prairie point » garden tours

a valentines day trip

Bill — Sat, 21 Feb 2009 16:28:22 +0000

A comment left on an earlier post about a stone boat in a garden pond got me remembering another stone boat in a garden that I had visited a number of years ago. I wanted another visit to see the boat again, which is in a demonstration garden across a road from Weston Gardens in Forest Hill. Then on Valentine’s Day our houseguests asked if there was someplace they could buy some roses to take back home with them. Oh, yes. Weston carries a good selection of antique and modern roses.

So we piled in the car and drove. It was a long way but the company was pleasant and we thought of several places we needed to stop before we got there. At the nursery our guests picked out their roses, mostly varieties I was not familiar with – Love and Peace, New Dawn and Crepuscule. Then we crossed the country road to the demonstration gardens.

Behind the stone gate is an old house and gardens originally built in the 1930′s. The overgrown gardens were bought by Weston Gardens and are being renovated as a demonstration garden. It was a chilly overcast afternoon and…

white shadows

Bill — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 04:40:51 +0000

Tuesday I was at Chandor Gardens for a lecture, and stuck around afterwards to take some photos. Even though there was not a lot blooming it is really the hardscape that most interests me about this garden. It’s been really hard for me to take photos of it that show off what I love about it.

Chandor Gardens is small. Originally called White Shadows, it was the private garden of Douglas Chandor, a famous English portrait painter who married a Texas heiress and made his home in Weatherford, Texas. He painted the official portrait of Queen Elizabeth and many other famous persons. Although his skills were such that he was much sought after, he once said that he only painted to finance his real passion, gardening. I bet a lot of my readers can relate to that.

Chandor has a lot of long sight lines and a lot of small water features. One of the central elements is this sunken fountain, which was not turned on, probably because the garden was not really open to the public at the time I was there. It is in the middle of a long path that extends to oriental miniatures…

grenetta’s garden

Bill — Sat, 08 Nov 2008 03:09:27 +0000

When Grenetta and her husband built their house seven years ago, they picked a lot that sloped down to a creek. They brought in over 100 truckloads of fill dirt to level the site and installed a retaining wall at the back of the house.

On Thursday morning she opened her garden to members of our Master Gardening class.

This is the view looking down. At the top there is a covered patio to the left and along the right the water feature shown below.

At the bottom of the steps there is a swath of lawn and then a border pierced with paths that enter into a series of interconnecting outdoor “rooms.” In the background is the natural area of the creek.