DryStoneGarden

View from the Stage, click to enlarge

‘I wanted it to have the feeling of being in one of the great Greek amphitheaters,’ Lawrence Halprin

Last month I went to Stern Grove and took some photos. I’d been there during concerts, but I wanted to check it out without all the crowds. It didn’t disappoint. It’s a great space, with awesome stonework, and worth visiting even when there isn’t a concert happening. I wasn’t expecting to see anyone there, but an impressive number of people passed through the space, even though it was a rainy Sunday morning. I’d always thought of it as a theatre, but it also works quite nicely as a park.

View from the West

The Grove has been a park and concert space since the 1930’s, but the stonework is all from about 5 years ago when Lawrence Halprin led a big renovation. Before the renovation it was just a natural amphitheater, and everyone would slowly slide downhill while they listened to music. Halprin terraced the slope and turned it into a proper Greek theater. My first impression of him when I started to learn about his work was that he tended to just make things up, but the design at the Grove is actually quite true to the style of the Greeks, with appropriate stonework and other detailing. Even the plan, which is rather free-form, is in keeping with the old Greeks’ appreciation for natural topography. From what I can tell, amphitheaters close to the center of the Greek empire tended to have a more regular form, while the ones built towards the fringes tended to be more irregular. Which makes the irregular form of this Greek amphitheater in San Francisco, 6500 miles from Greece, perfectly aligned with that tradition. One theater in particular, Thorikos, has a plan that reminds me of Stern Grove. Read the rest of this entry »

Yesterday was the second birthday of DryStoneGarden. Posting has been somewhat slower this year, but still pretty steady, and the post total is now over 200. We’ll see if it hits 300 by the third birthday. Thanks to all who read and comment.

Last December I admired the aspens at Tilden, here and here, after they’d dropped their leaves. I told myself I should stop and check out their fall color this year, and I did actually follow through, stopping in several times to walk the garden while the aspens were coloring. They were nice, not quite like I saw in the mountains on my way back from Bishop but I give them extra points for doing it near the coast. In general, this doesn’t seem to have been one of our best years for color. I think the early storms knocked off a lot of the leaves as soon as they changed.

September

The aspens were definitely nice, though, and are of course great after they drop their leaves. I’m a fan of local natives, but it’s also great to see mountain species down here in the Bay Area. I’m lucky that my commute takes me past Tilden so regularly.

This Week

The aspens have been bare for a while now. Willows and spicebush are two of the main species coloring and dropping leaves there. In my own garden, the spicebush still has most of its leaves and even a couple of flowers and buds. I’m only five miles away, but in a less frosty microclimate.

Wildcat Creek

There’s one vine maple turned red. All the other fall color is yellow.

Vine Maple, Acer cirnatum

And along with fall color, November means that manzanita season is approaching. A few had token blooms, but this one was starting up its full bloom.

Parry Manzanita Starting Up

Townmouse recently mentioned the 2010 Fall Color Project that Dave at the Home Garden is hosting. He’s collecting and posting links to blogs around the country that are showing off their fall color. Click through to the kickoff post or to his front page to start with the most recent collection.

Trachycarpus fortunei on the left, Brahea edulis on the right

Our client at the cracked pot garden recently went through her garden ID’ing all of the plants, a task which was harder than you might think because it was originally planted by a horticulturalist with a love for variety. There are six kinds of lavender, for instance, and both Julia Phelps and Dark Star Ceanothus, two of the most similar forms of Ceanothus. The plant list for the garden is about as long as the list for my entire planting career, or at least it feels that way. Anyways, in the process, we were trying to ID the palms in the garden, a new horticultural task for me. I’ve never planted a palm and don’t know them well, though I’m starting to appreciate them; they might be my favorite element in this particular garden. They look great with the mix of foliage, and in particular with a couple of California natives, the mounding forms of Fremontodendron and Ceanothus.

Brahea edulis

I really like the combination of the Brahea edulis with the low, mounding form of Fremontodendron, F. californicum decumbens. Both plants have a prehistoric look to them.

Blue Mediterranean Fan Palm, Chamaerops humilis cerifera

Another nice native with non-native combo, the Blue Mediterranean Fan Palm against the the dark green foliage of ceanothus behind it.

Trachycarpus wagnerianus?

According to the original plant list, one of the Trachcyarpus specimens is T. wagnerianus, the (relatively) dwarf species of windmill palm. I think this is the one. It’s smaller in size than the others and it’s sited where I would expect to find the dwarf planted, but I don’t know enough about palms to be sure.

I also don’t know what this one in a container is, something dwarf and slow. It looks good against the Chondropetalum behind it. Quite a few other plants were figured. Among others, we ID’ed the aster-family shrub I showed in April. It’s a Shrub Aster, Felicia fruticosa, a good plant to know. It’s quite the show-stopper when it blooms.

Soon after Smith Rock, we spent some time at one of my other favorite rock places, the Buttermilks. The Buttermilks is an area of massive boulders right at the base of the eastern slope of the Sierras, near Bishop. Astonishingly big boulders with great views of the mountains.

Grandma and Grandpa Peabody

The Grandma and Grandpa Peabody boulders are the biggest ones I’ve ever seen just sitting completely exposed on top of the earth. They remind me of the way sloppy landscapers sometimes place rocks by just dumping them out of the truck. Generally speaking, it’s bad form if people can see the underside of a boulder, but when the boulder is a fifty foot tall chunk of granite, there’s something nice about seeing it placed so casually. Nature’s good at getting away with unnatural-looking effects.

Grandma and Grandpa Peabody again

There’s almost always a group of climbers on the underside of the Peabodies.

The Ironman Boulder on the Right

The Ironman Boulder, with the low traverse across its face, is another one that always has climbers on it. Photos from the Buttermilks and two other nearby climbing areas below the fold. Read the rest of this entry »

Crater Lake

On the way back from Smith we stopped at Crater Lake National Park and hiked to the top of one of the little peaks on the crater. We also checked out the Crater Lake Lodge, which turned out to have an interesting history. It opened in 1915, and from the sound of things was always the source of complaints. It was at the end of dirt road a long ways from any town, and the site was much more extreme than Oregon contractors were used to in those days, so some corners were cut on the construction and it was never completely finished. Running the lodge was always a hassle; water, electricity, laundry, and staffing were difficult, and the structure itself was never sound. The stone walls were hollow and built on an ash base without a foundation, causing the floors and walls of the building to buckle and warp as the building settled.

In the late eighties the building was declared unsafe and the park service decided to tear it own to build a new lodge. But then the public objected. The park service reminded everyone that they had been complaining about the lodge since its opening and that no one had ever been happy with the building, but everyone replied back that they didn’t care, they wanted to save it. So the park service spent 4 years completely rebuilding it, taking it down to the ground and rebuilding it with a basement and a proper foundation, and rebar, wall ties, and a concrete core inside the stone walls. They numbered and stored all of the stones and then put each one back in the same place.

I can’t speak to the finances of it, but the renovated building is hugely popular. It was all full in late September, and they recommend making reservations a year in advance. I didn’t take my camera with me when Anita and I hiked to the top of the peak behind the lodge, but we both agreed that the lodge improved the view, creating a nice focal point on the circular rim around the lake.

They had information about the history of the lodge and a nice cross-section of the new walls.