It rained heavily all Monday night and continued lightly through the morning. Then the temperatures plummeted to 24 degrees. When I went out to my car at 11 am it was covered with ice, and all the locks and doors were frozen tight. I wasn't going anywhere. At 3 pm the sun began to shine brilliantly. It turned the trees and shrubs into crystal sculptures. Happily, even though the temperatures were still in the low 20s, the ice…
Probably the first thing I knew about Beatrix Farrand is that she was the niece of Edith Wharton, and designed the approach to Wharton's home, The Mount, in the Berkshires. Although she did not have anything to do with the rest of the gardens, I cannot believe that Aunt and Niece did not sit together and talk about what might be done during the years she lived there, 1902-1911. When you have talent in the family, surely it would be…
The name Constance Spry doesn't mean much to most Americans. Gardeners may know the Constance Spry rose, one of the first of David Austin's English roses, but not know the woman behind the rose. Constance Spry was born in 1886. She had varied careers in health, joined the civil service during World War I and was headmistress of a school teaching young teen aged girls who worked in factories. It was not until the 1920s that she began…
Ellen Ann Willmott is no longer as famous as Gertrude Jekyll, yet . . . "Ellen Willmott soon made a name for herself in horticulture, and helped to finance expeditions to acquire new plants. Queen Mary, Queen Alexandra and Princess Victoria visited her, and her garden became famous throughout Britain and beyond. She was one of two women awarded the RHS Medal of Honour in Queen Victoria’s Jubilee Year, 1897. The other was Gertrude Jekyll." This from…