Pottering Around

Flower cuttings - Home and Garden Style.

Rose by Nick Knight

A client has asked us to design and install a cutting garden in their backyard. This is very exciting and something we’ve been interested in incorporating into a landscape design. Even though our gardens always include plenty of perennials and annuals which can provide beautiful flowers for arrangements, having a dedicated area just for creatively useful flowers and vegetables is a lovely feature.

It's also a great opportunity to explore the craft of flower arranging!

Flower Decorator Constance Spry

As with most forms of arts and crafts, the degree of skill and mastery of floral arrangement varies from the casual hobbyist to the legendary artists. This, together with the natural beauty of even a single bloom, makes the genre interesting. You don’t have to be a professional to stroll into your yard and snip some ephemeral decor for your home.

The not so little project on the prairie.

Wolf Road Prairie Nature Preserve

Continuing our virtual and literal trek through the western suburbs of Chicago, Jamie had the chance to dig right in (or at least haul right out) by volunteering some maintenance work at Wolf Road Prairie Nature Preserve. About 20 nature enthusiasts showed up to help stop the advancing wooded area by cutting back rogue trees and brush from the edge of this important piece of the Illinois landscape.

We plan to visit and document this beautiful public place throughout the coming season. Today we have some early springtime pictures and a brief history of an area that may have disappeared long ago if not for the Great Depression and some determined individuals.

Pottering Around with Earth and Mother Nature.

It has taken us a little longer to prepare this post because we've been exploring the Western Suburbs of Chicago from outer space and the beginning of time. It's heavy stuff, and that was just learning to use the Google Earth! We are happy to say though, we've really got our geek groove on and have set up what we feel will make a nice ongoing piece. This doesn't mean we've given up modern times and people. In fact, we are working on posts about some fabulous local folks for the near future. But for now, let's go back 11,500 years to when the Chicagoland prairies first formed.

Click our Google Earth image above to see it larger

Northern Illinois is known for its harsh environment and this has been going on for a very long time. The entire region was covered by at least 4 glaciers with the Wisconsinan being the last to occur between fifty and fifteen thousand years ago. As it melted back it formed what is known as Lake Chicago which extended from the current lake front to about 2 miles west of where the Des Plaines river now runs. Everything from the City to much of suburban Cook County was once under water, including the villages of River Forest, Oak Park and Riverside. According to our map, LaGrange probably was prime lake front property!

Illinois native grass big bluestem (Andropogon gerardii) in foreground.

Glaciers provided a way for the original native American settlers to reach this land, gave us our familiar flat landscape, great lakes and much more local natural history. We've taken a look and compiled pictures of the Illinois native plants past and present.

Download Pottering Around the Western Suburbs of Chicago.kmz (98.2K)

Use the link above to visit our new local exploration on Google Earth. We will continue to add more information and images to the place.

Garden design becomes a contact sport at Chicago Flower Show.

Sporting feature show garden

The 2011 Chicago Flower & Garden Show is now on. As designers, we always look forward to the event because not only is it a chance to see lovely landscaping displays and ideas, it’s also a sure harbinger of spring. There is one thing however that always disappoints us about the indoor flower show, which is how difficult it is to photograph the designs in a way that really does them justice! We like to think we are okay photographers but haven’t quite figured out the art of shooting the show. So this probably means the only way to take in the design work and features in their full glory is to go see them all in person!

This year’s theme is The Sport of Gardening and we have a quick peek at some of what you'll find that make this event a great day out.

The King's Speech and a stroll in The Regent's Park gardens.

This week we are doing something different. Our search for local creativity will continue and we've found some interesting art and design that we are looking forward to sharing soon. However, being new to this online endeavor, we are still pulling bits and pieces together and want everything to be just right. So here is what we will call a Garden Diversion.

Colin Firth and Geoffrey Rush in The King's Speech.

Marina and I made it to the cinema just in time to see The King's Speech before last night's Academy Awards Show. Like many people, we thought it was a beautiful movie and deserved the Oscar. Impeccably acted, crafted and produced and despite us all needing a break from the weather right now, it also perfectly captured the cold and damp of winter in England. So to jolly things up and bring a little color to the ongoing gray outdoors, we've dug up this photo showing a garden location from the film in a much warmer light!

The Avenue is a formal garden area located in the Southeast corner of London's Regent's Park. Tree lined paths were part of the original landscaping design and plans by John Nash in 1812 but were not built at the time because the Royal Prince lost interest when he turned his attention to some remodeling improvements he wanted to do around Buckingham Palace!

About 1850, the Royal Botanic Society stepped in and commissioned garden designer William Nesfield to rework the park plans. By 1864 new planting schemes, fountains and ornaments were installed and it became The Avenue,  a Victorian-style garden in full glory.

We've posted a few more landscape photos we found to help brighten your day along with some links to information about Regent's Park history and the making of The King's Speech.

Click on any of the garden photos above to see more of each photographer's work on flickr. There's a lot of history inside Regent's Park, but we found a few gaps in the available information. For example, very little seems to be written online about the park during and just after World War 2. Maybe this is another future diversion for us to go on!

Here are the two best websites we found on the history of the gardens. One is The Royal Parks site and the other is The London Parks and Garden Trust.

This is a great article in The Daily Mail if you are interested in all the locations and the making of The King's Speech.

The Tropics, Oak Park, Illinois

The Oak Park Conservatory

This week we made the fifteen minute journey to the warmer climates of The Oak Park Conservatory. Even though we live near by and do a lot of work in the area, this was our first visit. Usually we are either too rushed to take in local sites after meetings with Oak Park/River Forest homeowners to present designs and plans or just too exhausted to walk another inch after overseeing (and pitching in) on landscape construction projects in the area.

We are delighted to have finally discovered this glass gem along the Eisenhower and will be stopping back often.

Plenty of snapshots and stories from the trip follow ~

Local artists. Local art and people.

This is a quick follow up to our last post about Riverside, IL. While visiting Grumpy's (itself a local landmark) we sadly missed the coffee shop's former location in the Arcade Building which is currently undergoing renovation, but were pleased to find some attractive and appropriately themed paintings on the walls.

Both Susan Hong-Sammons (above) and Walter Monastyretsky (below) have immortalized the ice cream monger in oils.

More about the artists and see Monastyretsky's painting of the Riverside Water Tower after the jump.