Category: vintage landscape

In a vase on Monday: snowdrops

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for the first day of spring. . .

“Bouquet of lilies of the plain of Kosovo (snowdrops) . . . on a farm table — Lipljan, Kosovo, (in May, actually) 1913, by Auguste Léon, via Archives of the Planet Collection – Albert Kahn Museum /Département des Hauts-de-Seine.

This autochrome is one of about 72,000 that were commissioned and then archived by Albert Kahn, a wealthy French banker who was committed to the ideal of universal peace and believed that “knowledge of foreign cultures encourages respect and peaceful relations between nations.”* He was also acutely aware that the 20th century was going to bring rapid material change to the world.

Accordingly, from 1909 to 1931, Kahn sent thirteen photographers and filmmakers to 50 countries “to fix, once and for all, aspects, practices, and modes of human activity whose fatal disappearance is no longer ‘a matter of time.'”†  The resulting collection is called Archives de la Planète and now resides in its own museum at Kahn’s old suburban estate at Boulogne-Billancourt, just west of Paris. Since June 2016, the archive has also been available for viewing online here.

I wasn’t able to make my own flower arrangement this week for “In a vase on Monday,”‘ but to see what other garden bloggers have created today, please visit host Cathy at Rambling in the Garden.

*Collections Albert Kahn website. Also, the above photo (A 1902) is © Collection Archives de la Planète – Musée Albert-Kahn and used under its terms, here.
†words of Albert Kahn, 1912.

The Sunday porch: Minden, Louisiana

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The home of George and Rosa Lee Woodbridge, Minden, Louisiana, ca. 1907, via Tyrrell Historical Library (Beaumont, Texas) Commons on flickr.

A definite “best in vines” contender. I also like the trio of potted plants in the upper window and the decorative woodwork at the tops of the columns. (You may want to click on the photo for a better look.)

Detail of above.

George Woodbridge was a Presbyterian minister, and Rosa Lee was a former teacher. She died in the house in 1907, age 41.

Johnny and Edgar Winter, blues and rock musicians, are the direct descendants of Rosa Lee’s sister, Sarah.

York Street, Dublin

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“A couple watching the world go by from their flat on York Street, Dublin,” 1954, via National Library of Ireland (cropped slightly by me.)

The photo was taken by Elinor O’ Brien Wiltshire or her husband Reginald Wiltshire, owners of The Green Studios Ltd., Dublin.

Spring in Berlin

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“Blackbird’s nest in the folded hands of a statue on a graveyard in Berlin, Germany,” 1932, Het Leven photographer, via Nationaal Archief (Netherlands) Commons on flickr.

The urn

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“Castle, possibly in Italy,” ca. 1900, by Queen Victoria of Sweden, via Tekniska Museet (Sweden) Commons on flickr under CC license.

Click on the image to enlarge it.  There are three more enormous urns on the right and some very tall agave blooms/stalks to the left of the little gate just in front of the castle.

Victoria (or Viktoria) of Baden — Queen of Sweden after 1907 — was the daughter of the Grand Duke of Baden (south-west Germany). She married Crown Prince Gustaf in 1881, and they had three children, but it was not a happy marriage. From 1882, she spent almost every winter in Egypt and Italy, mostly in Capri. She was a good amateur photographer, as well as a painter and sculptor.