Create Nourishing Flourishing Home Utopias
Here’s your photo of the day: A rustic garden gate we used for our flower and herb garden plots in a Tennessee mountain retreat we designed at Beall Blackberry Farm.
Sit back and enjoy these other photos of the property:
See our gallery of projects on Houzz here.
The tale of Toad Hall is steeped in folklore. Toad Hall is a 32-acre residential property located in a magnificent valley in Tennessee’s Great Smoky Mountains. The property boasts historic log structures, a passageway barn, a writer’s cottage, a stone bank barn, and a potting shed. When it came time to design the landscape, the owners turned to our team here at Dargan Landscape Architects.
The owners had a vision to turn the whole site into a lush English-style garden with native plants, natural materials, picturesque pathways, and majestic trees. The approach and arrival sequence takes you on a long pastoral drive amidst covered bridges, wildflower fields, grazing sheep, a trout stream, and even a little white chapel. The trout stream runs parallel to the drive and leads you to the heart of Toad Hall, a meadow nestled between majestic mountain woodland and soaring mossy boulder cliffs on the edge of Blackberry Farm.
A geothermal pond in a private enclave near the trout stream makes for a mini oasis. Complete with a tulip poplar island with turkey sculptures, the picturesque pond inherently ignites the same childlike wonder as “The Adventures of Huck Finn.” Weeping willows line the lake, and a crescent moon can be spotted on the door of the log guest cottage. Rustic locust posts stand in place of lamp standards.
Arriving on the grounds, you are greeted by a gravel courtyard framed by a beautiful barn and stone shed. A pathway of orchard stones takes you through a grassy forecourt enclosed by billowing boxwoods. From tulip poplars to old-fashioned hydrangea to antique roses, native flowers weave in and out of the property, forming postcard-like backdrops.
The centerpiece of the site is a stunning eighteenth-century kitchen garden. The period design consists of four parts enclosed by an edible natural fence of espalier and apple trees. The four areas are separated by Kingsville boxwoods and are connected by rosemary and lavender in the center. Edges are constructed of tumbled cobblestone, and walkways are made of weathered stepping stones nestled in grass which help to blend the garden gracefully into the natural surroundings.
Read more about the enchanting landscape and log homes of Toad Hall in the Architectural Digest article online.
We’d love to see how we can help create your own home utopia. To learn more about our landscape design services, contact Dargan Landscape Architects online or by calling 404-231-3889.
Are you bogged down with stress and looking for an outdoor escape? Gardening has long been considered an activity that can be cathartic and calming for those who enjoy working with plants and soil. The idea of nurturing plants to produce a bounty of vegetables and fruits, or creating a beautiful display of flowers and greenery, can provide a space for healing, meditation, restoration, and contemplation.
Recently, scientists, doctors, and landscape architects have started collaborating to create therapeutic landscape designs for mental well-being. Unlike traditional gardens, landscape planning for therapeutic gardens involves specific goals.
While a healing garden is designed to encourage overall health and encourage meditation, restoration, and contemplation, therapeutic gardens are designed to go beyond these goals to promote health and well-being. Landscape architects often work closely with the medical community to create gardens that will measurably contribute to a patient’s healing.
While this form of landscape planning is often used in long-term care facilities or rehabilitation centers, you can also opt to work with a landscape architect to develop your own therapeutic garden. Since the goals and measurable outcomes vary with the client, it’s essential to know what you want your therapeutic garden to accomplish.
For example, a garden created for a hospice may focus on quality of life and restoration for families, while a rehabilitation center’s therapeutic garden may serve as an actual component of therapy that provides respite from the hard work of physical therapy.
With 40 years in the business of landscape architecture, Dargan Landscape Architects would be happy to consult with you on a therapeutic garden design. Browse our portfolio of completed projects and contact us to learn how we can help.
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Do you want to light up your garden for late night strolls? Have you been looking to bring whimsical details into your garden design? From safety to creating a new focal point, votive candles can make a visual statement in a variety of garden and landscape designs.
Landscape lighting can be used to create safely-lit pathways, highlight certain features of your yard, or create an intimate setting for evening conversations. And when you are looking for soft light that encourages intimacy and a relaxed atmosphere, votive candles is an excellent choice.
The vessels you choose to contain your votive candles help define the style you wish to convey. Our Dargan Boundless Garden product line has many beautiful votive candles and accessories to make landscape lighting easy.
Dargan Landscape Architects has many products and services that will make your landscape beautiful and unique to your tastes. Please visit our site for more landscape lighting ideas, or contact us to learn how we can design the perfect landscape for you.
As sensory beings, incorporating texture into your garden design ideas will generate appeal that draws all passers. Not only will your garden provide a beautiful visual effect with color and depth, it will exude wonderful scents to fulfill the sense of smell and stimulate the sensations of touch and sight when you add texture.
Many people shy away from experimenting with texture worrying that their garden may take on an air of messiness or become overly cluttered. But when done properly, eye-catching garden texture can bring beauty and serenity into a number of settings.
Source: Dargan Landscape Architects
To create a sense of luxury, try layering colors and textures in your garden beds by combining short and tall plants with similar colors. Shorter plants and flowers should be situated toward the front of the garden, while taller varieties can go in the background. This simple garden design idea really draws to your landscape.
For a look that can be striking, while still giving a sense of serenity at the same time, combine textural elements in a single color such as paving bricks or garden path tiles. These textural elements can be surrounded by smooth pebbles in muted shades or bordered with lush green feather grass. Not only will you be adding several textures, you are adding a striking contrast with the foliage that borders your design.
If you have limited space for your garden design, there are many different options when container gardening. These eye-catching vessels can lift up a garden while incorporating texture. To keep the setting cohesive, you may wish to center your design on a single color scheme.
Finding the right garden design can be a difficult challenge. Dargan Landscape Architects are experts at taking the concept you visualize in your head and bringing them to life. Please visit our website to learn how we can help you bring your design to life.