Happy Summer Solstice...
We refine our gardening eyes by looking at and considering art, architecture and all things beautiful. I'm enjoying a gorgeous new book from Rizzoli called "The Way We Live With the Things We Love", which considers what is clutter and what are collectibles...what is meaningful and what is....well, just junk. Gardeners are notorious plant collectors, and we need to remind ourselves that gardens are more than just a hodge-podge of interesting plants. The best and most satisfying gardens use plants to create effects...these gardens become, through artful editing and placement, more than the sum of their plants....
Here's a quote from the book that applies to gardens every bit as much as interiors: "The collecting bug is responsible for an awful lot of clutter. Our attachment to the things we love can become so intensely personal that it becomes difficult to cull or organize them properly..." How often do we get distracted by plant after plant and forget that gardens are habitable spaces that just happen to be outside rather than in?
"The Way We Live With the Things We Love" by Stafford Cliff, photographed by Gilles de Chabaneix, is a beautiful lesson on discretion and discipline in all things visual....
