European gardens – Page 26

GB Bloom Day: snow day

March 15, 2016August 20, 2017 Cindy at enclos*ure7 Comments

Because I haven’t really been gardening here in Stuttgart, I decided that for this year’s Bloom Days, I would make a record of the flowers of the display garden of the 18th century Spielhaus at the Exotic Garden of the University of Hohenheim, which is close to our neighborhood.

Unfortunately, when I visited this afternoon it was snowing hard, and I didn’t take as many pictures as I would have liked. I may have to try again later this week.

Please click on any thumbnail in the gallery below to scroll through larger images. And to see what’s blooming today for other garden bloggers, visit Carol at May Dreams Gardens.

First seeing the Spielhaus through Japanese cornelian cherry trees in bloom.

Cornus officinalis.

Hohenheim Botanical Garden, March 2016, Stuttgart, by enclos*ure

The Spielhaus or playhouse,

which is part of the “English Garden” (now called the Exotic Garden) constructed by Duke Carl Eugen and his mistress (and later wife) Franziska von Hohenheim in the late 1700s. It’s now incorporated into modern Hohenheim University.

Abeliophyllum distichum. . .

. . . or white forsythia.

At this point, I was really hoping that my camera was water resistant.

Flowering Arabis ferdinandi-coburgi ‘Variegata’ or Alpine wall cress.

I believe the patch of blue on the right is a planting of Scillas.

Of course, there were snowdrops.

Abeliophyllum distichum ‘Roseum’ with hellebores in the background.

Aubrita-Hybride ‘Lavander’.

29 March 2016 Bloom Day, Stuttgart, enclos*ure

Pansies on the terrace.

Wisteria on the arbors.

Lonicera x purpusii ‘Winter Beauty’. . .

. . . or sweet-smelling winter honeysuckle.

A huge Platanus x hispanics or London plane tree.

You must stand still; and then. . . you will hear the infinite march of buds faintly roaring.

— Karel Capek [on the coming of spring], from The Gardener’s Year

In a vase on Monday: grape hyacinths

March 7, 2016August 20, 2017 Cindy at enclos*ure15 Comments

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On Saturday, I wandered around the downtown Stuttgart flower market admiring all the blooming spring bulbs — which were being sold both potted and as cut flowers (pictures below). I bought some cut tulips and then went to Butler’s for a vase and another container of seashell chips. On the way home, I stopped at a florist and bought a little pot of forced Muscari, or grape hyacinth, bulbs.

I think I should have set the bulbs lower in the vase, but I didn’t want to disturb their rootball, which I covered with the chips.

Click on any thumbnail in the gallery below to scroll through photos of the flower market.

To see what other gardeners have put in a vase today, visit Cathy at Rambling in the Garden.

The flower market at Schillerplatz.

Tulips — 6.50 euros for 10.

Potted forced dark blue irises.

Potted primroses in almost every color are a feature of the markets and florists right now.

Potted forced Fritillaria meleagris.

Cut tulips and Narcissus.

The Saturday markets, Stuttgart, March 5, 2016, enclos*ure

Cut Narcissus.

A potted lime green Chrysanthemum.

This stall had the prettiest colored cut Hyacinths, Muscaris, and tulips.

Cut Muscaris.

Cut Dutch hyacinths.

Potted forced tulips and Fritallarias. This was in the farmers’ market in the square in front of the Rathaus, or Town Hall.

I caught this woman in mid-step. I love the colors of her outfit.

Potted forced Narcissus and Dutch hyacinths.

The “ingredients” of my Muscari arrangement.

On the coffee table in our living room.

Muscari bulbs, Stuttgart, March 5, 2016, enclos*ure

The baskets are from Rwanda.

My tulips, Stuttgart, March 5, 2016, enclos*ure

In a vase on Monday: Fritillarias

February 29, 2016August 20, 2017 Cindy at enclos*ure11 Comments

Potted Fritillaria meleagris in our living room this week.

The plants are 13″ to 15″ tall.

I love the checkered pattern on the blooms.

Right now, almost all the supermarkets and florists here are selling small plastic pots of three or four blooming or almost-blooming spring bulbs (about €3.30 each — cheaper than a lot of cut flowers).

I replanted these into two purple ceramic pots that I had from a previous plant purchase. Then, to catch the excess water, I also put them down in blue pottery teacups from Rwanda’s Gatagara Cooperative.

I covered the soil with seashell chips.

The yellow-blue sake pitcher and cups in the photos above were made by American ceramics artist Hayne Bayless. They were purchased years ago at the Smithsonian Craft Show — which will be held this year from April 21 to 24 at the National Building Museum* in Washington, D.C. If you plan to be in the D.C. area that week, you can buy advance (discounted) tickets here.

To see what other gardeners have put in a vase today, visit Cathy at Rambling in the Garden.

*The Oehme/van Sweden exhibit will still be there.

The Sunday porch: Frankfurt

January 31, 2016August 20, 2017 Cindy at enclos*ure4 Comments

“Big Trees” (Pohon Besar) by Joko Avianto of Indonesia, on the facade of the Frankfurter Kunstverein (Frankfurt Art Club), Frankfurt, Germany.

The sculpture was created in 2015 for the exhibition Roots: Indonesian Contemporary Art at the Kunstverein.

[“Big Trees”] consists of 1525 woven stalks of bamboo imported from plantations in West Java. Bamboo is historically associated with traditional craft. . . . [Avianto] borrows and reinterprets traditional Sundanese (West Java) weaving techniques to construct his exaggerated sculptural forms. His innovative process of breaking the long compact fibres of the columns between each node of the bamboo stalk makes it pliable while maintaining its strength. This allows for the bamboo to be manipulated, bent and woven into soft curvilinear lines. An underlying concern for Avianto is the changing socio-economic and cultural values associated with bamboo cultivation. This includes the decline of village owned and cultivated bamboo forests in West Java due to a new wave of global industrialisation, and the aggressive monoculture of the palm oil industry.

— from the sculpture’s label at the Kunstverein

You can watch a 4 1/2 minute video of its construction here.

detail3, Frankfurter Kunstverein, Frankfurt, 2016, enclos*uree

And from a hill,
The earth is masses
Of cane, bamboo,
And other grasses.

— Donald Hall, from “Bamboo“

The palace garden, Venice

January 30, 2016July 19, 2017 Cindy at enclos*ure2 Comments

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A variation on the same theme. . . in Venice, at Christmas, our hotel also had an unusually large garden.

The Boscolo Venezia was built in the 16th century as a family palace. It is located in the Sestiere Cannaregio, between the Fondamenta de la Madonna dell’Orto and the lagoon, facing the island of Murano.

It claims to be the only hotel in Venice with a garden over 2,000 square meters.

Long and fairly narrow with winding paths of light grey pea gravel, the garden is heavily planted in trees and large, dark-leaved shrubs (and variegated Aucuba japonica). Berms down the sides and crossing the middle increase the sense of privacy, restrict a sense of the whole, and make the garden seem larger.

Click on any thumbnail in the gallery below to scroll through larger images.