Cozy Casita II, The Lovely Courtyard

It has been hot, hot, hot in the last couple of days here in San Diego inland with highest temperatures reaching 99F/37C yesterday. Needless to say that my garden is suffering and I often wish, that I had planted a more drought and heat tolerant garden at this time of the year.

There is just one catch, even though it is not politically correct to say, I have to admit that often drought tolerant gardens are not very appealing to me. I simply love my roses too much. But two years ago I had the chance to visit an incredibly beautiful one which was a true exception. I blogged about it already here, showcasing the front yard and today I will continue to introduce you to it and take you into the very lovely courtyard.

You enter the courtyard through a small insignificant wooden door from the street and suddenly you are in a completely enclosed very cozy and colorful space decorated with many, many containers holding drought tolerant plants. I was very impressed by this big cactus, adorned with, what I believe is, Spanish Moss.

The attention to detail in this garden room was incredible. Look for example at the foot of the cactus from the photo above. It is underplanted with many pretty succulents in all shapes and sizes and a small blue and white ceramic sphere is placed just for a pop of additional interest.

Details of the fountain that you can see in the first photo of this post. It looks like all the objects are loosely placed in the stone bowl that is the actual fountain. That certainly makes for a captivating display. The Mexican tiles add plenty of color and cheerfulness to the space.

A view of one corner of the courtyard. Plenty of beautiful containers in many different shapes, sizes and materials and some art objects are keeping your attention.

This looks like an old fireplace, that is not used anymore. More fascinating containers planted with small drought tolerant plants. I love the blue ornate sphere in the right corner. Blue was definitively a color that was often used and tied it all together.

Another container vignette. I love the blue-gray hues of these plants.

This one was my favorite. It really looked like that. The photo is not photoshopped.

This unique table was placed in the middle of the courtyard and shaded by a white sun umbrella. I think this is an amazing place to have breakfast or to end the day with a nice drink. I definitively would feel very comfortable here. 

This is the left side of the actual entrance to the house. The door to the house is open, visible to the right of the photo.

Another interesting pot parade to the right side of the entrance to the house. Do you see the beautiful copper rain chain?  And the Mexican violinist made out of metal? To reach the back yard, which was actually located on a very difficult to plant, steep, hilly terrain, you needed to walk through the house. The backyard was nothing short of spectacular, but this is material for another post.  

If you liked this courtyard and you haven't seen my first post about this garden, yet, I highly encourage to click the link below and go back and take a look at the front yard. I think it is truly special as well.

Cozy Casita I, Front Yard

Hope you are able to stay nice and cool and enjoy the summer if you are living in the Nothern Hemisphere. I am not a big fan of water, but I may consider taking a dip in the pool later today, the heat is really getting to me.

See you in the garden!

Warm regards,

Christina

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'Gardens Now and Then' Spring Garden Tour 2015: Cozy Casita - I, The Front Yard

One weekend in April last year I woke up and my husband told me that he just read in the newspaper that that day would be the "Gardens Now and Then" garden tour of the Horticultural Society of San Diego, which I am a member of. For some reason I missed that info, but decided on the fly to change my plans for that day and have a look. I couldn't make it there before lunch time and out of the twelve gardens that you could possibly see, I was only able to visit three, but one of them was absolutely amazing. I stayed there for a long time simply admiring the beauty of this garden and couldn't stop taking photos.

In the program for that garden tour, which was organized and sponsored by the Horticultural Society of San Diego and the San Diego Floral Association, the garden was titled as Cozy Casita, which says more about the house, a beautiful 1938 Spanish Mission Style home, than the garden itself, so I had no idea what to expect. But let me tell you to visit this garden was a real treat. It belongs to the President of the San Diego Horticultural Society and his partner and was created over the last 17 years. They certainly poured their love, creativity and hard work into this garden and I am sure on top of that a lot of money, too. I wanted to blog about this garden forever and I am happy that finally the day has come where I can share it with you.

Isn't that a stunning scene that greats you when you are approaching the house? They used a lot of heat and drought tolerant plants in this part of the garden.

I love these blue glazed terracotta containers!

A terracotta bowl planted with succulents can be quite fascinating, if it is done right.

The house itself is beautiful, but there is a lot of garage and very little front yard to garden with, when you analyse the photo closely. But this tiny front yard is so well designed that it really grabs and holds your attention.

Have you ever seen a succulent in this color and form? I actually didn't. I think this is an absolutely fascinating plant. 

Imagine these blue containers wouldn't be there. They are really such eye catchers. 

Here is a look at the second grouping of the containers. The combination of the different shapes, sizes and proportions is so well done. Here was someone at work with a truly artistic eye!

I think this is a container usually used for growing strawberries. Planted up with succulents it becomes a totally cool thing!

A closer look at the small island bed in front of the house. I think it is so well planted and I love the use of the palms together with the succulents. 

I found the color of this succulent quite fascinating!

This gray green palm is so beautiful and another eye catcher in my book.

Totally love this agave. The combination with the blue lobelia really make both plants pop. I wonder though, if the lobelias just have been planted for the garden tour event, since I assume that agaves and lobelias have very different water needs.

Last view of the whole front yard. I think it so incredible well done and maintained. Are you hocked by now? If the answer is yes, then please come back for more. I will try to do the next entry about the courtyard that lies behind the lovely white wall soon. It was equally fascinating. 

See you in the garden!

Christina

I am linking to 

Bernideen's Tea Time, Cottage and Garden

"Autum in the Garden", San Diego Garden Tour II

This post continues with the garden tour through Nan Kaufman's garden. There was really a lot to see. I hope you enjoy the rest of the tour.

(you can click on the photos to enlarge)

After strolling through the front yard (click here to see my first post about Nan Kaufman's garden) the tour went through the house to reach the back yard and when you turned back to the house you saw this nice patio area. I loved the arched windows and door that leads from the kitchen to the back yard. On the right side in the background you can see a bigger plant that I think was quite special...

...and that I had never seen before. Its name is Cleodendrum Ugandense, African Butterfly Bush. Aren't the dainty flowers pretty? I wonder if they really attract butterflies. 

In front of this plant was a beautiful container filled with different yummy looking lettuces. The blue flower seemed to be made out of glass, adds color, and is certainly very eye catching.

Walking further we passed this very beautiful camellia. I was astonished that it was in bloom already.

 

Decorating another corner in the back of the house we found this vignettes of three blue glazed terracotta containers. The shape of the containers was quite modern and even though modern is usually not so much my thing, I liked those quite a bit.

Here is a close-up of one of the containers shown in the photo above so that you can see the succulent mix a little bit better. Stunning, huh?

Then we reached an area with a pool. I found the landscaping around the pool quite interesting. In this section of the garden they used more of the modern shaped blue containers this time filled with red leaved plants. The pots were accompanied by succulents planted in the ground together with grasses which makes a quite unusual combination. It is certainly one, that at least I have never seen so far.




A more frontal view of the same area.

View of the same area but this time looking a little bit more to the right. I still can't get over the combination of succulents and grasses, I certainly would have never thought of doing this.

The other side of the pool was landscaped like you can see in the photo above. Repeating the use of blue containers planted with red leaved plants, surrounded by grasses and clumps of cyperus papyrus. Very interesting! In the background you can see a dense hedge of a plant, which I will show later a little bit more closely.

In an outdoor kitchen area they had placed this cute bowl with a moss teddy bear.

You also could find here another pumpkin planted with succulents. I liked this one best, because it is a white pumpkin, and white is my favorite color. A clear saturated orange is my least favorite color, by the way, so orange pumpkins are usually not for me. If you look closely you can see a little advertisement card in the background of the pumpkin that points out that obviously someone "professional" did do the succulent plantings for the garden tour not the owner herself.

This was probably my favorite succulent arrangement. How neat is it to plant them in a giant seashell? Just loved it!

For my personal taste this is a little bit over the top but a fun thing to look at for a garden tour. A metal Don Quixote sculpture planted with succulents. It definitely was the ultimate conversation piece.

This a close-up of the belly of the Don Quixote sculpture. This succulent arrangement contained so many tiny succulents, simply unbelievable.

And here they had planted succulent on the fire place set. Of course now it is useless for the fireplace, but it is a fun idea to do that. The miniature succulents are quite amazing. I have never seen so tiny ones used in plantings.




I was in love with this monstera deliciosa. I think, they just placed the plant there for decorative purposes for the garden tour only, because I assume our strong sun would burn it, if it would be out there permanently. But in any case this is a great indoor plant that I was growing twice in my life and I think seeing it on the garden tour again pointed me in the direction to get another one for my own house to live indoors with us.

Continuing with more "regular garden stuff". How about this beautiful tall bearded iris? The name of the variety is 'Frequent Flyer'. I do not get it why some people in San Diego can grow irises so lovely like this one and mine just sulk. It is a real mystery to me.

On the photo above you can see the whole bed in which the iris was growing. I like the water fountain and in general feel, that this area was well done. The bed seems to be fairly new and just has to grow in a little bit more then it will be perfect.

Another intimate patio area. On the photo above you can see one of the many espaliered citrus trees. It looked pretty healthy to me and was bearing plenty of fruits.

Above a shot of the whole area with many more nicely potted plants.

On the opposite side of the patio it looked like this. I am seriously wondering who is watering all the containers in this garden? As lovely as they are it is really work to water as many containers as have been scattered around in this yard.

This is a plant that is really fascinating to me and which you have already seen growing in the background of the pool. It is called solandra maxima or Cup-of-Gold vine with the common name. The plants in the garden are supposed to be twenty five years old and they were simply wonderful. They were building a hedge around one side of the property, which was giving the owners complete privacy.

This photo shows a close-up of one of the giant blooms of the vine. Aren't they drop dead gorgeous?

On the way out of the garden I noticed that even the beds at the feet of the Queen Anne Palms between the sidewalk and the street were underplanted with succulents. To me that looked really great and it is for sure a drought tolerant planting!

Having a closer look: The blueish/greenish succulents are building such a great contrast with the red ones. Stunning!

Altogether I got a lot of ideas from visiting this garden and felt very inspired to make my own little garden more pretty with the means that I have. For me attending a garden tour is always worth it and it is so much fun. Are you enjoying to go to garden tours, too?

See you in the garden!

Christina