Friday, March 7, 2014

RALPH HANCOCK

Additional information on the life work of Ralph Hancock can be found through a site was developed by his family www. ralphhancock.com.

And heres a podcast link off BBC radio...

Ralph Hancock - Dear Tempestuous Genius from Robin Hull on Vimeo.

Thursday, March 6, 2014

Modern Art Decoration Designs

Modern Living room

Living room furnishings include finer details in the form of carpets and furniture and accessories such as artwork and paintings, glass, ceramics and much more. Its the lighting, direct and indirect uses, to various places in the living room to highlight. A tastefully done light work of heat and light can donate a room to your advantage. Also decorative mirrors can give a room with distinctive character. For light rooms, it can also help in improving the feel of visual space. Bare walls or blind spots can be aptly used to turn into corners with functional art, photography and unique crafts.

Modern Dining room set

Dining room set includes mainly pictures, rugs, carpets, chandeliers and hanging lamps, rugs, buffets, china and cutlery. Elements such as appetizing paintings, ornate skylight, runners, rug complements and reinforces the visual stimulus, and also with contemporary and modern dining room work. It is a balance between art and function that are most important. Every room with a creative eye done left behind one of individuality and the satisfaction to pursue. You can play with colors, images, buffets and light to create the atmosphere for families at different times and moods social and personal

Modern Interior furniture

An interior would look naked without proper equipment. It is true, complete Modern interior furniture gives a room Home furnishings with the value, function and features spatial depth and meaning to a space. is a segment that tinkering many good aspects, such as art and sculpture, painting, home textiles, glassware, decorative pillows, towels, metal and wood, lights, storage covers, vases, rugs, ceramics, ornaments and other works, these to personalize a space and can function according to your individual taste and preference.

Modern Kids furniture

Kids furniture is another segment of the invention with its own demands. Kids Rooms have lively, active and safe. To embellish on these fine lines, you have kids rugs, pillows, carpets, curtains, bedding, artwork and a games room for storage. Clocks, paintings and art are as popular as baby murals and themed rooms. The idea is based on function, color and energy, in line with slightly every day. It can help to awaken the concept of personal space for young people. A simple but tasteful furnishings with open space for activities tend sounds ideal for children. Fun for a child-friendly theme murals are a great idea for the modern baby bedroom.

Elegant Kitchen facilities

Elegant
Kitchen facilities

Kitchen facilities include many details such as wine racks, high-style cutlery, cups ware, cooking, serving dishes, tablecloths, buffets, cutting boards, kitchen basket, radiators, vases and bowls, coffee decanter, floating shelves, special knives, ergonomic storage units to merge form and function at all well planned. Often small accessories in a kitchen together with careful arrangement gives a room with a great atmosphere. It can include anything from modern lighting, bowls ancestors valuable crockery, paintings, art, vases and glass.

Luxury Kitchen accessories

Kitchen accessories can fulfill both decorative and functional tasks in the definition and organization of a kitchen. Kitchen accessories and make great home interior warming and wedding gifts, in fact, for almost any occasion one can think of, from birthdays, Christmas and for all time around the year.

Modern and systematic kitchen

It pays to have a systematic and airy kitchen, it was a nice little kitchenette or a full-size modular version with up-to-date amenities. Kitchen is central to virtually every household and it is important to adapt a space for the individual lifestyle and preferences are. It should get some kind of place you for a drink, dinner with friends and gossip over a cup of coffee with friends or bake cakes and cookies to allow yourself a relaxing afternoon.

Check also:
Modern Kitchen
Luxury Lighting Design Ideas and remodeling
INTERIOR OF THE KIDS ROOMSofa Design and Furniture
Interior and Exterior Shutters
Home Decorating in Minimalism
Modern Lighting designs for your home
Contemporary and Luxury Dining rooms

landscape design ideas

Landscape Design Ideas for Beautifying Your Yard
Do you visit your front yard very little more than a area to corner in order to get to your home? If you do, your entry could use any makeover. Look at our yard redesign concepts below.

Pertaining to boring top yards....

The answer then is a fix of creative imagination. Design/Landscape gurus have got several ways to be able to jazz up tiresome front meters:

landscape design ideas

1. Target Elemental Equal rights. Feng Shui teaches in which equal pieces fire, material, earth as well as water can be found in a successfully pleasing layout. Landscape pavers are likely to be considered as planet. For steel, think about introducing a bronze sculpture or a indicative ball. Lively yellow along with red plants can add hearth, while drinking water can be displayed with a water fountain or water-feature.

2. Make use of a Variety of Components. People are lollipops for range. To spice up your own front place, tell your landscape designer to include a wide variety of components. As an example, rather than using only pavers, you could use tiny rocks and floor covers at the same time.

3. Consider How You will employ Your Style. Landscape designers who are well worth their sea salt ask just how their clients count on using their back yards. Utility is really a sure-fire way to eliminate boredom. The "edible" front yard is ideal for lovers involving fresh create, while any built-in sandpit is a desire come true for fogeys of preschoolers. Or, should you prefer a private getaway, add stucco wall space to create a remote sanctuary. Whenever partnering together with landscape design services, begin with a yoga on how you need to use the region.

front yard landscape design ideas

For meters that dont jive while using traditional National style...

Select a more good design. Panorama techniques via around the globe can easily highlight your own homes design. For example, should your house provides Asian particulars, you can continue this kind of theme with your front yard with the addition of an elaborate top gate and walls. (This kind of style is typical in areas like Asia, where minimal land direct landscape musicians to create front-yard personal privacy.) Check with the landscape designer to figure out which usually garden styles would very best accent the houses style. Landscape design services typically delight in the opportunity escape classic Americana.

For very small front yards that dont rationalize storing significant mowing equipment...

Speak with your landscape designer about floor cover choices to turf. A number of, like Whiskey and Irish moss, undertake and dont mowing. In reality, there are several advantages to getting rid of grass from the landscape design. Portland denizens, by way of example, are often enthusiastic about reducing his or her carbon foot print. For these eco-friendly enlightened house owners, a yard symbolizes unwanted energy costs - vitality spent advancing mowers, making fertilizers, and also transporting marijuana killers, which is just a start off! Many non-tree-huggers have got eliminated their own lawns at the same time, simply because they hate the undue amount of servicing that a garden demands.

backyard landscape design ideas

When you need more space regarding entertaining...

Develop an inviting room with quick shrubbery, highlight fencing, and also trellises. These elements of design can create an outside "room" that website visitors will experience drawn to. Landscape design solutions may also recommend building a brief wall to make the sensation of an smaller, cozier area. Or, you could possibly just opt to erect an outdoor patio cover as well as a front-yard deck for you to encourage outside socializing.

simple landscape design ideas

Wednesday, March 5, 2014

Contemporary Modular Sofas

Although the double chaises dimensions were too great for the existing porch, a similar, more suitable option is available from the same Caluco Mirabella Collection. Utilizing two corner sectional pieces and two ottomans, a daybed is created when pushed together. When entertaining groups, the pieces may be pulled apart for a seating group or for perimeter seating. When entertaining one guest, the pieces may be set out in pairs with two groupings of one corner piece and one ottoman separated by an end table.

Sometimes when we settle on a concept and realize it is not going to work out, pushing through the concept, the result becomes more refined and in the case higher functioning.

From the first option, the dual functioning, sculptural bar table is retained.

Now that the furnishings have been selected, it is a good time to start looking for accessories to soften the space as well as to enclose it further, perhaps with sunbrella curtains and to diminish the somewhat unsightly view of the hot tub.

Photographs courtesy of http://www.caluco.com/

Kadsura

Kadsura

Kadsura japonica
A fast growing, twining, evergreen vine, reaching up to 15 feet in height, that is native to eastern Asia ( South Korea, China, Japan and Taiwan ). It is great for use on trellises.
The thick, elliptical leaves, up to 4 inches in length, are glossy deep green. It is usually not evergreen north of zone 8.
The fragrant, creamy-yellow flowers, up to 0.8 inches in width, are borne on axilliary clusters.
They are followed by pendulous, scarlet-red fruits, up to 1 x 1.2 inches, that are borne from the leaf axils on a 1.5 inch stalk.
Hardy zones 7 to 9 ( 6 with protection ) in partial to full shade on moist, fertile, deep, light, well drained soil.

Chirifu

* photos taken on June 23 2013 @ U.S. National Arboretum, DC

Fukurin
Very attractive, Hoya-like leaves that are variegated with a broad creamy-white edge. The variegation may turn rosy-pink during winter.
Reported to be hardy even in zone 5.

Tuesday, March 4, 2014

front landscaping designs

front landscaping designs

Numerous garden landscape designs concepts are simply boring. While you wouldnt like to do anything which will get you quit out of the property owners organization, you are able to have a very fascinating as well as distinctive type. Here are some tips.

Stones, Big river rocks And Stones

You might have seen a sizable boulder next door others who live nearby lawn and thought it absolutely was part of the landscape before the residence had been made. That may be correct. However, if the rock appears to match perfect, it had been more than likely positioned generally there by a landscape fashion team.

You can get rip-rap rock, attractive boulders, granitic, water boulders and other gemstones from the few different providers. Many organizations provide free delivery for large weighty purchases.

There are numerous benefits of planning with good ole. First, the actual stones will protect you against break down, but will need absolutely no applying water. Second, they assist stop weed growth from broadening. Third, they search fascinating.

front landscaping designs australia

The front yard and front door walk might be made up of lock paving gemstones, instead of cement or concrete. If you take a review of some of the on-line pictures of done projects, you should concur that will interlock pavers tend to be more appealing compared to standard components.

Using pavers is probably the yard landscaping ideas that will help you cut costs later on. Glaciers growth will not likely cause them to split. Theyll really give throughout an earthquake instead of falling apart.

Mesh or mortar-less rock and roll may be used to produce flower mattresses, water fountains, keeping walls and also other decorative items. Your options are limited only through your creativeness as well as the size of your own lot.

Develop Herbs, Timber, Blossoms As well as Trees

Even though some individuals might not concur, I would not believe it is possible have a lots of blooming crops. Herbs are not only seen stunning. They are aromatic and might be used in the kitchen space.

modern front landscaping designs

For many really distinctive garden landscaping suggestions, you could speak with people who have gotten rid of any the majority of their unique lawn. As the "barefoot lawn" remains the convention, you will find choices. A number of them are incredibly stunning.

Your home owners which may have went grassless benefit from flowering terrain cover, ornamental grasses as well as time tested timber such as boxwoods.

Boxwoods undoubtedly are a sturdy drought-resistant grow you can use to make a hedge and prevent targeted traffic sound. The actual year-round greenery can be satisfying for the attention and might be engrossed in plant lights at Christmastime.

You will find countless garden landscaping suggestions on-line. Ensure that you seek advice from your property owners relationship before you decide to do anything whatsoever too intense.

landscaping designs for front of house

Monday, March 3, 2014

Carroll Gardens deck and fence A work in progress

The Importance of Landscape Design

Landscape designing has come of age. People these days are continuously looking for a landscape design that offers a blend of natural beauty and homely charm. Increasing standard of living has ensured that landscaping becomes an indispensable requirement for homes and commercial establishments all across the world. Companies also provide greenbelts these days. A professionally worked out landscape design ensures that a well patterned greenbelt is achieved. At times, it has been observed that people who enjoy gardening as a hobby – indulge in creating landscape design. As a result, the patterning and zoning of the garden is not achieved. This is where the need for a good landscape design comes into the picture. Here is a list of some important aspects that will help you choose the right landscape design.
Creativity: This is something very important. The crux to a brilliant landscape design is creativity. Without the slightest of doubt, we all would agree that landscaping looks great when it is unique. A professional landscape design company would always ensure that the site specifications and project compatibility are kept in mind before offering a design to the customer. Though an architectural field, landscape design has a special aesthetic value. Elements of art include but are not limited to color, line, form, texture and scale. These elements are never independent of each other, but their individual natures should be handled with care before considering the interactions. Increasing upcoming projects of urban development require high-end professional landscape design. The reason behind this is simple. The value of a housing establishment increases if proper landscaping is provided. Landscape design is a multi-disciplinary field, including within its fold mathematics, science, engineering, art, technology, social sciences, politics, history, philosophy. Color, line, form, texture and scale are tools which are used in combinations to adjust design of the landscape. Design principles include unity, balance, transition, proportion, rhythm, repetition and simplicity. All these principles interact to yield the intended landscape design.

Natural Feel: A good landscape design must give a natural feel. Once you enter the landscaping zone, you must feel as if you are on a hill station. The density of naturalness also depends on the depth of the project. For example a home landscaping project may demand a more natural look than that of an office or housing complex.

I hope this information helps you choose the right landscape design.

Scarletts Landscape is a leading landscape designer in Ventura and Camarillo. For more details, please visit: http://www.scarlettslandscaping.com/

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The Cloud Hedge Experiment

Lust. The first time I saw a picture of Jacques Wirtzs cloud hedges, I wanted them. Of course, I often look upon glossy magazines of European gardens and covet one thing or another. But the overgrown boxwoods that the Wirtzs clipped into iconic cloud-like shapes stayed with me. They were both solid and structural, yet light and whimsical. Artificial yet organic.

For years now, Ive been thinking about using cloud hedges in a design or my own garden, but to be honest, I havent been confident I can pull it off. After all, cloud hedges are more about garden craftsmanship than design acumen. So I was delighted when I saw Jake Hobsons new book, The Art of Creative Pruning. I hoped I would find a step by step tutorial on how to create this effect. The book unfortunately is more of an illustrative coffee table book than it is a how-to manual. The images themselves are instructive, and Mr. Hobson does give some useful advice for creative pruning. But I found his advice for creating cloud hedges to be a bit too general: " Rough out the basic forms, following the flow of the plants." So I went outside and looked at an overgrown yew hedge in my front yard. I wasnt seeing too much "flow" to work with.

One of the simplest ways to create a cloud hedge is to create one new. I recently saw this technique used by Tom Stuart-Smith in his 2010 Laurent Perrier garden for the Chelsea flower show. Stuart-Smith simply assembled a bunch of mature boxwoods into the forms he wanted for the temporary garden. A few weeks of growth and voila! Instant cloud hedge. Of course, this garden used huge mature boxwoods which probably cost the average home owner a fortune. The same effect could be done starting with smaller shrubs that eventually grow together, but this could take up to a decade before they have the desired effect. I recently planted groups of five and seven boxwoods in irregular clumps for a client. I plan to have them shaped over the next few years into these gumdrop shapes.

Large boxwoods pre-selected for the show garden, image from Chelsea Flower Show blog

Cloud hedge in its place. photo by Allan Pollack Morris

Since I cant quite afford fifteen mature boxwoods, I decided to see if I could transform the overgrown yew hedge in front of my house into a cloud hedge. My wife and I recently bought a dilapidated ranch house and were considering removing the overgrown yew hedge in favor of a more layered, softer foundation planting. However, the yew hedge--while not particularly interesting--is mature and relatively healthy. And that means we dont have to spend several hundred dollars in replacement plants.

Inspired by images from Mr. Hobsons book, I went out this weekend and started to hack at our hedge. I tried to follow the "flow" of the plant, but this hedge had been shaped as a rectangle for years, so the branching structure was pretty uniform. I started by outlining the contours or folds of the clouds, but found it hard to compose. I would stand back at the street and try to visualize some cloud-like forms, but when I got back and starting hacking, it was easy to lose the concept. I found it particularly difficult to create the amount of contrast in height that I wanted by merely shearing the plant. I didnt want to cut the yew back down to its structural branches. Ive done that before and it took years before it leafed out. But I did cut it back to bare branches, knowing that it would fill out again in the spring.

I started to outline the contours or folds of the clouds which required skinning the shrubs down to bare branches in some places

I quickly came to the realization that to create the amount of contrast between peaks and valleys, I could not simply rely on shearing/subtraction alone. Instead, I would have to wait for some areas to grow out in order to get the necessary dips and valleys.

How did it turn out? To be honest, I have no idea. Right now the hedges look pretty awful. Kinda like Bill the Cat from Bloom County--some parts skinned, some parts poking out wildly. But I figure well see how it goes in the spring. Since we were planning on ripping these out anyways, there was no harm in trying. Hopefully, within a few years, Ill have delightfully unique, dreamy hedges to contrast with all the perennial and grass plantings we have planned in the future. Until then, our poor neighbors will have to suffer through more of my horticultural experiments.

Have any of you done any creative pruning? Whats worked for you? How long did it take? I"ll be sure to post on the hedges progress next summer.

Alabama Croton

Croton alabamensis
A very handsome endangered shrub native to Tennessee and Alabama that reaches a maximum size of 9 x 8 feet. It can be trained as a lovely single trunked shrub-tree with a thick, rounded canopy.
The blunt tipped, elliptical, semi-evergreen leaves are up to 4 x 2 inches in size. The foliage is shimmering deep green above and silver below, turning to bright orange or sometimes red in autumn. The flowers are yellowish-green and are borne in clusters up to 1.5 inches in length during early to mid spring. The twigs are whitish.
Hardy zones 4b to 8 in sun or shade preferring moist, fertile, light, well drained soil. It is very heat and drought tolerant.
Propagation is easy from seed.

* photos taken on March 28 2010 @ U.S. National Arboretum, D.C.

* photos taken on June 30 2013 @ U.S. National Arboretum, DC

A Look Beyond Flowers and Fauna of Hawaii

Yellow Tropical Hibiscus

While it is freezing and snowing outside I am catching up and reminiscing by going through some photos from our visit to Kauai this past fall. The island of Kauai in the Hawaiian Islands is one of the most beautiful places I have ever encountered. The island is a gardeners dream comprised of tropical rain forests, beautiful blooms and interesting foliage. I took hundreds of photographs during our trip and just completed sorting through each one and choosing the best to bring here. We also encountered some amazing native and tropical birds at the resort we stayed at that are worth sharing. If there is a place on earth one could call paradise this is certainly it.