RE: Embothrium and Harland Hand's garden

Hello Cheryl,

I have my home and garden in Berkeley, California,
near the North Berkeley Bart Station on Delaware
Street.  If you are going to visit Harland Hand's
garden, you are in for a treat.  His sister Lou Schley
is doing a very good job of keeping the garden in good
shape, and I had been helping her for a few months
last summer with the maintenance, before I took a job
in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, landscaping a palace for
prince Abdul Aziz bin Fahd.  

Harland was a past president of the California
Horticultural Society, and had a very eclectic design
sensibility, in that he grew alot of different types
of plants, combining subtropicals, succulents,
mediterraneans, orchids and rhododendrons and azaleas
in a way that was uniquely his own style, combined
with a very original use of hand formed concrete on a
very steeply sloping site to simulate alpine rock
formations.  There are several articles on his garden
in old issues of Pacific Horticulture magazine, if you
have access to them.

I think that Harland has influenced many of the
current crop of landscape designers here in the east
Bay Area, myself included.  Marcia Donahue's garden,
Roger Raiche's and Bob Clark's gardens are all East
Bay gardens that I think share much of Harland Hand's
influences, and are all located here in the East Bay,
and have all been or will be included as part of the
Garden Conservancy's Open Gardens.  Sonny Garcia's
garden in San Francisco is another garden whcih shares
characteristics with Harland's.  All are worth seeing
if you have a chance, and all are jam packed with more
species of plants than most people could possibly
imagine.  

My own garden(s) lean more to the subtropical than
some of the others, as I am specialized in outdoor
hardy bromeliads, heliconias, succulents, proteas and
cloud forest plants.  I think that I developed my love
of the tropical look from my travels in Brazil and
southeast Asia.  My garden was featured in the August
1998 issue of Sunset Magazine, if you are
interested...



- Cheryl & Wayne Renshaw <renshaw@best.com> wrote:
> Hi David,
> 
> I think I'll be seeing this garden in a few weeks as
> part of my plant design
> class at Foothill College. If it's the garden I
> think it is, his heirs are
> planning a renovation of the garden for this
> spring...my instructor had to
> do some pleading to allow us to see it now before
> the renovation. I'm
> looking forward to seeing it.
> 
> I've been enjoying your contributions to the list.
> Where in the Bay Area do
> you garden? I'm down in the South Bay in Santa
> Clara.
> 
> Cheryl
> 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: owner-medit-plants@ucdavis.edu
> > [o*@ucdavis.edu]On Behalf
> Of david feix
> > Sent: Friday, October 06, 2000 7:48 PM
> > To: theryans@xtra.co.nz; Mediterannean Plants List
> > Subject: Re: Embothrium
> >
> >
> > Regarding Embothrium, it can be grown in the San
> > Francisco Bay Area, although it is quite rare
> here.
> > There is a a very beautiful specimen growing in
> > Harland Hand's garden in El Cerrito, which blooms
> > reliably every year, and has even set seed.  The
> small
> > tree is about 15 feet tall.  This garden is in the
> fog
> > belt of the east bay hills, and gets alot more
> > humidity and fog drip as a result, and is
> considerably
> > more moist than down in the flatlands of Berkeley
> > where I garden.  Harland had amended the whole
> garden
> > with a local product called supersoil, and the
> garden
> > receives overhead spray irrigation every 3 to 4
> days
> > in the dry months.
> > The garden is well worth a visit, and is open to
> the
> > general public during the Garden Conservancy Tour
> > dates for the Bay Area, as recently as last
> weekend...
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > - Tony & Moira Ryan <theryans@xtra.co.nz> wrote:
> > > William Bade wrote:
> > > >
> > > > I haven't taken part in this discussion yet,
> but
> > > would like to add that
> > > > there were laburnums in Danish gardens when we
> > > lived there. We were
> > > > cautioned that they were poisonous, and that I
> > > should watch my children
> > > > when they played in the garden.
> > > > I have always wondered about the soil they
> need,
> > > as well as the climate.
> > > > I was told that there was no place in Denmark
> > > further than 40 miles from
> > > > the water, and we did have moist air and a
> lovely
> > > light which I felt was
> > > > reflection from the water (Bornholm had it
> > > especially). In some places
> > > > the soil was chalky, a vein that ran from the
> > > island of Mon across Denmark
> > > > to the Dover Cliffs. Is this why they are more
> > > successful there?
> > > > To add another element. I have been told that
> > > Embothrium is not success-
> > > > fully grown in the San Francisco Bay Area
> because
> > > it needs moist air too.
> > > > Could this be the reason?
> > >
> > >  Elly
> > > Although it doesn't actually NEED a limy soil
> > > Laburnum, being a legume
> > > would certainly enjoy it and I am equally sure
> it
> > > would prefer a cool,
> > > moist climate like Britain or Denmark to the hot
> > > part of California.
> > >
> > > Embothrium also, as you suggest, likes a moist
> cool
> > > climate, or at the
> > > least a cool root run, but it can't abide lime.
> > >
> > > Moira
> > >
> > > --
> > > Tony & Moira Ryan <theryans@xtra.co.nz>
> > > Wainuiomata (near Wellington, capital city of
> New
> > > Zealand)
> > >
> >
> >
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> >
> 


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