Historically and etymologically 'garden' relates to enclosure and whether this is a wall a hedge or a fence it serves to concentrate what you are calling "the eye's focus of vision". When no such enclosure exists the transition between the yard and the area beyond offers a challenge to this focus. In the two examples we have seen lately the problem is exacerbated because the bed (garden) is right up against the "outer limits" leaving no space for the usual forms of transition. When the flower beds are near the house and there is stretch of grass ending in a shrubbery that backs on to a woodland area the problem is solved. When the flower bed is at the other end and IT backs on to woodland I see a way that it could work if the flower bed is used to frame an entrance, with or without arch to the woodland.

I also think that there are some folks who need context and some who don't. I, personally, need everything in context with connections where some others might be fine looking at things in isolation. It's one of the reasons I don't enjoy flower and garden shows...all those little (or larger) vignettes, but the whole of it is discombobulated. For some folks, though, the isolated vignettes give pleasure and there is no internal need for there to be a unifying gestalt.

Sometimes, particularly in a landscape/garden you are familiar with, your eyes/brain edits out the stuff that doesn't 'belong' or distracts from what is featured. I suspect that is what happens with people who enjoy garden shows - you know the scene is artificial but you can 'erase' the jarring background and enter into the illusion.

One of the reasons I find photographs of the garden useful is that I know I do the unconscious editing when I look at the garden. But, when I take a photo, the camera won't do that edit! The neighbours houses/cars just won't cooperatively disappear, nor will unfortunate placements of plants or other 'things' in the garden. Looking at the pictures or realizing how difficult (or impossible) it is to capture with a camera what you 'see' when you look at the garden, makes you realize that what you 'see' is often not what others see. And that makes you think differently about what needs changing in the garden. (...assuming you care at all about other's view of the garden or whether it is just for yourself...)

We seem to be at odds over the universal, classic(?) and the particular or subjective. If you can't see it then it isn't there (beauty is in the eye of the beholder) versus a 'unifying Gestalt'. I know from experience that you can leave a pile of wood, soon to be logs for the fire, so long that the original intention is forgotten and you just walk around it as you did the tree the logs came from. As woodyoak says we just edit it out. What we need is an internal MIL. you know she is right but boy does that get up your nose.

You can have a great composition put together in a pot. It is beautiful and complete.

You can have that pot on the corner of a nice set of steps in front of a really nice front door making yet another great composition.

You can have a great house with a great planting in front of it that has a wonderful door and set of steps with a pot of beauty nicely placed on that step.

The house can be in a beautiful yard .... in a nice neighborhood ..... in a nice town....

Or it could be a lousy town, or a nasty neighborhood, or the yard needs work, or the planting is not so great, or the steps are ugly, or the pot, ...

The point is that no matter what the detail is, all of these other things either support it or detract from it. Anything that you have the ability to enhance or mitigate will add to the overall affect (or effect or iffect or uffect, whichever it is). You don't always have control over every variable, either physically or based upon the compromises we all have to make in our daily lives. But when there is no compelling reason not to address these things, it makes sense to address them.

If your shoes don't go with your outfit and you have a pair that are equally adequate for where you are going that do match, why not change them. ... and some of us have to ask "do these shoes go with these pants?". When we do, we can get mad if we are told that they don't. Or we can get second and third opinions. Maybe we'll change them, maybe we won't. Maybe we care, maybe we don't.

Maybe we don't notice and just keep on keeping on.

But, when you call in a bunch of fashion consultants and they tell you your shoes don't go, you might want to think about it.

This is one of those great subjects that add so much depth to my gardening experience.

Off topic, though -- Andrew, I appreciated your comment in another recent thread that one reason you write here is to improve your communication skills. I always have enjoyed the philosophical tone of your comments.

One thing you are aware of is that you haven't pinned down the difference between 'affect' and 'effect,' and lots of other writers have the same problem.

No wonder! Both words are used both as verbs and as nouns. In this case the word 'effect' should be used, as a noun: 'the overall effect.' 'Affect,' when used as a noun, has the accent on the FIRST syllable and has to do with emotion, mainly in psychiatry. So probably just about always, if you're using it as a noun, it will be 'effect.'

As for verbs, let's save that for another day. :)

Maro

I have to say I approach temporary gardens (such as show gardens) with different expectations than permanent ones - after all, the "vignettes", as Barefootinct put it, are only meant to give an idea of what could be. In my own show project, I did "import" the spirit of one place into another, which I wouldn't do if the garden was permanent. Using local materials and native plants makes a lot of sense to me.
So what if the "outer limits" are less than idyllic? In one's daily environment, even if it's possible to visually "edit out" the discrepancies, I'm sure they accumulate as stress somewhere in the hindbrain. Does that lead to the conclusion that it's not worth adding the missing color nuance to the flower bed if my shed is ugly? Funny thing is, it doesn't. The flower bed becomes an oasis of beauty that gives me reason to improve the shed.
Another alternative would be to "go grunge" and follow in the footsteps of artists who saw beauty in ugliness. Grow tomatoes in old tires and fly Jolly Roger, whatever, just make sure it's big and loud. Anyone fancy a heavy metal garden?

When you have less than ideal backgrounds you mitigate them. One way is to screen them out, but they are often too big to screen, so you distract to make them insignificant.

Timbu, if you think about it, you did take into account the surroundings that you were dealing with. Your vignette had something built into it to overcome the surroundings, or lack of surroundings.

There are usually ways that you can disengage from surroundings. Taking the flower pot on the steps again as the example, if the rest of the planting is less than ideal and out of the budget, a couple of key plants on either side could frame it into a slightly bigger composition.

What I'm trying to say is that whatever your composition is, it sits in a larger composition. And, whatever your composition is, it has smaller ones within it. The smaller one looks nicer if the larger one that it sits within is nicely done. The larger one looks nicer if the smaller ones within it are nicely done.

Whenever any of those compositions are less than ideal, it is good to try to overcome them by overpowering with something else. That is distracting from or mitigating the negative.

Sorry if this sounds argumentative Andrew but in the past you have said that it is best to work from the big picture towards detail, isn't what you are saying above the opposite to that?

Sorry if this sounds argumentative Andrew but in the past you have said that it is best to work from the big picture towards detail, isn't what you are saying above the opposite to that?

Sorry if this sounds argumentative Andrew but in the past you have said that it is best to work from the big picture towards detail, isn't what you are saying above the opposite to that?

Sorry , I was told that my message had been rejected so I tried again... and again but you only need to answer one of my questions Andrew. Outer limits indeed..twilight zone.

I probably didn't express myself well at the end of my comment above. I was trying to say that, while I 'edit' things mentally and unconsiciously, pictures can draw that editing to my attention. Once I am consciously aware of the 'editing' that I am doing, the need to, as laag says, do something to mitigate whatever I am mentally editing out is highlighted. But sometimes I just decide it's not worth the effort/that I can live with it as it is.

As I have gotten more versed in landscape design my awareness of unity has increased to beyond my own property line (hence the title beyond the outer limits, sorry couldnÂt resist the sci-fi tie inÂ). Ensuring that everything works together when viewed from multiple angles and heights has grown into how the area under my dominion fits into the context of itÂs surrounding areaÂ. The universal Gestalt mentioned by Ink. See 'link below for Gestalt, is how the mind attempts to find some order or unity in the whole of everything in itÂs perception.

Others would suggest that this is not necessary or needed as long as the garden is self-consistent and defined on itÂs own terms. If itÂs pretty why bother to look else-where?

Laag has mentioned in several posting to start from the general to the specific. The universal Gestalt maybe the most general for me but for others it may be a step later in their design process in determining what style of garden to pursue or the placement of tree/shrubs for screening.

Here is a link that might be useful: Gestalt

Tony,

I was worried that you were a designbot for a moment, there. I'm glad it was just a computer error.

I'm still into big to small, general to detail, abstract to specific, and such.

I guess I have a two part answer.

One is that no matter what our composition is it can always be bigger, but we are always eventually limited by one reason or another (property line, budget, ...).

The second part of the answer is that rather than designing from small to big, it was more of an analysis of what is built starting with the pot and realizing that it is part of bigger and bigger contexts. I did not mean to imply that one would start their design with the pot and work out from it.

I really think that many people see tidbits in gardens that are very well supported giving them the illusion that the tidbit itself is the thing that is beautiful. They copy the tidbit and it is a disappointment.

"tidbit" is a word you inherited from your mother Andrew (I know these things)but this is the difference between what a photographer captures on the perfectly still moist day that is truly a vignette, an interpretation as it were,and what is going on in the garden.

I know that you are right, Tony (on both counts). It is just that some of the posters and lurkers are limited as to how much of it they can take on for one reason or another. Sometimes I don't consider that, but on this thread I'm trying to.

Laag, when you say "tidbit" I automatically get a mental image of a Japanese stone lantern!