Re: Yard vs Garden

**"* <d*@comcast.net>**

I grew up in the Midwest with the terms front and back yards as indicating 
living space. We spent many hours playing in both, and planting in both.

I became acutely aware of the term "yard" as meaning a utilitarian space 
when I gained many English friends a few decades ago. They  chide me, but 
I'm still likely to refer to my landscape as "the yard" and then 
differentiate between flower and vegetable gardens, borders,woodland  and 
lawn (not much of the latter).

In landscape design and horticulture classes, we were taught to use "garden" 
or "landscape" to boost the perceived value for our clients. I usually fall 
in with whatever my clients use. I'm an aural chameleon, and the 
nomenclature has changed so much in the south over the last couple of 
decades that there's no "correct" word to cover all.

d

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Catriona Tudor Erler" <cterler@gardenvista.com>
To: "Garden Writers -- GWL -- The Garden Writers Forum" 
<gardenwriters@lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Thursday, June 19, 2008 11:05 AM
Subject: [GWL] Yard vs Garden

>    Interesting you brought this up, Daryl, because for years I've toyed
> with the idea of writing a piece about these terms.  I grew up in
> southern California calling any home landscape a "yard."  Then when I
> was fifteen I spent a month in London with my great aunt.  I referred to
> someone's outdoor landscaped space as their yard.  My great aunt got on
> my case (made a deep impression on me) and said it is a garden.  A yard,
> she told me, is the utility space where you store your rubbish bins
> (trash cans to Americans) and other unsightly utilitarian things.  Then
> a few years ago I got talking to the gardening experts at Colonial
> Williamsburg in Virginia, and they told me that in colonial days, the
> yard was the outdoor work space - where the laundry was done (open fires
> to boil the huge wash cauldron), things stored, etc.   Gardens would
> have been the cultivated space, either ornamental or vegetable (very
> high class to have an ornamental - or pleasure - garden in those
> days).   Clearly the British connections were still strongly felt, and
> the terminology came with them across the Atlantic.  I don't know when
> the vocabulary started to shift in this country.
>    So partly due to the influence of my great aunt in London (now
> deceased, but her legacy continues) and partly due to the fact that I
> think "yard" is an ugly word to describe something lovely, I always
> refer to cultivated space around a home as a garden, and I feel very
> peeved when an editor will occasionally - and arbitrarily - change the
> word to yard.
>    Catriona
>
> dp2413@comcast.net wrote:
>
>>25 years ago, "garden" meant vegetables. Everything else was "yard"
>>
>>In my part of the south, "landscape" to too many is a boring blend of 
>>foundation shrubs and Bermudagrass Lawn. People with "landscapes" may have 
>>flower gardens, sometimes herbs, rarely vegetables.
>>
>>The trend now is towards outdoor living and outdoor rooms, of course. 
>>While people might have a landscape designer, I don't think there's a 
>>consensus on the term. I think "landscape" will win out.
>>
>>"Landscape" has remained the term for cohesive plantings and hardscape 
>>among many gardeners, but see pp 2 for how the suburbanites regard it.
>>
>>Has this confused your confusion?  ;-)
>>
>>Daryl
>>
>>
>> -------------- Original message ----------------------
>>From: jo ellen meyers sharp <hoosiergardener@sbcglobal.net>
>>
>>
>>>What do southerners call their gardens? Does garden mean veggies or
>>>flowers or both? Do landscape and flower garden mean the same thing?
>>>
>>>Does 'southern' imply vegetable gardening in the south? Other
>>>comments? Thoughts?
>>>
>>>Thank you.
>>>
>>>jems
>>>
>>>
>>>
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