garden structure and planning

Now is a good time to plan for 2015 garden. My area is is a large terrace on the fifth floor. Sometimes high wind. Limited direct sunlight. Extremely dry.It is an all around challenging area.

Amateurs such as myself make a common mistake of waiting for the season to roll around then visit local nurseries and accept what is available at that moment in time and try as we might to tack together some sort of agreeable arrangement with no real planning involved. But now is a good time, I think, to search for interesting plants and items that add structure to one's composition of textures, colors, color-values, density, foliage, positive and negative space, and the like, all the elements that go into well thought theme, one stated with authority.

I have a terrace. It's architecture is the decorative railings. That is my starting architectural design element. Everything devolves from and fits into that.

Every garden photographer knows you cannot get a good picture of densely packed riot of various flowers. You just cannot. There is no backbone to it, There is nowhere for the eye to settle. Gardens need architecture. The architecture comes first and the plants secondarily. You build around what you have, walls, stairs, pathways, what have you.

Clever decorations can break up the mess. Partially concealed to delight by discovery. Real human faces draw one's attention compellingly. I see garden decorations intended to break up riots of compacted foliage and bloom but used inappropriately as centerpieces or disjointed nicknack objects d'art, purchased because they are adorably cute, or caught the eye separately from the garden. I see all kinds of cheap craptastic containers. I don't want them. I see what is available at the hardware stores and reject most of it. There are very few garden decorations that avoid the trite, the overused, the common, such as sun faces, gnomes, ducks, frogs, peacocks, wire things, cute things, adorable things, children-type amusements, whirly gigs, weather vanes, flamingos with wire legs, very few items can pull this off uniquely, impressively with maturity and authority.

I just now found one such item, that if placed sufficiently cleverly and well enough disguised, can do just that. It is concrete and not very large. I bought it. And so the experimental adventure continues.

Respect mah authoritah!

This appealed to me by striking a chord to a fantastic memory.

In Cancun a group of us rented a house in a gated neighborhood. In Mexico all beaches are public. Nevertheless houses are build in secluded areas that for all intentions and purposes become private by their inaccessibility. Our rented house was built on the base of a stone jetty. A short wall divided the jetty from a small area that formed a perfect little beach. Even the other houses behind the gate did know about so didn't care about this tiny private beach. The wall is built of local lava rock in striking black and white and gray pattern.

I sat there on the beach reading my Mary Renault book about Rome and weary from the heat gazed idly upon the stone wall. I recall thinking, "Jeeze, that pattern of rock is fantastic. It could be anything. The pattern made into any textile for any purpose at all. It is quite amazing. Think of it, clothing, patio furniture, throw pillows, sheets, tarps, anything at all."

Then it moved. Startled the hell out of me. Perfectly camouflaged. Extraordinary evolution, right there. Darwin's proof right before my eyes. And it was there the whole time. Once noticed it cannot be unnoticed. It cannot be forgotten. 

This is the effect that I have in mind.