,” said my handyman Gustavo after shoring up the back deck and removing some rotten railings. He shook his head as he surveyed the garden demolition and took measurements to rebuild a decrepit wood screen in the front.

Guess so. The yard looks pretty desolate now with just a lone dasylirion left under the old oaks. Lizards sun on the rocks and robins hunt for worms but the deer don’t even bother stopping by.  Nothing worth munching here.

But soon the soil will be prepped and the irrigation installed and then we can plant new plants. My landscaper Keeyla and I picked out some old favorites like white wisteria, burmese honeysuckle and orange roses to climb up the back decks. Plus some deer-resistant perennials like red bottlebrush and sunset-colored grevilleas to light up the front driveway. A pink dogwood will blossom outside the living room window and a maple with leaves the color of Matisse’s favorite red will signal we’re home.

Last summer my brother planted a Bearss lime for me and now I’ll add both Eureka and Meyer lemons. (After you’ve had them growing in your garden, it’s so frustrating to buy them—I know, I know, us poor Californians.) At the nursery a Kieffer lime tree looked especially pretty and I added it to the order.  You might ask who really needs two different limes growing in their garden? But I figure who wouldn’t want to explore the possibilities? Kieffer lime leaves are used in Thai cooking—not something I do all the time, but will likely attempt more with one of the featured ingredients growing in my back yard.

Back from the nursery I put together a Pinterest board showing what plants are going into the garden and felt more hopeful about what’s to come.

It helped when two umbrellas the color of my soon-to-be-planted “Westerland” roses arrived to cheer me up ’til things look better.

Plans for the outdoor spaces continue to evolve as I gather information and consult trusted experts.  One of those experts is Berkeley artist and landscape designer Keeyla Meadows.

I first met Keeyla twenty-some years ago when I was scouting gardens for a garden tour fundraiser for our kids’ grade school. Someone tipped me off to Keeyla’s garden and I drove right over and peeped over her fence. (Shameless, I know.) The incredible explosion of red and pink poppies waving in the sunlight looked like Mother Nature’s ultimate Valentine.

Over the years that effervescent field of poppies has turned into an art-filled outdoor gallery replete with sculpture, water features and artful plantings.  Keeyla’s won numerous awards, written two beautiful books on color and design and been published widely. It’s always a treat to write about her gardens. As I’ve pondered what to do with the unusual mix here—a stark modern home on the edge of wild, open space—I wondered if Keeyla might have some answers for me.

We met up this week and I’ve been dreaming about possibilities ever since.  Her  initial vision for the garden?  Take inspiration from a Calder mobile, creating blocks of color and incorporating movement to make the most of the architecture and the setting.  I love the idea. Can’t wait to show you how this plays out.

Here are a few other artful things I’ve been considering this week:

An AirBnB retirement plan.

Swirly water from a fabulous faucet.

Ruth Reichl uses ketchup and Worcestershire sauce to clean her copper pots.  Really.

Creativity exercises for those feeling blocked—or just housebound and bored.

“Horribly pleasing” smokestack photos.

This new-to-me Annie Dillard essay about an eagle and a weasel, brought to my attention by the fabulous folks on the Slate Culture Gabfest podcast.

And finally, a little peek into Jack Black’s California roots.

California Inspires Me: Jack Black (2014) from Nicolas Ménard on Vimeo.