Zanthan Gardens
Garden Visits: Open Days 2010: Part 1

October 20th, 2010
Open Days 2010: Part 1

On October 16, 2010, we visited the six gardens on The Garden Conservancy’s Open Days Program in Austin, Texas.

The two gardens on the 2010 tour which, based on their descriptions, one could assume were the most alike ended up being the most different, visually and emotionally. Both are built on steep hillsides west of Austin. Both are gardens of means, obviously expensive to build and maintain. Both are filled with unique collections of garden ornaments. Both contain extensive hardscaping and terraces. Both have swimmng pools. Both have outdoor living spaces where one can imagine serving cocktails to elegantly dressed guests. Yet, to me, the David-Peese garden feels personal and intimate. The Jones garden feels impersonal and public. Why is that? I studied my photos to see if I could figure out the differences.

The David-Peese Garden

This was my third visit to the David-Peese garden. AJM and I arrived a little early and were ushered in and given the opportunity to speak to James David a few moments before the tour opened. He said that, like many Austinites, they had lost trees to the drought and that he was replanting with more water-wise plants.

Although the largest garden on the tour, the David-Peese garden is intimate; it draws your gaze inward and pulls you into it. The garden is filled with hidden delights.

Even the most formal plantings have a wonderful sense of rhythm and motion to them. These curvy box hedges look like whimsical doodles. I love the tension between the straight formal line and the curves. It reminds me of dancers lining up for the Virginia reel.

All this stone and gray concrete could have felt heavy and lifeless. The narrow limestone steps flow down the hillside like a mountain rivulet.

For the most part, the David-Peese garden completely ignores conventional garden wisdom about building wide paths where people can walk two abreast. I think a great deal of the intimacy comes that the paths are narrow and winding. A fresh discovery is waiting around every bend in the path.

The hardscaping forms an impressive foundation. The forms and the weight are so beautifully proportioned that they support but never distract from the planting.

Most gardeners self-identify either as plant collectors or spatial designers. The David-Peese garden is one of those rare gardens which excels in both. The spaces from every angle are so balanced and harmonic and alive. However, the plants are never treated as just living filler, the “green element”, of the design. The garden shelters so many cool, wonderful, unique plants that it would take days to see and learn about each one of them. I’m glad one of my favorite trees survived the drought.

The Jones Garden

The Jones Garden is situated on a hill which overlooks Austin and the Colorado River. With the a view like that, it’s little wonder that the garden is used to frame the view, to draw the eye out and beyond.

What a place to party! However, as a rather introverted, inward-looking person, I’m much more attracted to the promise of secret gardens.

I love the idea of something hidden around just out of sight.

AJM was drawn to this soapstone urn and the way it caught the morning light. My eye travelled immediately to the planting and I was disappointed. It would have been better with no flowers at all than half-wilted mums from a big box store. (They looked worse in real life than in this photo.)

We continued down the bend in the path, past the greenhouse and into the swimming pool area. I felt that the promise of my secret path had fizzled. We exited around the back of the house, and then….

…a walled garden. I gasped with delight at that curve of green. Unfortunately the sun was just coming over the house and the contrast between light and shadows meant I couldn’t get a good photograph. This little garden was circles and curves punctuated with a beautiful round pond in the center. The room that overlooks the garden must see nothing but cool, green relief in Austin’s horrible summers. Oh! How I dream of a 20 foot wall of green!

However, I just can’t connect to this garden emotionally. The spaces are attractive but they seem impersonal. They remind me of an expensive spa resort.

by M Sinclair Stevens