Small Urban Garden In Los Angeles Serves Up A Tall Order

 he Los Angeles Public Library building

is a landmark at 630 West 5th Avenue in central L.A.  It was built in 1926 by architect Bertram Grosvenor Goodhue    

in a Mediterranean revival style and is topped with a tile mosaic pyramid.

It certainly stands out in the modern downtown area of this west coast concrete jungle.

And the small but pleasant Maguire Gardens

just outside the building is the perfect soft antidote to all the hard concrete and tall steel.

There is a walkway through the small garden which is landscaped with borders of hedges, lots of trees including Jacaranda and tall Cypress,

a few fountains,

several benches for reading, of course,

 and there is a lovely restaurant with patio seating in the garden.

It is just enough green space to serve as a little sanctuary

for urbanites to come back down to earth in the midst of a skyscraper heaven in the city of angels.


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Copyright 2013 by Jeannine at www.gardenenvy.net. 

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Get Thee To The Getty Garden In Los Angeles

                        The central garden at the Getty Museum in Los Angeles is both garden and art. It was designed by artist Robert Irwin who started planning it in 1992.

 Three iron bowers filled with bougainvilleas are a beautiful feature here

and one of my favorites. Placed together in a triangular format they create a small shaded patio at the end of the 'zig zag garden' that is built around a small ravine.

I was here just a couple of weeks ago during the first week of June. I have been here before and the bougainvillea stands out in my mind from two previous visits. It is a perfect display for this large, thorny and showy vine.

 The brilliant hues of bougainvillea against the all-white museum building and blue skies made me think of my visit to Greece, where this vine is a standout for the same reasons.

They are stunning, especially against white backgrounds.

The maze of azaleas floating on a pond of water is another stunning feature at this garden. This is beautiful in green and must be amazing in early spring when the flowers are blooming! 

 I love seeing this maze from all angles, whether from under the angel's trumpet,

surrounded by the colorful garden,

or with the waterfall in the background.

 Engraved at the Getty museum garden is Irwin's statement, "Always changing, never twice the same." Of course, that is one of the attractions to gardens--living art, always a work in progress and, in this climate, available year round. So I plan to get back here when those azaleas are in bloom.

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Copyright 2013 by Jeannine. All Rights Reserved.

The Norton Simon Museum Sculpture Garden Carves Memorable Moments

The Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, California is a remarkable private collection and 

study in art, with paintings by the European masters: Renoir,

van Gogh, Claude Monet, Edgar Degas, and Italian artwork from the Renaissance.

It is also a study of sculpture:

 sculpture in a garden.

Suddenly, from different perspectives the combinations of plants and sculpture, and variations in light carve a new dimension that you can't experience inside a museum.

The soft twilight, the purple hue of the Jacaranda blooms and the reflections on the pond painted a romantic glow last Friday evening.

There is a small treasure trove of Rodin sculptures placed in the front of the museum that initially sets the stage

but the back garden steals this show.

It was an unplanned stroll through a lovely garden and art museum with my husband
 last Friday evening;

one of those things that just sort of worked out spontaneously when we arrived in town around the dinner hour and learned that the museum is open late on Friday nights. And, as we learned when we got there, admission is free on the first Fridays of the month.

As I said, one of those things that just worked out.

 I love when that happens.

A memorable evening of great art and a beautiful garden in Pasadena.

And there is nobody else that I would rather share these moments with.

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Copyright 2013 by Jeannine. All Rights Reserved.

This Garden Is For The Birds

It was only a matter of time

 (two days) before the finches found the special feeder filled with niger seed just for them.

I bought it at Lowe's and hung it on the edge of the patio cover, about six feet from the sofa. At first there were only two birds but now there are as many as four or five at a time on this feeder. True, it is  quite primitive without a catch basin and I do have to clean up after them; but mostly it is a pleasure to watch them and listen as they chatter and squawk at each other. 

And because they visit for the seed, now they are also hopping around on my Sally Holmes rose that climbs the post of the patio cover and I even saw them taking a bath at a wall fountain by my window near the family room.

I was only recently inspired to hang a feeder for finches after attending a workshop about gardening to attract birds and butterflies. It was sponsored by the San Diego Horticultural Society and taught by Marcia Van Loy, a master gardener, who lives in the Clairemont neighborhood.

She gardens mostly in her backyard on this terraced slope, which she and her husband have created over 25 years. And she gardens primarily with one thing in mind: to attract birds and butterflies into her backyard. 

This colorful hillside can make the heart of a gardener jump with joy just a little.

The variety of color, texture, and sounds of birds chirping and water falling are so inviting you can't resist hiking up through the paths.

It is a lovely place to explore.

She has water lilies, and a pond

with a waterfall.

She definitely has some feathery and furry visitors. In fact, her backyard is certified by the National Wildlife Federation as a wildlife habitat because it provides water, food, cover and a great neighborhood to raise the youngins. 

Though Marcia does have bird feeders hanging about, she relies heavily on the kind of shrubs, trees and flowers that she plants to attract birds and butterflies for nectar or seeds.

Hummingbirds are attracted to tubular flowers, such as the trumpet vine here,

and foxglove (above). Hummingbirds in my garden love my red bottlebrush and jasmines. 

Butterflies are attracted to this protea 

and this passion flower vine; but there are numerous other flowers that will bring the winged creatures to your garden. And, it is important, she noted, not to use pesticides in the garden that could make the plants toxic to the birds, butterflies or anything else.

 Marcia also has lots of resident housing options for her feathered friends.

This tree stump on the hillside makes a perfect bird townhouse development location, but

these are just a small sample of her rustic houses; I couldn't even count how many she has in her yard. Marcia teaches other master gardeners how to build them (using all manner of  re-purposed items headed for the trash bin) and then sell them to raise money for their organizations.

At the moment the only birdhouse I have is a useless metal one (because birds do not want to nest in a metal box, thank you!) on a post that my husband re-purposed a long time ago to use as a stake to support a vine and trellis up against our house.

So I guess I had better get chopping on some wood birdhouses!

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Copyright 2013 by Jeannine at www.gardenenvy.net. 

GardenEnvy logo by dezine9. All Rights Reserved.