Sissinghurst Castle Garden, part 2: White Garden, meadow, and tower views
August 04, 2018 Has any garden been more admired, copied, and written about than Vita Sackville-West’s White Garden at Sissinghurst? We visited in mid-June, and I was excited to finally step into this glowing space and see it for myself. Twilight would be better for appreciating the pale effect of ...
Sissinghurst Castle Garden, part 1: Walls and roses in the English countryside
August 03, 2018 Sissinghurst. Mecca to gardeners worldwide. Like every traveling gardener, I’d put Sissinghurst Castle Garden at the top of my bucket list, and when we started planning a trip to England I insisted on seeing the famous garden of Vita Sackville-West. So one sunny mid-June morning, we drove ...
Cotswolds country charm at Victoria Summerley’s Awkward Hill Cottage
July 19, 2018 It wouldn’t be an overstatement to say that my family and I traveled to England last month to see gardens. Particularly, romantic English gardens in the rosy flush of June. And specifically, three gardens I’ve longed to see for years: the famous estate gardens Sissinghurst and Great ...
Old school sightseeing in Oxford, England
July 16, 2018 English longhorns at Christ Church Meadow in Oxford Last month, after two nights in London, we rented a car and drove to Oxford, our home base for several day trips we’d planned for the remainder of our vacation. Oxford is a lovely old city, and we enjoyed ...
Historic kitchen garden at Château de La Roche-Guyon
July 06, 2018 Our mid-June French château-visiting plan was foiled when we missed the last house tour at Château d’Ambleville (not that I minded, with that wonderful garden to explore). But like I said, you can’t throw a rock without hitting a castle in France. So we drove 15 minutes ...
Hedge fun: The Italian Renaissance garden of Château d’Ambleville
July 05, 2018 So many châteaux (manor houses, mostly, but also palaces and castles) litter the French countryside that today some can be purchased for a relative song. We were not looking to buy, however, but merely to visit a couple of châteaux in mid-June, after our tour of Monet’s ...
Paris parks, pigeons, and masterpieces
June 28, 2018 After Venice earlier this June, we spent 5 nights in Paris, a city I hadn’t seen in 29 years. It is as beautiful and vibrant as I remembered. My husband took these twilight images from the top of the Arc de Triomphe, looking out over the city ...
The romance of Venice
June 24, 2018 You can hardly believe a city like this really exists, its gelato-hued, wedding-cake buildings perched at the edge of watery streets… …boats zipping past instead of cars… …the ancient house facades and narrow alleys suffused with a romantic decay. Speaking of gelato On June 3rd we flew ...
Flowering trees and Athena the owl at the Wildflower Center
March 22, 2018 Texas mountain laurel, one of our finest native flowering trees Whether you’re hunkered under a blanket of snow or your gardening season is well underway, let’s pause to appreciate the beauty of spring-flowering trees and other gorgeous native plants at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center here ...
Ellsworth Kelly’s “Austin” brightens University of Texas campus
March 07, 2018 Resembling squares of lime, cherry, berry blue, and grape Jell-O, the glass-block windows of artist Ellsworth Kelly’s new artwork, Austin, are colorful, playful, and flat-out fun. You kind of want to slurp them up, or stick your finger in them to see if they jiggle. A new ...
Fair grounds at Fareground food hall in downtown Austin
February 06, 2018 Twice last week I visited buzzed-about Fareground food hall on Congress Avenue in downtown Austin, killing time before shows at the Paramount Theater. I’ve yet to see Fareground in the daytime, but at night the softly lit landscaping and plaza sure are enticing. (The stairs and outer ...
Yippee Ki Yay! Austin has its own Stickwork sculpture in Pease Park
February 03, 2018 Have you ever seen a bowerbird’s elaborate, woven-twig structure? That’s what the Stickwork creations of North Carolina artist Patrick Dougherty remind me of. I’ve admired his twiggy sculptures in other cities and gardens. And now we have one in Austin at Pease Park. Titled Yippee Ki Yay, ...
The twinkliest town in the Hill Country
December 22, 2017 If you want to see trees made of light and a charmingly illuminated main square, go visit Johnson City, a small town of 2,000 residents, located about an hour west of Austin. Every December they turn their town into a beautiful spectacle of light — called Lights ...
New Central Library – “Austin’s front porch” – boasts rooftop garden and more
December 15, 2017 Austin is head over heels in love with our new Central Library, a marvelous civic structure by Lake|Flato that is much more than a library. It’s a community space for all of Austin in a prime location on Cesar Chavez Street near Austin City Hall and across ...
Chihuly in the Forest and American art at Crystal Bridges Museum
November 05, 2017 While in Eureka Springs, Arkansas, last weekend, my husband and I drove to nearby Bentonville to see the remarkable collection of American art at Crystal Bridges Museum. The museum is surrounded by pleasant walking trails, and an exhibit of Chihuly glass sculptures, Chihuly in the Forest, was ...
Foliage architecture (and art) on Rice University campus
October 16, 2017 At my alma mater in Houston last month (right after Hurricane Harvey), I appreciated the marriage of foliage and architecture at the Brochstein Pavilion, a remarkable structure and hub of student activity that didn’t exist when I was a student at Rice University. A hedge of tightly ...
