The Daily Reviewer | The Occasional Gardener

Pushing Through

Mar 10, 2010 1:43pm

These crocus were a lovely sight, a little patch that had spilled over beyond someone's garden in Mamaroneck. There were more in the garden under the trees albeit not quite as spectacular as the ones I saw in Brooklyn a couple of years ago. Nevertheless it was still uplifting...

Stirrings

Mar 7, 2010 10:13am

Up in Mamaroneck, two things stir the gardening impulse. Bright green chive shoots emerge in the vegetable garden to kick the year off. Later in the year they will drive me crazy keeping them in check, but right now they remind me of how dependable a tenant they are here....

Right Minding

Feb 22, 2010 7:54am

The tediousness of the left brain chores I am currently mired in, has my right brain parched. Circumstances don't help either- trapped in a seemingly unending winter, there's little outside that inspires - it's just grimy snow and salt frosted sidewalks. Last night I dug out some old footage...

Seeds

Feb 13, 2010 6:39am

Not the garden variety. I have a pair of abstract encaustic paintings titled Seed that I've appropriately decided to seed my new Etsy shop with. It will be a place for me to sell artwork and perhaps some things for the home, some vintage things - all with a nature...

Rejuvenated

Feb 1, 2010 1:29pm

While NYC dips into temperatures below freezing again, I continue to work on designs for Summer 2011 and thought I would share an interesting trend prediction from Li Edelkoort's recent presentation - water. Not just aesthetically as in color palettes drawn from rivers, reefs, pools, oceans, mermaids and the like...

Turquoise 15-5519

Jan 29, 2010 6:42pm

I just got round to noting Pantone's color of the year for 2010 - Turquoise 15-5519. My first garden related thought about the color was- Kyles' pot. Kyle, an artist friend living in Rhode Island that I visited while on vacation this year had the most beautiful collection of ceramic...

Verbena Notes

Jan 26, 2010 12:11pm

I love Verbena Bonariensis. I love the lanky stilt stalks - see how they catch the evening September light here ( taken at the NYBG ). I tried last year with seed sown directly into the beds. Nothing showed up. I had them in my London garden and they...

How Will Your Garden Grow?

Jan 14, 2010 1:09pm

Back in 1998 I bought a computer- a Mac. I patiently waited for AOL dial up to get on the internet, struggled through a manual to learn Photoshop and breathlessly read Wired magazine's predictions about what this all meant for the future. Would all this technology really allow me to...

New Year Star

Jan 5, 2010 11:54am

I went up to Mamaroneck on new year's day for a party and was charged to gather up whatever I could from the garden to spruce up the festivities. A quick walkabout yielded some red berries that went nicely with some pine branches. Then a range of dried hydrangeas and...

Bleak Beauty Redux

Dec 26, 2009 6:52pm

Last year, I worked on this winter hydrangea image which then led to a couple more in a certain palette of yellow/green/brown cast neutrals inspired by Andrew Wyeth's palette and then it picked up an indigo ink tinted scheme. The more graphic motifs/images created by a blank snow canvas against...

Plantago

Dec 21, 2009 11:53am

I recently ordered some Plaintain Oil to make some salve with. The oil is from the leaves of Plantago Major or Common Plantain. I've been reading many references to its use as a vulnery (wound healing), it's anti inflammatory properties and abilities to draw out bites. The latter...

Evergreens

Dec 16, 2009 3:47pm

At the farmer's market, this week there were beautiful evergreen wreaths, branches and trees to celebrate the season. The word evergreen is beautiful and hopeful, the colors, especially when things are getting fairly wintry, uplifting and the scent is transporting. Evergreen trees immediately suggest landscape, not only as motif, but...

Contemplating Berries

Dec 12, 2009 1:08pm

I don't know what kind of berries these are, maybe Hawthorn. If they are then they are edible, full of nutrients,vitamins and minerals according to well known NYC wild foods expert Wildman Steve Brill. He also says they have medicinal properties and can be infested with insects. But I...

Late Autumn Walks

Dec 7, 2009 9:26pm

After months of not being able to walk in Central Park with my fosterdog because he was too dog reactive, the situation reverses. He's now come along with his training far enough to start exposing him to more dogs so we now take about four long walks a week- from...

Fruit leaves

Nov 29, 2009 12:03pm

I love Tangerines and I couldn't walk by a box of them in Chinatown, still with leaves intact without buying some. There's something that cognitively suggests freshness and ramps up the desirability for me when I see leaves on fruit- I want them more. I grew up climbing fruit trees...

Fleeting Green

Nov 24, 2009 6:07am

After it's abundance all summer, green in the fall garden, as it retreats becomes an interesting color accent. Not the blue cast of evergreens that start to become more apparent now as things around them die down, but the chlorophyll pigment of leaf greens that won't quite let go and...

Persimmons

Nov 21, 2009 6:54pm

At this time of year, Persimmons are easily found on the streets of Chinatown, I always buy a few, not for their flavor so much as their looks. Such a beautiful color and shape- and that dried calyx on top- like a fine carving. I love to have a bowl...

Autumn Palettes

Nov 16, 2009 12:27pm

Autumn is a great time to go foraging for color palettes. I find color juxtapositions, pairings, and contrasts that surprise and inspire. Here are two good examples, a few remaining fiery orange leaves set against a dusty blue background, cris cossed with neutral branches and a dusty pink hydrangea separated...

Upside Down Tomatoes

Nov 13, 2009 9:26am

No, not the growing kind. I tried this last year with good results, so this year there was a serious display of all the tomato plants still with fruits attached cut and hung upside down in the window to ripen. Added to this was also some basil plants and some...

Suburban Foliage

Nov 2, 2009 9:53pm

I've been to Mamaroneck the last 2 weekends, the first weekend my camera had issues and I ended up borrowing Jim's camera. I was only able to download the images the following weekend when my own camera became issue free and I took more photos. That's my excuse for...

Urban Autumn 2

Oct 20, 2009 12:18pm

I managed to squeeze in a quick walk in Central Park a few days ago and enjoyed another view of an updated Urban Autumn except more biased to the autumn part. This time the Manhattan geometry was well in the distance framed by autumn golds, the human crush whittled down...

Bittersweet

Oct 11, 2009 10:19am

The sight of these bittersweet branches hung on a line on the side of a truck in Union Square market stopped me dead in my tracks. It wasn't just their stark sculptural beauty, it was the contrast of their organic curving forms against the geometry of the trucks rivets, the...

Autumn Flotsam

Sep 29, 2009 11:41am

It's eyes down, here in Manhattan as the pavements get strewn with Autumn flotsam. Acorns, leaves, seed pods and twigs litter the urban floor. Sharp yellows of turning leaves decorate the dull gray concrete. The crunch of dry twigs and seed pods add an autumnal nuance to the urban percussion...

Small Mercies

Sep 24, 2009 10:05am

.Everytime I think today will be day I run out and indulge in a little garden photography, it clouds over or rains. My foster dog is highly dog reactive, walks in central park are out of the question but long walks are necessary since he is young and spirited, so...

Urban Autumn

Sep 19, 2009 6:34pm

The first signs of the approaching fall usually start with the arrival of Gingko leaves, delicate little yellow calling cards outside my front door announcing the inevitable. This year the signs were harsher, a week or so ago the pavement was littered with acorns and small oak branches ripped off...