A City Garden Tour

I love a good garden tour.  Don’t you?  It’s especially nice when it’s in the city.  Friends of ours have an adorable home that they have put a lot of love into, and some of that love ended up in their picturesque backyard garden.  Designer Jon Carloftis (you can see more of his designs here, here, here) had a hand in it, and he tweaks it every now and then.  When Jordan visited a few weeks ago, we stopped in for a tour and took along a camera.  Not only is the garden lovely, but it has an amazing little guest house that makes me want to get asked to a sleep-over.

 

Here’s the thing about Bill and Beverly’s garden that should interest all of you.  It isn’t huge, and the plants aren’t exotic.  However, the basic design is good.  As we stepped out of the kitchen onto the back patio, this was our view.  The guest house once was a  shed with a driveway leading up to it.  The shed and the driveway are long gone.

 

 

The patio is brick and is surrounded by boxwoods.  A nicely built pergola provides just the right amount of shade.

 

This terrarium is spending the summer outdoors in the dining area.

 

The annuals and perennials can all be easily found at any garden center, but they were lush and inviting.  There was no way anyone could resist taking a stroll through the welcoming paths.

 

The cosmos and hostas looked as if they have been sipping on some steroids.  I’ve never seen any look as fab as they were.

 

 

There are plans in the works to turn the grassy area in front of the guest house into a vegetable garden next summer.

 

 

Oh, and by the way, the vine growing on this pergola is a clematis that is about three years old.  It blooms in the fall.

 

 

Now, let’s take a peek inside the guest cottage.  It is just the right size.  There’s this lounge area that has a loft over it.  That ladder you see in the corner becomes the make-shift steps to the loft which could easily be another sleeping area.

 

 

The couple has beautiful antiques handed down from their ancestors, and they used a few in the guest house. Beverly loves to mix rustic with refined and promised me that I can take photos of their home’s interior soon.  Let’s just put it this way:  She has a Steinway baby grand piano in the same room with a wooden chicken coop that has a silver tray on it.  I love that approach to decorating!!!

 

 

Sometimes they use the cottage to catch up on their work.  Isn’t this a great way to store away their books and papers?

 

 

There’s this bright bedroom.  The walls are neutral, and the yellow bedspreads give it all the color it needs.

 

 

Wouldn’t you love to wake up to this view?  I love how the flowers and the beds are all yellow.  There’s a bath adjoining this room.

 

 

We can learn many lessons from this space:  Any city lot can become an oasis, a garden doesn’t have to be huge to be magnificent, ordinary plants and shrubs can be spectacular when they are part of a good garden design, and you don’t need a huge area to have a guest cottage.

 

And one more thing:  Have fun with it!

 

 We had a great week-end.  Jordan and Mr. Spring spent the week-end camping and kayaking.  They realize that when their little one arrives (here), they might have to upgrade to a canoe.  I visited my parents and enjoyed their summer flowers (here).  The newlyweds (here and here) stopped in for an overnight, and it was great to see their tanned faces after their tropical honeymoon.

 

Thank you all for stopping by The 2 Seasons today.  We really appreciate your spending some of your precious time with us.  If you would like to see our blog in your email six mornings a week, you can subscribe here.

 

Take care.