Two posts about Tudor Place events

Tour Georgetown’s Garden Treasures: Tudor Place and Dumbarton Oaks
 this Saturday, May 14, 2011 at 10:30 a.m.



Two of my favorite public gardens are in Georgetown.  How lucky can you get? Better yet:  Both are on tour this Saturday morning!   At 10:30 am Gail Griffin, Director of Gardens & Grounds at Dumbarton Oaks, and Suzanne Bouchard, Director of Gardens & Grounds at Tudor Place will lead a group through both gardens. 

What I love about these two gardens is the contrast between their histories and their designs. Tudor Place, steeped in the history of the Custis Family (Martha Washington’s granddaughter, Martha Custis Peter and her husband, Thomas Peter, purchased it in 1805) and the development of the Capitol, reflects the family’s requirements for food production and beauty as it evolved over six generations.  It is unique in how long the house and gardens were owned and lived in by a single family.  Moreover, no designer was involved in it’s creation yet it stands out as an intimate and beautifully laid out garden with a tremendous plant collection, some of which is related to plants at Mount Vernon.  It’s worth a trip this week, just for its rose garden!

Dumbarton, on the other hand, is the result of a 25-30 year collaboration starting in 1921 between landscape architect Beatrix Farrand (niece of Edith Wharton, and the only female founding member of the American Society of Landscape Architects) and Ambassador and Mrs. Bliss —educated, cultured, and noted art collectors.  Their efforts resulted in the creation of a spectacular terraced garden, a stunning blend of European and American influences.

This tour is a great opportunity to learn how the gardens at Dumbarton Oaks and Tudor Place have evolved aesthetically since the nineteenth century and the challenges surrounding their preservation today.

Reserve now, as space is limited! 

Dumbarton Oaks & Tudor Place Members: $10
Nonmembers: $15

Go to http://tudorplacegardentour.eventbrite.com/ to register.

Herbs Workshop at Tudor Place, Saturday, May 21, 2011

If you love history, eating, cooking, and plants, you will be pleased to know there are still a couple of openings for the first of three “Garden to Table” workshops inspired by the historic gardens at Tudor Place. This first workshop, which will run from 10:30 until 2:30, will focus on container herb gardening with a Mediterranean theme, reflecting the travels of the last owners of Tudor Place. It will be taught by Suzanne Bouchard, Tudor Place Director of Gardens and Grounds, and lifelong "foodie" and owner of Just Simply...Cuisine, Chris Coppola Leibner.  Just Simply...Cuisine is a teaching kitchen in Woodley Park that depends on local grocers, farm markets, butchers, fishmongers, bakeries and dairies to inspire students.  Workshop participants will start the day at Tudor Place where they will learn hands on the basic steps of herb gardening, primarily in containers, and each participant will create their own herb filled container to take home.  Lunch will be provided at Just Simply….Cuisine after the cooking class.  Students will dine on their own culinary creations based on the herbs discussed and planted in the morning session.

Tudor Place is now a relatively formal garden but at one time had vegetable gardens and its owners grew herbs in the flower knot, which is now the renowned rose garden. 

The next two workshops are “Edible Flowering Plants for the Garden” on June 18, and “Fruit Production for Small Spaces” on July 16. At both workshops, Suzanne Bouchard will discuss how the Peter family incorporated each theme (herbs, edible flowers, & fruit trees) into their gardens and examples you can see today.

The workshops are $90 per session or $260 for all three sessions for members, and $95 per session or $275 for all three sessions for non-members. You can register for these workshops (the deadline for the one this Saturday is Friday) online at: http://gardentotable.eventbrite.com/

I wish I had a pick up truck…

As a garden designer, I feel I should comment on the layouts of the various wonderful gardens on last week’s Georgetown Garden Tour, and indeed, I have much to say.  My inner plant nerd, however, has taken my design-training hostage, and instead I am compelled to write about some of the truly beautiful plant combinations on display.  These are plantings you can and should try in your own garden!

Coral Bells and Strawberry "Lipstick"

The sheer imagination of the planting designs on this year’s tour shone.  Take the combination of Coral Bells (Heuchera), a North American native, and ornamental strawberries (Fragaria – probably the cultivar “Lipstick”).  This color combination was show stopping, with sprays of miniature light pink blossoms floating delicately above dark pink strawberry flowers.  The soft green leaves of the coral bells hovered slightly above the small, dark green leaves of the strawberry plants, ensuring a pleasing contrast when both plants have stopped blooming – one that will persist in winter since both plants, which prefer sun and partial shade, are also evergreen. 

My Favorite Heuchera

The ornamental strawberries, which are not grown for their fruit, also looked amazing with a purple leafed heuchera.  Heucheras have been intensely hybridized over the past several decades and now come with a broad and shocking variety of colored leaves and names that make my mouth water: “Marmalade”, “Plum Pudding”, “Mocha”, “Tiramisu”, “Berrie Smoothie”.   Their leaves range in color from orange to deep purple, silver to mottled everything, and I will confess I find many disconcerting and unappealing beyond their culinary names.  I am a devotee, however, of the deep purple leafed varieties, which look fantastic in the garden.  Here they were planted to great effect with white roses and the strawberry blossoms but I’ve also seen them with Japanese painted ferns, which have silver leaves accented with purple.  This is combination is definitely on the “must plant” list.

An Architectural Success

Allium (Ornamental Onion) is always beautiful and I was pleased to see it planted with another of my favorites, variegated Solomon’s Seal.  I loved the color arrangement of the purple and white blossoms and the white and green stripy leaves, but I’m not sure that I wasn’t more enchanted by the combination of this erect stem topped by its spherical umbels, the arching stems of the Solomon’s Seal, and the broad, soft leaves of two different hostas. The backdrop of a Cherry Laurel’s glossy pointed leaves lent not only a dark green foil for the brighter colors but ensured winter structure.  The entire planting was an architectural success.

Shimmering Lamium and Lime Green Hosta

Hostas are deer lettuce – or perhaps, mesclun – and therefore, I regularly found them munched to stubs in my old Connecticut garden. I was consequently delighted to see lovely hostas planted throughout the tour, and was especially taken by a large, lime green form that was tucked in a bed of lavender-flowered lamium.  Lamium is a wonderful ephemeral ground cover that also comes in a white-flowered variety, and both create a soft variegated carpet in summer.  Here, the small soft rosy purple blossoms were a perfect contrast to the relatively huge lime green hosta leaves, and both were set off by the lamium’s small silver and green leaves which caught the dappled sunlight and made this bed shimmer.

Every garden needs toad lily and hellebores!

There was also a wonderfully healthy planting of stinking hellebores.  The chartreuse flowers of the hellebores emerged in winter and the brightly colored sepals remain, contrasting beautifully with their narrow, bluish green foliage.  They were planted next to toad lilies (tricyrtis), another of my all time favorites.  The contrast of the hellebore and tricyrtis foliage will be beautiful all summer as the toad lily has soft green strappy leaves evenly spaced along its long, arching stems, but the real treat will come at the end of summer when the tricyrtis reveals its little mottled orchid-like flowers.  Every stem bears a series of flowers, individually tucked into the joining of the leaf to the stem.  They are gorgeous moist shade lovers that should be considered mandatory additions to every shade garden.

The Startling Hakone Grass

Another real eye catcher for partial shade is Hakone grass (Hakonochloa macra), especially the cultivar “Areola”, which was the Perennial Plant Associations 2009 Perennial Plant of the Year (so there).  It’s yellow and green striped leaves are always startling, sometimes too much so, and I always feel it must be used cautiously.  In this garden, it was perfectly balanced by a diversity of hosta, ferns, sweet woodruff, and black Mondo grass that blended well together to create a coherent planting -- very elegant and imaginative.  Hakone grass likes moist, rich soil and unlike many grasses, does better with some shade, especially in hot climates.  It’s also well behaved as it is a slower grower and doesn’t self-sow.

The Miniature Petticoat Daffodile

Finally, I will single out one little bulb that has charmed me for weeks.  It is visible from the street and I have walked by it several times so it was exciting to see it up close.  It is the petticoat daffodil (Narcissus bulbicodium – and you should know that bulbicodium is Latin for “wooly bulb”).   Most of us think of daffs as relatively large, but there are a whole series of them that are small, perfect for small gardens.  The petticoat daff, which grows to a whopping 8 inches, is the only one I can think of that is at once small and very very loud with a bright deep yellow that you wouldn’t miss with a blindfold on.  They are great in masses or as accents in small gardens, and are supposedly not difficult to grow in pots for springtime forcing. 

I am so inspired by the gardens on the tour that I am now ready to purchase everything on this list and more.  It is times likes these that I lament my decision to drive a Mini Cooper.

Garden Tour and Celebrating Georgetown's Trees....

Roses and bluebells and deutzias, oh my!

According to weather.com, this Saturday is supposed to be a lovely 71-degree day – the perfect temperature for touring the nine spectacular gardens on the 83^rd annual Georgetown Garden Tour, sponsored by the Georgetown Garden Club.  Pick up your tickets at Garden Tour headquarters at Christ Church, (31st and O Streets, NW), and start walking.  The whole fabulous experience runs from 10AM until 4PM plus you can do a little shopping for beautiful topiaries, fine porcelain vases, and unusual gardening tools at the Garden Boutique (don’t forget Mother’s Day is Sunday)! When you are all tuckered out and want to sit and reflect on the day’s adventures, head over to Keith Hall at Christ Church between 2 PM and 4 PM for tea.  It’s billed as a “not-to-be-missed tea”, and since the cookies, tea sandwiches, and sweets are all homemade by members of the Georgetown Garden Club, I believe them. 

Get your sunscreen and walking shoes out, people!  Come be inspired by the secret gardens of Georgetown!

Tickets are $35 and the tea is included.  The experience is priceless! 

For more information go to http://www.georgetowngardentour.com/index.html

Celebrate Georgetown’s Trees

By now you must have noticed all the new trees that have been planted this spring in the empty tree boxes along our sidewalks.  This fantastic effort has been undertaken by “Trees for Georgetown”, a volunteer committee of the Citizen’s Association of Georgetown, which identifies vacant tree boxes and works to fill them with trees that will ensure our neighborhoods will have green, leafy canopies shading our streets for years to come.  They also do yeoman duty in summer by trying to make sure trees are adequately watered.

If you are like me and value this effort, you should know that “Trees for Georgetown” is having its’ spring fundraiser on Wednesday, May 11 from 6-8 pm at Jill and Rock Tonkel’s historic home.  Herman Hollerith built it at the turn of the 20th century for his three maiden daughters, Lucia, Nan, and Virginia who, with their mother, co- founded the Georgetown Garden Club. For all you history buffs, Mr. Hollerith invented the punch card tabulating machine that was used in the 1890 national census, saving our country $5 million (back when a million bucks was a million bucks).

“There are over 3000 tree boxes in Georgetown”, says Betsy Emes, head of Trees for Georgetown.  “The price of everything has gone up from the fences to the trees.  Two years ago we had big damage due to snow and many trees have had to be removed, so there are more vacant spaces.  We are doing our best to plant as many trees as we have can, so we are raising money to plant more.” 

Each tree, including installation, tree fence, and mulch costs $900.   Be a Patron for $1000, a Sponsor for $500, a Friend for $150, and a Junior, if you are under 35, for $75. There will be a drawing for a free custom protective tree box fence at the party!  Pay at the door or send your donation for the fundraiser to Bob Laycock, Trees for Georgetown, 3258 O Street, N.W., Washington 20007.  General donations can be sent to CAG, 1365 Wisconsin Avenue, N.W., Suite 200, Washington DC, 20007.  For further information, email Betsy Emes at Betsyemes@aol.com.

Not Just a Voyeur…

Not Just a Voyeur…

I have already purchased my ticket for the Georgetown Garden Tour.  It’s not until May 9^th, but I can’t wait, so I’ve bought my ticket to ensure that soon I will be walking through Georgetown with a pass that will give me entree to some of its loveliest and most exclusive gardens.  It’s like holding the golden entrance ticket to Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory. 

I last went on the Georgetown Garden Tour in the early 1990’s. I moved to Connecticut the following fall, and consequently haven’t been on the Georgetown tour since.  Though I’ve been on many tony tours elsewhere, it remains my favorite. It’s not just that I am a voyeur (actually, I like to think of myself as “one in search of inspiration”).  There is something uniquely singular about having permission to breach garden gates and doorways where access is normally denied, and entering what are essentially separate universes divided from the real world by a mere garden wall or fence. 

Setting up this garden tour is a gargantuan task undertaken by the Georgetown Garden Club that begins with the enlistment of diverse gardens.  This year, as Georgetown Garden Club member Jane Matz assured me, “The contrast in the gardens is small and large, very modern and very traditional, lawns and pools, guest houses and tree houses.  We're thrilled to get every garden, as most visits to Georgetown never let you see the charm and expanse behind the houses”. 

 

Yet it’s not just finding gardens and gaining permission to display them.  Volunteers must be assembled, homeowners reassured, sponsors found, vendors arranged, publicity organized, and other logistics anticipated and thought-through.  Surely prayers are said as well, not only for a beautiful “day of”, but also for a “Goldilocks spring” – neither too hot nor too cold, neither too wet nor too dry.  One of the garden owners told me last week that,  “preparing has been easy but a bit frustrating in that the cold winter delayed the production of the flowers”.  Hardly had he uttered his words when, of course, the weather turned unseasonably warm!

This year’s tour features nine superb gardens. Several are formal, but one belongs to an old farmhouse – one of those delightful surprises one discovers in Georgetown.  Several of the gardens are professionally designed including one that is congenial to wheelchairs (you might never notice), a formal garden that is unexpectedly large with gravel paths and a swimming pool, and still another that is, according to designer and long-time tour organizer, Edie Shafer, “snappy and stylish”.

Evermay will be on the tour, but will not be the only garden of historic significance.  After all, this is Georgetown!  One garden boasts a water pump that was used to supply water when the White House was under construction and another was once owned by Abraham Lincoln’s only surviving son.  Its’ boxwoods are said to have been planted by Robert Todd Lincoln himself over 100 years ago, just blocks from where his brother, Willy, was once buried.  Its’ owner confided to me that  “what stuns me about the yard is the feeling of quiet and country and we are literally one block from M St. I feel like I am in Middleburg when I sit back there. Also the history is very stirring, with the only remaining cornerstone of 1751 Georgetown.”

As a plant lover, I am dying to know what will be blooming a week from Saturday – tulips, bluebells, roses, wisteria, dogwoods, azaleas, peonies, alium, the catkins of Corylis avellana “Contorta” (but you expected a bit of Latin)?  I find myself trying to anticipate what will be out, what will be gone by, and what not quite there yet.  Since each walled garden is it’s own microclimate determined by site orientation, shade or sun, and other conditions, it will be fascinating to see the variation in plant development from one garden to the next.   I have also heard there are edible plants in some of the gardens.  I’m dying to see how they are arranged.  Then there are the pots, containers, and urns:  Will more exotic summer annuals have replaced pansies?  It’s all too exciting!

And being of an acquisitive as well as an inquisitive nature, I don’t mind confessing that I’m secretly looking forward to having tea at Christ Church’s Keith Hall (between 2-4 pm) and browsing various items at the Garden Boutique.  I am told there will be herbs, small topiary standards from Cultivated Gardens, vases from Middle Kingdom, and various items on consignment from Georgetown merchants for sale.

Fortunately, one can enjoy the entire day, the tea, and all without guilt since the proceeds of this wonderful tour will benefit the preservation of historic parks and public spaces. Tickets are $30 before May 2 and $35 thereafter.  I will see you there!

Read more and get tickets at ww.georgetowngardentour.com/index.html

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