Garden-making

Front matter

ELSA REHMANN

-*>With supplementary chapters and: illustrations by Antoinette Perrett

$3.50

Preface

Tus book seeks to give garden-making its place in the realm of art and to discuss garden design in its simplest forms. It dwells upon plant material, upon perennials and roses, bulbs and annuals, shrubs and trees, not so much for their individual beauty as for the way in which they embody the garden’s design and interpret its character. It discusses the distribution of flowers, takes up some of the problems of their succession, and emphasizes the importance of flower color as a factor in garden-planning. In this connection, it is particularly fortunate that my sister, Antoinette Perrett, has put at my disposal, as a finishing touch to the text, her descriptions of some of the gardens she has visited, for by these specific examples she brings out the various factors that make up the modern manner of flower-planting. The book touches, too, upon garden furnishings and garden ornament, the ideals of craftsmanship and style that govern them, and the distinctive use to which they are put in completing the garden’s design. It seeks the sources of old-time charm that every new garden longs to recapture, and suggests the way in which fragrance may pervade and influence the garden’s character, for qualities such as these make up the spirit of the garden.

I am glad that I am able to draw from Mrs. Perrett’s rich collection of photographs all the

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PREFACE illustrations for this book. Mrs. Perrett has a rare appreciation of garden art and of the achievements of the artists and craftsmen, of architects and landscape architects of to-day. It is the appreciation of one who bases her pleasure in garden loveliness upon the fundamental principles that guide artistic work, and who uses the camera, not merely to reproduce her subjects, but to catch their spirit and to put her own interpretation upon them. The exclusive use of her pictures, however, is not only due to these facts and to a desire for unity in the illustrations, important as this factor in bookmaking seems to me, but to the fact that we virtually share the same standards and ideals.

NEWARK, NEW JERSEY

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I wisH to acknowledge the courtesy of House and Garden, The House Beautiful, and the American Magazine of Ari for permission to reprint the articles that appear in revised form as chapters in this book.

I wish to thank all those who have so generously allowed the use of their gardens and the architects and sculptors, the landscape architects, and other garden-makers whose work appears in this book. I have painstakingly gone over every detail of name and place and designer. In case there should be through an oversight any omission or mistake, I beg indulgence.

I hope that the pictures, necessarily much reduced to fit the small volume, will not lose their intrinsic value but may even seem more precious as miniatures.

Sp od

Contents

INTRODUCTION: GARDEN-MAKING AS A FINE ART

Part I

. THE RouND GARDEN

. OVAL GARDENS

. SOME OTHER GEOMETRICAL GARDEN PAT-

TERNS

. OLD-TIME CHARM . THE SEAT AS AN ELEMENT IN GARDEN DE-

SIGN

. THE STATUE AS AN INTERPRETATION OF THE

GARDEN SPIRIT

. FRAGRANCE AS A FACTOR IN GARDEN DE-

SIGN

. SHRUB AND TREE IN THE FLOWER GARDEN . VINES

. THE EDGING PLANT IN THE HERBACEOUS

GARDEN

. DAFFODILS

- SOME AUTUMN FLOWERS . CHRYSANTHEMUMS xi

XXxi

CONTENTS

XVII. THE DISTRIBUTION OF FLOWERS IN THE GARDEN 134 XVIII. THE SEQUENCE OF FLOWERS IN THE GARDEN 144

XIX. CoLor AS A FACTOR IN GARDEN DESIGN 155.

PART II I. A TuLIp GARDEN IN ROSE AND AMETHYST _—iI7I II. A GARDEN FULL oF TULIP SUGGESTIONS 173 III. A JuLy GARDEN IN BLUE AND LAVENDER 177 IV. A JuLy GARDEN IN ROSE AND PURPLE 181 V. A GOLDEN AUGUST GARDEN 184 VI. AGERATUM, HELIOTROPE, AND BLUE SAGE 188 VII. UNusuAaL BLUE FLOWERS IN AUGUST 189 VIII. BRILLIANT AUTUMN COLOR 196

IX. RosE, LAVENDER, AND PURPLE IN SEPTEMBER 201

X. FLESH-PINK, WHITE, AND LAVENDER IN SEP- TEMBER 203

XI. AN OCTOBER GARDEN 206

(As a garden is constantly changing, not only in the evanescent moods of the seasons but also in the slower progress of growth, a record of when each picture was taken may be of interest)

The Gateway of a Garden designed by Elsa Rehmann, Landscape Architect (1922) Frontispiece

A Deserted Way in a Garden formerly belonging to Mr. Stanley Mortimer at Roslyn, Long Island (now belonging to Mr. and Mrs. Francis P. Garvan) (1920) 4

Under Fruit Trees in the Garden of Dr. and Mrs.

C. S. McKinney at Madison, New Jersey 5

A Tiny Place within Hawthorn Hedges in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Carl L. Watter at Essex Fels, New Jersey (1923) 5

Elsa Rehmann, Landscape Architect

In the Wild-Flower Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Clarence Kenyon at Glen Cove, Long Island (1900) 8

Path beside the Pond on the Estate of Dr. and Mrs. George Woodward at St. Martins, Pennsylvania (1922) 8

A Steep Way through the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Glendenning, at Chestnut Hill, sal vania (1925) 9

Beside the Wall in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Glendenning at Chestnut Hill, Pennsylvania (1925) | 9

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In the Garden of President and Mrs. John Grier Hibben at Princeton, New Jersey (1921) Designed originally by the first Mrs. Woodrow Wilson; now taken care of by Beatrix Farrand, Landscape Architect The Round Pool in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. S. J. Leonard at East Hampton, Long Island (1920) Charles N. Lowrie, Landscape Architect

The Oval Garden designed for Mr. and Mrs. Horace A. Saks at Elberon, New Jersey

As it appeared in its second June, 1922. Elsa Rehmann, Landscape Architect

The Oval Garden designed for Mrs. Bayard Dominick at Rumson, New Jersey (1923) Elsa Rehmann, Landscape Architect

In the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. John Hampton Barnes at Devon, Pennsylvania (1924) Wilson Eyre, Architect; Elizabeth Bootes Clark, Landscape Architect In the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. John T. Pratt at Glen Cove, Long Island (1920) Charles A. Platt, Architect

In the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Eugene Meyer, Jr., at Mount Kisco, New York (1921) Charles A. Platt, Architect; James L. Greenleaf, Landscape Architect Cedars, Peonies, and Boxwood in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Otto H. Wittpenn at Bernardsville, New Jersey (1920) The Weeping Willow in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. A. Felix du Pont at Wilmington, Delaware (1922) XIV

Great Boxwood Bushes, Luxuriant White Azaleas, Pink Rhododendron carolinianum and Forget-me-nots under an old Pear Tree contribute a Wonderful Old-Time Spirit to the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Henry W. DeForest at Cold Spring Harbor, Long Island (1920)

Olmsted Brothers, Landscape Architects

The Garden Wall at Goodstay, formerly the Home of Miss Paulina du Pont, now that of her Niece Mrs. Hollyday Meeds, Wilmington, Delaware (1922)

In the Walled Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Ormsby Mitchell at Mamaroneck, New York (1921) Mott Schmidt, Architect; Ellen M. Shipman, Landscape Architect Half-Forgotten Splendor in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Edwin Morgan at Roslyn, Long Island (1920)

Under the Great Elm in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. John T. Pratt at Glen Cove, Long Island (1920) Charles A. Platt, Architect

In the Courtyard Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Morgan Colt at New Hope, Pennsylvania (1922) Morgan Colt, Architect Under the Pergola in the Garden of Mr. Robert Goelet at Edgemere, Chester, New York (1920) Beatrix Farrand, Landscape Architect

The Sundial Boy, the Work of Gail Sherman Corbett, Sculptor, in the Garden of Mr. George D. Pratt at Glen Cove, Long Island (1920)

‘Pan,’ the Work of Richard H. Recchia, Sculptor, in the Garden of Mrs. Gardiner M. Lane at Manchester-by-the-Sea, Massachusetts (1922)

XV

‘Philomela,’ the Work of John Gregory, Sculptor, in the Studio Garden of Mrs. Payne Whitney at Manhasset, Long Island (1920)

_ Pelicans in the Garden of Mr. C. H. Ludington, at Ardsmore, Pennsylvania (1923)

Baby, the Work of Frances Grimes, Sculptor, in the Garden of Dr. and Mrs. James H. Lancashire at Manchester-by-the-Sea, Massachusetts (1922)

Lilacs beside the Gate in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Henry W. DeForest at Cold Spring Harbor, Long Island (1920)

Olmsted Brothers, Landscape Architects

Willows at the Mill Run in front of the House of Mr. and Mrs. Morgan Colt at New Hope, Pennsylvania (1922)

Evergreens around the Swimming Pool on the Estate of Mr. George D. Pratt at Glen Cove, Long Island (1920)

James L. Greenleaf, Landscape Architect; Trowbridge and Ackerman, Architects

Marble and Rhododendrons in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. John Magee at Mount Kisco, New York (1921)

Ellen Shipman, Landscape Architect

Boxwood around the Pool in the Garden of Mrs. Harold I. Pratt at Glen Cove, Long Island (1920) Martha Brookes Hutcheson and James L. Greenleaf, Landscape Architects Boxwood, Wistaria, and Pink Dogwoods in the Old- Time Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Henry W. DeForest at Cold Spring Harbor, Long Island (1920) Olmsted Brothers, Landscape Architects XVI

The Wall Fountain and Forsythia in the Garden of” Mr. and Mrs. William K. Wallbridge at Short Hills, New Jersey (1923) 71

The Three Trees on the Terrace in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. William K. Wallbridge at Short Hills, New Jersey (1923) 71

The Matrimony Vine in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Henry W. DeForest at Cold Spring Harbor, Long Island (1920) 76

Olmsted Brothers, Landscape Architects

Boston Ivy over the Archway of the Home of Mr. and Mrs. John Hampton Barnes at Devon, Pennsylvania (1924) 76

Vines covering the Steep Slope in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Henry C. Martin at Glen Cove, Long Island, as it was in 1920 before the House was Burned 77

Harry T. Lindeberg, Architect

Climbing Hydrangea in Chestnut Hill, Pennsylvania (1924) ’ 77 The Virginia Creeper at the Studio Door of Mr. Morgan Colt, at New Hope, Pennsylvania (1922) 84 Ivy and Roses in the Garden of Miss Violet Oakley at St. Martins, Pennsylvania (1922) f 84. Wistarias and Grapes in the Courtyard of Mr. Henry H. Binsse at Short Hills, New Jersey (1920) 85 Roses in the Courtyard of Mr. Henry H. Binsse at Short Hills, New Jersey (1920) 85 Harrison Yellow Roses in the Courtyard Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Morgan Colt at New Hope, Pennsylvania (1922) 88 XVii

Roses ornamenting the Porch in a Garden at Garden City, Long Island (1923)

Yellow Polyantha Roses scattered through borders of White Pinks and Forget-me-nots in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Horace A. Saks at Elberon, New Jersey (1922)

Elsa Rehmann, Landscape Architect

In the Rose Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Charles Hirshon at New Rochelle, New York (1923) Elsa Rehmann, Landscape Architect

In the Rose Garden of Mr. Robert Goelet at Edgemere, Chester, New York (1920) Beatrix Farrand, Landscape Architect

Roses over a Garden Wall at St. Martins, Pennsylvania

Spring-Flowering Edging in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. William K. Wallbridge at Short Hills, New

Jersey Frank Schmidt, Landscape Gardener

Edgings to complete the Flower Loveliness in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. William A. Reade at Purchase, New York

Beatrix Farrand, Landscape Architect

Daffodils in the Garden of Mr. Chester Jay Hunt at Mayfair, Little Falls, New Jersey (1923)

Iris Drifts in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. William K. Wallbridge at Short Hills, New Jersey (1922)

Scilla, Iris, and Lupines in the Garden of Mr. and XViil

93,

Mrs. William A. Reade at Purchase, New York (1921)

Beatrix Farrand, Landscape Architect

Lupines and Larkspurs at ‘Boxly,’ the Garden of Mrs. Frederick Winslow Taylor at Chestnut Hill, Pennsylvania (1924)

Olmsted Brothers, Landscape Architects

Delicate Flower Interminglings at ‘Boxly,’ the Garden of Mrs. Frederick Winslow Taylor at Chestnut Hill, Pennsylvania (1924)

Lupine Clumps and Roses in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Leonard K. Elmhirst at Roslyn, Long Island

Beatrix Farrand, Landscape Architect

Foxgloves and Pinks in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Leonard K. Elmhirst at Roslyn, Long Island (1922)

The Garden at Tulip Time designed for Mr. and Mrs. T.G. Tallman at Wilmington, Delaware (1922)

Wilson Eyre, Architect; flower arrangements by Elizabeth Bootes Clark, Landscape Architect

At Tulip Time in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. C. Marshall Barton, at Wilmington, Delaware (1922)

In July in the Garden planted for Mrs. Clarence Kenyon at Glen Cove, Long Island (1900)

Emile Fardel, Landscape Gardener

During July in the Garden of Mrs. Gordon Abbott at Manchester-by-the-Sea, Massachusetts (1921) Ellen M. Shipman, Landscape Architect sth

I4I

The Golden Borders in the Garden of Mrs. Gardiner M. Lane, at Manchester-by-the-Sea, Massachusetts

Olmsted Brothers, Landscape Architects; James Scott, Gardener

Ageratum, Heliotrope, and Blue Sage in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Otto H. Wittpenn at Bernardsville, New Jersey (1920)

The Blue Borders during August in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Gardiner M. Lane at Manchester-by-the-Sea (1922)

Olmsted Brothers, Landscape Architects; James Scott, Gardener

Autumn in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. Henry C. Martin at Glen Cove, Long Island (1920) Design by Harry T. Lindeberg, Architect; flower scheme by Charles Galanti, Gardener During September in the Garden of Mr. and Mrs. F. H. Ryan at Short Hills, New Jersey (1923)

During September in the Garden of Mr. William K. Wallbridge at Short Hills, New Jersey (1923)

October

INTRODUCTION GARDEN-MAKING AS A FINE ART

IF, with all his other activities, the Italian artistarchitect of the Renaissance achieved distinction in the art of garden-making, it was because he had only to adapt his hand to a different medium. It seems it was not difficult for him to use land and landscape instead of building material, to use earth and trees instead of clay and marble, to use flowers and verdant green instead of pigment. He knew how to make his garden as beautiful in design as his building, for was it not a veritable part of it? He could model the Italian hillside as wonderfully as he could carve his statue. He took as keen a delight, no doubt, in the green of ilex, in the whiteness of marble, in the blue of the Italian sky as in the colors for his altar-pieces and frescoes.

It is, then, quite understandable that the landscape architect of to-day, specialist though he be (and I make no distinction between the men and women in this field of art), should manifest the sensitiveness of the older artists. There is no other art, perhaps, that demands quite so keen an understanding of design and form and color as this one of garden-making or requires so sensitive a poetic feeling and so subtle a taste of its creator.

But, while he may not be wholly conscious of it,

XX1 the landscape architect is apt to show a keener understanding and a greater sensitiveness to one phase of his art than to another. One garden-maker may be particularly interested in design. By the strength of its lines, by the dignity of its proportions, by the exquisiteness of its geometric pattern, by the breadth of its space composition will he express the beauty of his conception. Sometimes it seems as if it hardly mattered how such a garden is planted, so dominant is the design over the planting. In the finest examples, however, the planting is so adapted to the scheme that it heightens and accentuates its every perfection. That is what the’ planting is for. It ought to be no mere afterthought but an integral part of the garden. It is there to interpret the design through its very loveliness.

I do not wish to give a wrong impression. Every true garden-maker is conscious of design, for it is the way he can make real his idea. Some people seem still afraid of design, timid of the artificiality of beds and borders. I do not blame them altogether for this. Many a garden is quite hopeless with many little unrelated compartments and free standing beds difficult to plant. But you will find that, in a legitimate design, these beds and borders are not conspicuous in their artificiality, but are indispensable units of the underlying structure. They form the skeleton upon which to build. Without it, the cloak of flower loveliness is but sham.

Some people imagine that design is something forced, while the best gardens are those where the

XXxii design adapts itself to the site, moulds itself to contours, and conforms with house and landscape. Take but a single example. Those of us who are overawed by Versailles and the perfection of its sumptuous design need but to realize its perfect adaptation to the great level country all around and to the scale of its great palace buildings, need but to repeople it with courtiers on horseback and ladies in sedan chairs, need but to sense the grandiose desires of a Louis XIV and to visualize the magnificent life of his court, to understand the part that design plays in creating such stupendous effects. But we can go to the other extreme just as well. It requires just as keen an understanding of our forefathers’ day to interpret again the spirit of those little doorway gardens whose effects were none the less fascinating because the designs were so very simple. In a broad sense, too, every landscape architect is really a sculptor. He moulds the earth’s surface to his will and models his garden’s body with infinite care. He is conscious, too, of the form of every tree and shrub and flower that he uses. It is easy to see the hand of the sculptor in the Italian garden. He exhibited it in the terracing of hillsides, in the curving grace of stairways, in the lovely tumbling cascades. He showed it in the use he made of pyramidal cypress and of the picturesque round-headed stone pine. He showed it in the way he cut holly into walls of green and shaped the trees into pleached alleys. He showed it even in his use of wooded areas. Or take the topiary work in old gardens, in Italy, in XXiil

Holland, in England. This was the work of fantastic gardener-modelers. And the weeping and pendent trees and trees bent and trained into shapes not their own was the work of later odd-minded horticulturists.

The garden-maker of to-day has a different viewpoint of vegetation. The natural forms of trees and shrubs have a strong appeal, and he finds ample variety to satisfy every sculptural desire. The sweeping beauty of the beech, the ruggedness of the red pine, the picturesqueness of the apple, the grace of the hemlock, the exquisitely carved elm are lovelier to him than any exotic or man-trained specimen. Even though he uses the clipped forms of boxwood and yew as of old for formal effect or from whimsical desire, the unclipped boxwood has a greater beauty for him and the unclipped yew a rugged grace. -He delights in rugged thorns, in graceful ironwoods, in nice dogwoods. He rejoices in crude sumacs, in drooping snowberries, in delicate spirzeas, in stately lilacs, in shapely laurels. He enjoys recumbent junipers, prostrate cotoneasters, tumbling matrimony vines, trailing roses, and spreading honeysuckles — no end to such a catalogue. Each tree and shrub and vine has its own appeal. Its characteristic individuality wields its own spell in genial situations. But it is particularly in the exquisiteness of its placing, in the charm of its selection and assembling, that the garden-maker can exhibit his ability in producing the sculptural beauty of gardens through plant material.

XXIV

Flowers exhibit even a greater degree of variety in form, a more exquisite modeling. Hardly a flower can be mentioned that shows no characteristic beauty of form. Think of all the flowers you know, the decorative iris, the graceful lilies, the strident hollyhocks, the sturdy mulleins, the fascinating milkweeds, the sumptuous yuccas, the hyacinths, the daffodils, the Canterbury bells, the phloxes. Think of the characterful composites in all their variety, of the figwort family of which the foxgloves and snapdragons are conspicuous members, of the pulse family with all its delightful butterfly-like flowers. These are all too few to show the beauty and variety of flower forms. Not only is the shape of the individual flower important, but the decorative arrangement of its foliage and the very structure of its stalk. I have found delightfully suggestive the words of a client who thought that very beautiful combinations could be achieved with leaves as well as with flowers with all their variety of textures and shapes. And no less a sculptor than Rodin has it said of him that ‘flowers communed with him by the gracious swaying of their stalks,’ as if he caught this subtle phase of flower beauty akin to his own great art.

To distinguish the individuality of these shapes, one by one, is truly a fascinating game, but the real significance of their sculptural beauty in the garden lies in their intermingling, for then they resolve themselves into flower friezes. They can be wrought into borders that are as exquisite and delicate, or as

XXV

INTRODUCTION | bold and daring, as any bas-relief, according to the demands of the situation. Some gardens delight in such flower borders. Then the form of the flowers seems more important in them than their color. And all the greater is the designer who can sense this need in gardens and develop its significant beauty.

There is one aspect of flowers in borders that a frieze of stone cannot attain. It is what I like to call the stereoscopic effect of flowers, for they can stand out and away from one another and from their background. Flowers planted in drifts will attain a fine strength in this way, and others delicately intermingled will have an airy grace. |

Then there are designers who are particularly interested in color. They are not the least among their confréres, albeit their work is as evanescent and as transient as the flowers themselves. Each garden-designer, if he be a colorist at all — and some are strangely lacking in this sensitiveness — is as individualistic in his handling of flowers and flower color asa painter. He has, I think, the more difficult task, the more subtle art, for plants come and go with the seasons — yes, with the weeks, making a hundred pictures in an interlocking series. Besides, they are subject to the idiosyncrasies of weather and to the whims of gardeners.

Upon the lessons he has learned from the painters, the garden-maker draws valuable inspiration. In fact, it can be truly said that the painter impressionists and their successors have revolutionized his art, for the understanding of atmospheric effects,

XXVi and more particularly the effect of light upon color, have given the garden a new beauty. The old order of flat bedding-out effects was no longer to be tolerated as soon as the garden-maker could translate the painter’s effect of broken color into the medium of his own art. He found he could attain effects, previously unthought of, by the lavish intermingling of bulb and perennial and annual in the herbaceous border. This new freedom in flower assembling made it possible to use flowers in spots and groups, in drifts and masses, in so many new ways and so masterfully that he could rival at will the pozntilage of the impressionists or the heavier brush strokes of the modern painter to produce whatever effect he desired.

The garden-maker found that he could arrange colorful harmonies or mosaic patterns of great beauty. He could delight in exuberant contrast or in startling concords. He could produce misty effects of subtle softness or scintillating effects full of golden sunlight. He could create delightful scenes with colors delicately blended or bold and clashing effects. This is something finer than a mere craving for pretty color schemes, for he can express every delicacy or any daring that his personality desires, or his temperament suggests or his client delights in. And, in all this handling of color, you will find that he expresses his ideas by a technique which is as unmistakably his own as is that of any painter.

Yet in this use of color there is something even

XXVil finer, for by it the design of the garden can be brought to its finest perfection. This is no caprice or whim of the creator. It is governed by the truest laws of artistic composition. Just as the painter expresses his idea through the blending of his color, so the garden-maker can bring out the underlying idea of his garden through color arrangement. Perhaps of even greater significance is the fact that color can express a garden’s mood. Lavish masses of golden and yellow and orange flowers, do they not suggest a garden of ample size and luxuriant borders out in the brilliant sunlight? White flowers, the white laid in delicate pattern upon the green of flower foliage, — do they not suggest a garden of old-fashioned charm, fragrant with box-edgings, with seats in sequestered nooks, and a sundial with quaint inscription? And a garden all of quiet green, does it not suggest a place deep in the shade of overhanging trees in a cool hollow with a deep pool of quiet water wreathed in vines? These are but bald examples, to be sure. They can give but meager suggestion of this thing that is so ethereal, hardly definable in words, for it is that well-nigh intangible thing writers love to call atmosphere.

PART I

Chapter I The Simplest Kind Of Garden

THE simplest kind of garden is a flower-bordered path. Its simplicity lies in the singleness of its purpose and in the directness of its composition. Despite the elemental character of its design, however, it can reach sublime perfection in proportion; de- _ spite its straightforward sincerity, it can be elaborated with exquisite detail; despite all its limitations, it can be wrought into a wonderful completeness. Try to visualize a typical example. It seems so easy, doesn’t it? Just a flower-bordered path, and yet you become ensnared straightway in the tangle of its infinite variety. There is a path, I remember, that wanders through a woodland, finding its delight in primroses and violas, in forget-me-nots and Anchusa myosotidiflora, in columbines and mertensias. There is another path I know, carved in the slope of the hill where, beneath a wall overhung with a wealth of intermingled rose climbers and buddleias with soft summer bloom, there are narrow borders filled with polyantha roses. There is a third path beneath the sun-flecked tunnel of a long grape arbor where Japanese anemones find a welcome haunt. There is a path that climbs its wonderful way up and up, flight upon flight, between hemlocks and pines, with all sorts of tumbling plants along the edges. And, finally, there is a path in an orchard where fascinating medleys of spring flowers spread out beneath blossoming fruit-trees.

There are paths that find their greatest pleasure in directness. Straight as an arrow, they become impersonations of that familiar axiom, a line that is the shortest distance between two points. And then, there are paths that, moulding themselves to contours and fitting themselves to circumstance, wind their ways graciously like languid streams. Some paths fit on level ground and others like to wind up a hillside. Some are brilliant and sunny, others like the deep shade and half shade of woodsy places. Some are so narrow that we find ourselves in constant peril of treading upon the flower edges, while others are so generously wide as to allow two people to stroll leisurely along with a dog by their side.

The width of the walk depends partly upon the material used, but mainly upon circumstance. Few realize, however, that the width of a path can determine not only the amount of physical comfort, but the degree of sensitory pleasure there is in walking through a garden. A path of two or three feet is too narrow, in any case; a path of eight feet is commensurate with a big design; a path of five or even six feet is usually in proper proportion and comfortable.

The width of the borders, too, depends upon cir-

IN A GARDEN AT ROSLYN, LONG ISLAND, DESIGNED FOR MR. STANLEY MORTIMER Nathan Franklin Barrett, Landscape Gardener

IN THE GARDEN OF DR. AND MRS. C. S. MCKINNEY AT MADISON, NEW JERSEY

IN THE GARDEN OF MR. AND MRS. CARL L. WATTER AT ESSEX FELS, NEW JERSEY Elsa Rehmann, Landscape Architect cumstance. I have found, however, that five-foot borders are usually too reserved and unmindful of flower habits. They may be very nice upon a plan, but in actuality they not only put strict limitations upon the flower selection, but give the garden a cramped and stingy look. I never feel free to use any tall or free-spreading flowers in them, no hollyhocks or heleniums, no dahlias or perennial asters, for instance. Ejight- or ten-foot borders are much happier in looks, are usually sufficient and possible from a working point of view. I have found that, evenina rather small garden, ten-foot borders accommodate themselves quite nicely. They may look too wide in plan, but even a rough cross-section will give you the effect that flower heights and background shrubs and hedges have upon the width of the garden. These are all niceties in proportion which must be sensitively felt to be really appreciated.

Sometimes the borders must be self-contained and the flowers carefully distributed for height and color; again, these path gardens may give way to ‘all sorts of vagaries. The borders may be now wide, now narrow; the flowers now high, now low; the bloom now abundant, now meager; the color now brilliant and boisterous, now faint and fairy-like. I like a little cozy path where you can tuck all those darling little things that are not effective in a real garden. There is often a chance for such a pathina vacant corner. All the little edging plants are especially welcome there, for each little variety can be noticed, so close at one’s feet it is. I want violas there in all their fascinating variety, and for very contrast with them the saxifrages. I want creeping veronicas and all the dainty kinds of dianthus. I want tunicas and nierembergias. I like these plants in irregular masses and delightfully intermingled and planted so near the edge of the border that they spread over the path with freedom. I like these paths to be of broken paving, for such plants spoil the edges of grass paths in their very exuberance and look forlorn when they come in contact with gravel. I would rather have these wondrously free edgings with all their varied bloom and varied habit than even boxwood edgings for all their beauty, and I would forsake the most wonderful of great gardens for one of these little cozy paths.