Design

When I'm away (from our garden), I always enjoy looking at other people's gardens (front yard, back yard, vegetable gardens, raised beds, fruit trees, etc.) Fortunately, where we stay in the mountains, there are lots of observations to be had. This house is nearby, one of the lovely historic homes in the Montford Historic District of Asheville. Some of the large historic houses have lovely gardens. This rose arbor caught my attention. The roses were small, but very striking on the arbor! In a growing time of the year, I'm (VERY) easily encouraged into thinking and musing about plants and growing things, if something catches my attention. I admired plants in a local community garden (Pearson Community Garden), said hello to the first person that I've seen tending things so far, but we didn't strike up a conversation, as that didn't seem like what he was interested in. But I hope to find out w hat the scheme is there, eventually!

I'm fascinated about how people create gardens that please them. We have different tastes in colors, color combinations, whether our gardens attract wildlife, focus on natives, or some other passion. I'm firmly in the 'creating gardens that mimic nature' side of things, but that doesn't mean I don't appreciate the exotic and unusual in other people's gardens, even if I think, I'd never plant that! I'm also interested in how gardens change. I listened to a lecture program coming over to England, I think from the RHS, that I had downloaded (to my iPod), with Sir Roy Strong and Fergus Garrett talking about whether you can preserve a garden that has a personal imprint of the gardener. Roy Strong clearly was of the opinion that change (often radical) was good, reflecting on how he'd changed his house and garden after losing his wife, who had created the garden with him. But I had the sense that he and his wife had been of differing tastes, when i...