Showing posts with label Color. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Color. Show all posts

Monday, April 28, 2014

Paint Walls & Furniture same Color

Paint all your furniture the color of the walls
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 A lovely comment from previous blog post.


A Ralph Lauren version, above.
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Recently renovated my master closet and all the furniture was painted the color of the walls.  Not large, it needed the cohesion.  Calm.  Clothes are the focus, getting dressed more easily.  Bill Blass, "If a woman has a closet full of clothes but nothing to wear, she doesn't know herself very well."
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Every garden needs a color trinity.  Green-brown-white is the classic for impact, calm & etc.
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Adore Ralph's color duo above.  Blue/white classic for centuries, and here, the people/lunch/conversation are the focal point.  After the main focal point of the views.
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Studying for 3 decades across continents/countries of centuries old gardens it's obvious, the best views require a garden with the most simplicity.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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For a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, become my client, local/on-line.
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Award winning speaker, hire me for your group, local/out-of-state.
                                                                                 .
Books by Tara Dillard, Amazon
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Tara Dillard & Associates Design: farm to city pied-a-terre.
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Construction by Award Winning:
Shaefer Heard Construction, licensed home-builder, renovation - new construction.  Heard's Landscaping a unit of SHC.  3 decades of service.

Saturday, April 26, 2014

Penelope Bianchi: Quote


Studying historic gardens across France I learned about field-gathered furniture.


Need patio/terrace furniture?  And the budget is tite?  Dumpster diving on garbage pic-up days, garage sales, thrift stores, junk shops.
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Paint it all the same color.
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Done.
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Queen of interiors & gardens, Penelope Bianchi says, "I am a huge believer in what "looks great" IS GREAT!"
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Garden & Be Well,  XO Tara
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Pic from Penelope Bianchi.  
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For a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, become my client, local/on-line.
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Award winning speaker, hire me for your group, local/out-of-state.
                                                                                 .
Books by Tara Dillard, Amazon
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Tara Dillard & Associates Design: farm to city pied-a-terre.
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Construction by Award Winning:
Shaefer Heard Construction, licensed home-builder, renovation - new construction.  Heard's Landscaping a unit of SHC.  3 decades of service.

Thursday, April 17, 2014

Words: Use with Caution in Styling

With some people, years ago, I learned not to share joyous news.  They took delight in diminishing my joy.  Another epiphany, not too long after, 'I choose the plants in my garden, choose the people in my life.'  Within seconds eject button pushed on several persons.
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Lightening life's load was instant.  No regrets decades later.  


Words in the garden, be wary of using them.  Words, most often, dominate any mood, any narrative, weather, ephemeral delicate beauties, etc.
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Gardens speak, without words.  It is the human cheapening their language.
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Instead of admonishing with a picture proving my 'words' I've chosen an exception.  Words in a garden providing pleasure.  If my garden needs a sign, 'Spring has Sprung', do not ever, in a lifetime galaxy of black holes, hire me.  My garden decadently overflows spring's bounty.  Front door, above, is not my home/garden, it belongs to a young woman.  Her mom renovated/styled the home, to perfection.  'Words', included !
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Love exceptions, and breaking rules.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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For a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, become my client, local/on-line.
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Award winning speaker, hire me for your group, local/out-of-state.
                                                                                 .
Books by Tara Dillard, Amazon
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Tara Dillard & Associates Design: farm to city pied-a-terre.
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Construction by Award Winning:
Shaefer Heard Construction, licensed home-builder, renovation - new construction.  Heard's Landscaping a unit of SHC.  3 decades of service.

Monday, April 14, 2014

Front Door Color: Safe is not on the list of Choices


She loves coral.  Loves.


Of course her home is an orange brick.  White front door lost amongst white windows/eves.
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Perhaps the white front door is not lost, merely, safe.
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We're aiming for a coral with browns, yet pops.
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Rich anticipation.
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Cote de Texas had this pic, above, recently & I wanted to grab the drapes-pillows and take to the orange brick house.  I know her coral is in this room.
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In Hawaii I bought 2 coral necklaces, a blood red brown coral & a lite salmon coral.  You know the reason for both.  A summer coral & a winter coral.
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What we need for her front door is neither.
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Remember, from the garden looking at your home, I must clearly know who you are.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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For a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, become my client, local/on-line.
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Award winning speaker, hire me for your group, local/out-of-state.
                                                                                 .
Books by Tara Dillard, Amazon
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Tara Dillard & Associates Design: farm to city pied-a-terre.
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Construction by Award Winning:
Shaefer Heard Construction, licensed home-builder, renovation - new construction.  Heard's Landscaping a unit of SHC.  3 decades of service.

Saturday, March 29, 2014

Design: Sources of Inspiration

Cracked.  Cracked & stapled is my favorite.


A farm scene, and cracked, above.
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Perfect.
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Why do we buy dishes?  By the set.
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Fun discovering the cracked dishes at a clients last weekend.  I must look more closely at the pattern, perhaps there is something to copy into the garden.
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Ironically, her garden's color trinity is green-brown-white and these dishes are almost the exact faded brown version of her garden.
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Garden & Be Well,     XO Tara
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If you want a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, and causes you to tap the brake pedal, as you look in the rear view mirror heading out, become my client, local or on-line.
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Award winning speaker, hire me to speak to your group, local or out-of-state.
                                                                                 .
Garden books by Tara Dillard, Amazon

Wednesday, March 19, 2014

Choosing Color at the Front Door

Moving the pots, below, a mere inch wider will make the doorway wider.
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Staining the pots the same color as the siding, and moving the pots 3" wider creates an entirely new entry focusing on the custom door.
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What is the right answer?
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Don't know without seeing the interior.


REPETITION,  is your best friend in a small space.


In the Daily Mail Associated Press pic, above, I forgot about the topic/article I clicked on when I saw these pots.  Elegant, understated, quiet, no need to show-off, seemingly bespoke.
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Ironically, & counterintuitively, designing small spaces is tougher than acreage.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Top pic, 5th & State.
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If you want a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, and causes you to tap the brake pedal, as you look in the rear view mirror heading out, become my client, local or on-line.
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Award winning speaker, hire me to speak to your group, local or out-of-state.
                                                                                 .
Garden books by Tara Dillard, Amazon

Friday, March 14, 2014

Oscar de la Renta: Simple Garden Trinity


Backdrop + bench + meadow = Fabulous Garden.  A trinity working hard long before Christ's era.


Dark green + Chartreuse green = Fabulous
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Thank you Oscar for playing dress-up in a garden.
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Within simplicity, aside from elegance, you'll discover Albert Einstein's, 
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"The pursuit of truth and beauty is a sphere of activity in which we are permitted to remain children all our lives."
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Oscar's book, updated, Here.
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If you want a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, and causes you to tap the brake pedal, as you look in the rear view mirror heading out, become my client, local or on-line.
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Award winning speaker, hire me to speak to your group, local or out-of-state.
                                                                                 .
Garden books by Tara Dillard, Amazon

Tuesday, March 11, 2014

Choosing Exterior Paint Colors

Exterior colors begin inside.  Wallpaper, sofa, art are your resources.  Especially for the front door.
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Trim & window colors are often dictated by the brick, stone, or mortar, on your home.


Exterior colors should look old the first day they are applied.  No waiting.  Benjamin Moore Historic Colors are a favorite.


I'm hard on my interior.  Loving faded colors on wood & textiles.
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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara
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pics in my kitchen yesterday.
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If you want a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, and causes you to tap the brake pedal, as you look in the rear view mirror heading out, become my client, local or on-line.
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Award winning speaker, hire me to speak to your group, local or out-of-state.
                                                                                 .
Garden books by Tara Dillard, Amazon

Thursday, February 20, 2014

Little Input, Big Impact

A bit of meadow, stretch of wild wood, bench.  Done.


In the depths of winter, still, one of the best invitations.
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Pictorial definition, LITTLE INPUT, BIG IMPACT.
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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara
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If you want a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, and causes you to tap the brake pedal, as you look in the rear view mirror heading out, become my client, local or on-line.
.
Award winning speaker, hire me to speak to your group, local or out-of-state.
                                                                                 .
Garden books by Tara Dillard, Amazon

Wednesday, February 19, 2014

Front Porch: Color Choices for Views & Guests

Built in the late 50's for the Queen's sister, Mount Corbett has a few original pieces remaining, below.
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This table wasn't designed for meals, propping feet, or bridge.
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This table leveraged conversation, cocktails, cigarettes (I can hear, & smell, the Zippo lighters shutting), & considering the era, 'stuff'.
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More than views, colors were mutedly chosen to show case people.
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How I would love to go back to the early years and see the clothes, hair, jewels.



Instead,


alone on the veranda, I was the color.
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My Ken Doll did  construction & landscaping at Mount Corbett a few years ago, hence my afternoon lolling in the pool & enjoying views while he gabbed with friends at the estate.
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Garden & Be Well,     XO Tara
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Pics taken this month in Jamaica.  We both wanted to prune the hedge blocking the views.  Alas, or maybe good for you, Mount Corbett is for sale.
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If you want a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, and causes you to tap the brake pedal, as you look in the rear view mirror heading out, become my client, local or on-line.
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Award winning speaker, hire me to speak to your group, local or out-of-state.
                                                                                 .
Garden books by Tara Dillard, Amazon

Wednesday, February 12, 2014

Color Echoes: Pamela Harper

On the way to Noel Coward's our driver needed to stop here, below.
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Color alone told me whatever is ahead is good.
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Gates were unlocked, below, and we were ushered into a courtyard throwing me decades back to a stay at the Dauphine Orleans in New Orleans French Quarter.  But.  This was better.
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Ken Doll asked, You liking this Baby?  
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He got a smile, I was speechless.  He grasped my arm, my eyes were everywhere & there were steps.  Then our driver, worried I would fall, was helping too.
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This aging lady stuff is nice, indeed.


Color Echoes well done always capture my attention.  
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Pamela Harper pioneered the concept & I heard her lecture at Atlanta Botanical Garden when her book was published.
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Sand & Caribbean were the starting point.

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Towels echo the walls echoing the sand.  

The pool, below, looks exactly like the work of my friend, landscape architect, David Cristiani.


Leaving this Faberge Egg of perfection felt like reignments being pulled off, by force.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pics taken last week, Jamaica.
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I doubt the Queen of Color, Maria Killam, has had 2 handsome men help her during a Color Swoon.
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What were my reignments for this day's outing?  Bikini, long-sleeved white linen shirt, flip-flops.  Perfect trinity.  Done.
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Wednesday, January 22, 2014

Using Color Restraint with Intensity

Intense restraint and another example of the color trinity green-brown-white.


Restraint so intense the terrace has become a proscenium for guests.
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Subtlety so rich the bluestone & granite become focal points.
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Humbling execution.
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Garden & Be Well,     XO Tara
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Pic Wendy Posard and Associates.  Definite teamwork between architect & owners.
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2 Tara Dillard questions a patio must answer, 'Is this patio so fabulous I must see inside the house?', 'Is this patio so incredible I must see the garden?'.  Yes & yes.

Thursday, January 16, 2014

Stained Concrete

Technically this should be a 'cold' space.  Concrete, glass, iron.


Instead, with staining of the concrete, there is warmth & invitation.
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Pressure wash?  Never.
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Garden & Be Well,    XO Tara
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Pic via La Maison Fou.
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If you want a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, and causes you to tap the brake pedal, as you look in the rear view mirror heading out, become my client, local or on-line.
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Award winning speaker, hire me to speak to your group, local or out-of-state.
                                                                                 .
Garden books by Tara Dillard, Amazon.

Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Aerin Lauder: Color Choices

What is the most obvious fact, below?


Green-Brown-White is the top color trinity, again.
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Choose a color trinity for your garden, and it should flow from your interiors, then stay true.
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What is your color trinity?
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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara
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Pic Aerin Lauder.
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Aerin Lauder must be an old soul.  She's kept, yet made her mother's garden/house her own.  Building upon good existing layers.  No ego about starting from scratch, just because she can.  The garden, above, is a garden design class in a single pic.  More than pretty, it didn't cost much to create nor will it cost much to maintain.  Aerin's Effortless Style is no sales gimmick in the garden.

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If you want a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, and causes you to tap the brake pedal, as you look in the rear view mirror heading out, become my client, local or on-line.
.
Award winning speaker, hire me to speak to your group, local or out-of-state.
                                                                                 .
Garden books by Tara Dillard, Amazon.

Tuesday, December 10, 2013

Layers of Green are Best in Garden Design

Layers of green always work.

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Flowers.  Give-me-flowers-or-give-me-ugly seems to be the starter gardener mindset.
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Layers of green are pretty all year vs. a season.  Layers of green emit ion exchanges of serenity.
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I can assure you choosing layers of green vs. flowers is, "The spreading wide of narrow Hands To gather Paradise—", "I dwell in Possibility..." by Emily Dickinson.
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Odd how most of Garden Design is counterintuitive.
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Garden & Be Well, XO Tara
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How do I know these things?  Queen of the flower method of garden design 12-step program.  No, I will not enable you.  My goal is to help you get rid of those pink elephants in your landscape.
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pic via Pinterest.
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If you want a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, and causes you to tap the brake pedal, as you look in the rear view mirror heading out, become my client, local or on-line.
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Award winning speaker, hire me to speak to your group, local or out-of-state.
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Garden books by Tara Dillard, Amazon.

Thursday, December 5, 2013

How to Design a Grill so it's not an Eyesore

Movable grills are awkward, not aesthetic, & do not 'fade away' into the backdrop.  Mostly, movable grills are an eyesore.  

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If a movable grill is on your buy-list study the exterior design, above.
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This is an expertly executed exterior design.  
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Obviously a styled photo I can still smell what's cooking.  And we 'know' there was no cooking going-on for the shoot !
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Why does this movable grill look good?  Props: comfort chairs-pillows-table-umbrella-mood, a color trinity was chosen/green-gray-stainless, simplicity, focal point (if you have an eyesore place a focal point nearby), contrast of many square shapes vs. round armillary sundial, formal landscape choices contrasted with informal plantings, repetition of flooring from dining area to garden area, an easy to maintain garden lets you focus on LIVING in the garden.  Simply.
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Garden & Be Well,      XO Tara
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Pic via 5th and State.  No excuses about the house, above.  If it's beautiful at a historic estate, it will be beautiful in your landscape.
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If you want a beautiful garden & home filling you with joy, and tap the brake pedal, as you look in the rear view mirror heading out, become my client, local or on-line.
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Award winning speaker, hire me to speak to your group local or out-of-state.
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Garden books by Tara Dillard, Amazon.

Friday, November 22, 2013

Garden Design: Color + Proscenium


Choose a color trinity for your garden.  Green, Brown, White is one of the best.
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House & Garden are YOUR proscenium.
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Why?
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So YOU are the star.
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What will it take to get your Home & Garden to this level of competence?  
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Merely being aware.
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It's that simple.  
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Garden & Be Well,  XO Tara
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Pic Aerin Lauder
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You don't need Lauder's bankroll.  It's all in the attitude.  Taratude, get you some !

Friday, November 15, 2013

Wendy Posard: Bathroom View


And the garden, below, is art on the wall.


Though a tooth brush & tooth paste seem an inconvenience, above, that is forgiven for the casement windows.
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Oakleaf hydrangea, white sasanqua, tea olive, gardenia, Natchez crapes, asiatic jasmine, akebia, & the requisite oaks, conifers, kousa dogwood, grancy graybeard, sourwood,  yes, I know exactly the garden for this view.
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Garden & Be Well,   XO Tara
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Pic Wendy Posard.  Imagine every window with a garden view.  That is my starting point.  Anything less is a trifling effort.

Monday, November 11, 2013

Wendy Posard: Kitchen + Garden


When the garden is a feature of the kitchen I know the architect has gone beyond their education.  And delved into the realm of intuitive.


Flooring flows inside/outside and the scale is charming vs. large.  Other comparisons: happy vs. large, nurturing vs. large.......
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Necessity vs. luxury.
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"I can live without the necessities but I must have the luxuries.", a quote I first heard age 8, repeated by Miss Katherine Scott, a grand influence.
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Garden & Be Well,       XO Tara
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Pic is a Wendy Posard project.

Saturday, October 26, 2013

Features to Copy from this Room into the Garden

In the garden you know exactly what type of arbor is required, below.  Arched, 3' deep, iron, creating an enfilade punctuated with an urn on plinth matching the one below.



Repetition, is one of your strongest design tools in the garden.  Maximized with interior repetition.
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Color & pattern, very easy to copy from this room into the garden.
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I never tire of a client saying, "I love that."  Exactly, I copied it from their interior.    Yes, it's that simple.
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Garden  & Be Well, XO Tara
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Pic via Cote de Texas.    Why an iron arbor to match?  Contrast.  Yet, if the client wanted heavy cottage style I might do the wood.