Table of contents for Mar/Apr 2019 in Veranda

THAT’S THE QUESTION renowned New York decorator and Dorothy Draper disciple Carleton Varney asks of each new client before he so much as shows her a fabric swatch. He shared this last March at the Dorothy Draper School of Decorating, a weekend-long retreat he hosted at the historic Greenbrier resort 1 (and at the Draper-designed, and equally storied, Grand Hotel on Michigan’s Mackinac Island in July). Weeks after I’d come home from this most fabulous of girlfriend getaways (the wallpaper! The lectures! The spa!), I couldn’t shake Mr. Varney’s question: What is my first memory of a room? The sunroom from my childhood home in Atlanta—with its rattan lounge chairs, shell-filled lamps, and always-dappled light—where I sat on my father’s lap while he read the paper? The screened porch at…

When 17th-century landscape architect André Le Nôtre was commissioned to design a grand garden for King Louis XIV at his beloved Versailles, he did so with nearly a blank slate. The monarch’s palace was under construction at the time and didn’t have large hedges or mature trees yet. To help match the château’s soaring scale, Le Nôtre established latticework structures. “He relied on treillage to create instant grandeur and forced perspective,” says Philippe Le Manach of Accents of France, a company that designs traditional and contemporary treillage and was commissioned to work on the restoration of the Pavillon Frais at Versailles. Use of “treille” (latticework for vines) dates back to the Greek and Roman Empires. In the 12th century, French gardeners and farmers began fashioning it to support heavy climbers.…

EARLY AMERICAN BEAUTY AT MONTICELLO Thomas Jefferson fashioned the two-acre vegetable garden at his Monticello estate as a laboratory of sorts. More farmer than showman, he experimented with everything from endive to English peas (his favorite), yielding a bountiful terrace of green. Its orderly rows of flourishing crops and locale in the Virginia hills made it an ideal retreat for the statesman, giving rise to a reading pavilion rebuilt in 1984 based on Jefferson’s notes. IF YOU GO: Garden tours are offered April through October, but summer is the best window to avoid school trips. monticello.org ARTISTRY AND EXUBERANCE AT JARDIN MAJORELLE Before Yves Saint Laurent and Pierre Bergé bought the property in 1980, French painter Jacques Majorelle toiled nearly half a century on his gardens and villa in Marrakech.…

1 Follow nature’s calendar. No need to ship in Dutch tulips in September, for instance. There is plenty flowering in any given month, so find abundance in what nature puts on offer. 2 Arrange with an open mind. Allow for asymmetry and let flowers behave naturally, as they do in the garden. Don’t begin with a set shape or formula in your head. 3 Embrace the power of two. Seek flowers that naturally complement each other. 4 Take a step back. As you build your arrangement, slow down and look at it from a distance and from all angles. 5 Spend time in nature. Visiting and walking through gardens will help you arrange more confidently.…

IT’S SAID THAT EVERY HOUSE TELLS A STORY. If so, Ragan Cain’s Mountain Brook, Alabama, home’s is, simply put, a love story. As with many a romance, it begins with a vivacious gal and an unsuspecting suitor: in this case, a 1950s home on the market by its original owners. At first glance Cain was unimpressed with the façade—it was far from the grand Tudor or sweeping colonial she’d always envisioned. But it did offer an unheard-of nine acres inside city limits, which appealed to her, as she and her husband Brad were craving space and a place to put down roots. As she walked through the midcentury rooms for the first time, its intact architecture (original elements like interior shutters, a sweet ’50s kitchen, a groovy sunroom bar with…

TREILLE CHIC Page 30 Image excerpted fromLove Affairs with Houses by Bunny Williams, published by Abrams Books; abramsbooks.com. PETAL PUSHERS Pages 48-50 Prestige Gala Le Bleu vase, $545; rosenthalusa-shop.com. Exotic Plumes wallpaper, to the trade; yorkwall.com. Leslie Freeman stoneware compote, $175; morriceflorist.com. Stoneware vases, from $125; lesliefreeman.com. IN FULL BLOOM Interior design: Mark D. Sikes, 323-378-6927, markdsikes.com. Architecture: James Laughlin, jameslaughlin4@gmail.com. Florals: Marigold Designs, 205-447-4747, marigold-designs.com. Greenery and potted plants: Shoppe, 205-224-4450, shoppebham.com. Wardrobe styling: Megan LaRussa, meganlarussa.com. Page 68 Trim paint: White Dove by Benjamin Moore, benjaminmoore.com. Wallcovering: Gracie, graciestudio.com. Table: Century, centuryfurniture.com. Chairs: Hickory Chair Furniture Co. (host, 828-328-1801) and Henredon, 336-888-4900. Rug: Merida, meridastudio.com. Lighting: Visual Comfort & Co., visualcomfort.com. Page 69 Wall and ceiling paint: Citron, Farrow & Ball (farrowball.com) and White Dove. Blue sofa fabric: Pierre Frey,…

ask Carrie Barratt, the new president of the New York Botanical Garden, to name a favorite collection on the grounds, and she demurs. “A bit like having to pick a favorite child: unfeasible and unwise.” Barratt, however, is quick to confess her passion for sowing the seeds of conservation beyond the garden gates. “Without plants, life on Earth would be impossible,” says Barratt. “My favorite NYBG project, because it can involve all of us, is our Citizen Scientist program,” which enlists volunteers to observe and record data about plant life in their natural surroundings. Here, she shares her (mostly) off-duty indulgences.…

12TH CENTURY French gardeners fashion latticework as vine support. MIDDLE AGES Lattice structures take on an ornamental appearance. 17TH CENTURY Treillage is used as a defining architectural element at Versailles. 18TH CENTURY Marie Antoinette’s mother Maria Theresa decorates her suite at Schönbrunn Palace with murals of treillage and botanicals. 1864 William Morris’s first wallpaper, Trellis, launches. 1907 Elsie de Wolfe creates the Trellis Room at the original Colony Club in New York City. 1960s David Hicks caps the Hollywood Regency era by incorporating trellis patterns into his projects and textile designs. EARLY 1960s Sister Parish decorates Coolidge Point for Thomas Jefferson Coolidge, adorning a sunroom with a trellis mural.…

Step inside the new McKinnon and Harris headquarters in Richmond, Virginia’s historic Scott’s Addition neighborhood, and you’d be hard-pressed to identify the nearly 80-year-old building’s original use. Flooded with natural light thanks to two massive skylights and anchored by a pair of monumental olive trees and a parade of boxwoods, the 65,000-square-foot space exudes tranquility and longevity. But it wasn’t always so. When McKinnon and Harris took possession of the World War II–era building (originally used as a morgue for fallen soldiers), its walls were graffitied, roof caved in, and interiors stockpiled with old school furniture. McKinnon and Harris cofounders (and sister and brother) Anne and Will Massie saw potential despite the years of neglect. Now the building, which houses the corporate headquarters, flagship showroom, and workshop where all of…

HOPPING BETWEEN CENTURIES is second nature for John Derian. A morning spent rearranging tableware in one of his Manhattan shops might slip into an afternoon lost in a mid-1700s English garden. The decoupage artist is a modern-day time traveler, bringing sketches, lithographs, and other prints from eras past into the contemporary art world through his iconic pieces. So it’s little wonder that when he envisioned a rose-themed luncheon in his West Village shop (which opened last year), he readily jumped back a century or two to find his muse. “The floral images I used in the tableware collection came from old instructional texts,”says Derian, who set these against a backdrop of his own cabbage rose wallpaper (The Rose in sepia), a pattern inspired by a 19th-century Currier & Ives painting.…

EARTH LAUGHS IN FLOWERS,”reads Danielle Dall’Armi’s email signature. She’s quoting Emerson, but likely envisioning the uproarious land around her. In the Carpinteria Valley of Southern California, roses in varied scents and colors bloom across the 15 acres where Dall’Armi and her husband Bill Hahn live and farm. “It’s hard to be in a bad mood when you work with roses,”she says. “I’m amazed every day, especially in the spring. The first bloom always takes my breath away.” And yet, these aren’t the hardy tea hybrids that have governed our rose lexicon over the last half century. “I always loved roses—the big, old-fashioned kind my grandmother grew,”says Dall’Armi, who grows more than 120 varieties of English, French, Italian, and even some old American roses alongside the Southern California palms and Italian…

1/ FOR YOUR JEWEL BOX Siddharth Kasliwal uses plique-à-jour—an enameling method that produces an effect much like stained glass—to craft these pretty necklace florets. 2/ FOR A GOOD NIGHT’S SLEEP Loyalists of the London-based fashion house Preen by Thornton Bregazzi can bring the brand’s modern-vintage style home with a new collection of toss cushions and quilted down-filled throws. 3/ FOR KEEPING TIME Get Patek Philippe’s Twenty~4 ladies’ wristwatch in rose gold. The self-winding piece features a diamond-set bezel with a satin shantung gray dial. 4/ FOR AWAKENED SKIN Gardenia stem cells restore skin’s collagen while magnolia oil extract brightens, making this botanical gem a natural (and aromatic) pick-me-up. 5/ FOR A FRAGRANT GIFT If heady floral scents are akin to a walk in a spring garden, count these rose perfumes…

1 Lattice refers to wood or metal strips that crisscross to make square or diamond shapes. 2 Fretwork is more intricate and decorative in appearance and made with a fretsaw. 3 A trellis is a structure made of lattice and/or fretwork. It can be freestanding in a garden or simply a panel attached to a wall. 4 Arbors are freestanding structures usually in the shape of an arch and are distinguished by a continuous piece of latticework running from one side to another. 5 Pergolas are similar to arbors, but typically feature posts that support a flat roof, rather than round arches.…

BEST FLOWER SHOPS IN AMERICA 2019 Flower Power Move OLD MASTER MIX Richly colored and grand in scale, this ambitious arrangement is reminiscent of 17th-century oil paintings. Avant Garden DALLAS, TX Event and floral designer Todd Fiscus’s exuberant blend of mostly Dutch blooms and eclectic home accessories has been a Highland Park institution for 15-plus years. SHOP FOR: porcelain vases, stationery, contemporary art. 214-559-3432; avantgarden.com Emily Thompson Flowers at the Guild NEW YORK, NY Emily Thompson’s breathtaking design work has found a sumptuous new home at the Guild, the Soho retail outpost for interior design firm Roman and Williams, which means picking up flowers will likely lead to shopping for furniture, perusing for collectible books, and pausing for lunch at in-house cafe La Mercerie. SHOP FOR: flowers by the stem, glassware, natural…

the perfect garden is one whose owner died six months ago,” says Shane Connolly from behind an iron worktable. At his feet are a dozen buckets spilling with rhododendrons and white lilacs, Banksian roses, and wild sweet pea. A 17th-century Jacobean manor house half-shrouded in wisteria is behind him. “The best gardens are planned,” he clarifies, “but let nature do its thing.” I’m one of eight students in his courtyard classroom in Oxfordshire, England. He pulls from the buckets as he speaks, arranging the stems into a network of twigs in a low, round bowl. Floral foam and chicken wire, he reasons, are the Spanx of the garden world. “Why do you need to control everything?” he asks. It’s like having Edward Hopper teach you how to paint. Connolly holds…

In 2017, Capucine De Wulf Gooding launched her eponymous jewelry line for every stage of womanhood, from maiden to mademoiselle to madame to matriarch. She’s wearing her Victoria cuff (left), named for her mother and featuring cabochon labradorite set in gold-plated sterling. NEW CANAAN The tony Connecticut suburb, known for its spectacular estates and just 20 minutes from Juliska’s Stamford HQ, is where Gooding and husband David are raising their three daughters. COMFORT-FOOD CRAVING The artful beet salad at Baldanza, a restaurant run by a husband and wife with a passion for seasonal, local food, is divine! The cheeseburger with bacon jam and two types of cheese is ridiculous. VINTAGE SHOPPING STOP The New Canaan Thrift Shop is full of quirky treasures from the wonderful estates in our area. I…

THE GLORY OF ROSES by Allen Lacy, with photographs by Christopher Baker (Abrams) A photographic celebration of the delicate, determined rose A VICTORIAN FLOWER DICTIONARY by Mandy Kirkby (Ballantine Books) An illustrated guide to flowers and their historic, literary, and cultural significance THE BOOK OF FLOWERS by H. Walter Lack (Taschen) A catalogue of French flower painter Pierre-Joseph Redouté’s magnificent botanical illustrations IN SEARCH OF LOST ROSES by Thomas Christopher (University of Chicago Press) A surprisingly riveting account of how centuries-old, all-but-forgotten rose varieties have been brought back to life…

WHEN DAVID AUSTIN presented Dame Judi Dench with an eponymous rose at the 2017 RHS Chelsea Flower Show, the acclaimed actress sneezed. It was an apricot-orange beauty “with ruffled petals and a button eye,”and is one of a dozen in Austin’s catalog bearing the name of an English luminary (among them, the robustly fragrant Charles Darwin and tenacious-pink Princess Anne). In many ways, what the 84-year-old Dench is to acting, David C.H. Austin was to rose breeding. His legacy is rooted deep in the 120 varietals of roses he brought to the floral market since he began experimenting in the late 1940s, ranging from shrub roses and ramblers to climbers and floribunda. He learned how to farm alongside his father, who bought 500 acres in Shropshire, England, in 1920. He…

ANNE BOLEYN Warm pink rosette-shaped flowers bloom in large, enchanting sprays. CHARLES DARWIN Voluptuous and fragrant cup-shaped blooms echo the color of sunshine. DAME JUDI DENCH Soft, ruffled petals exude a fresh tea fragrance. PRINCESS ANNE This award-winning repeat bloomer has a vivacious, deep pink hue. THOMAS À BECKET A highly fragrant red variety celebrated for its health and resilience. ROALD DAHL Orange-red buds of this free-flowering shrub open into peach rosettes. QUEEN OF SWEDEN The romantic, soft-pink flower is known for its intoxicating myrrh scent.…

THE PHRASE “DREAM HOUSE”gets tossed around lightheartedly. But to anyone involved in a design project, the actual journey from dream to house is often a long and complex one. For Shauna Varvel, this process was set in motion by a clear and compelling vision. “Shauna had always envisioned having a place in France one day,”says interior designer Susan Bednar Long, who previously worked on several projects for the client. “This was very close to her heart.” Finding the right property required patience, however. The Varvel family is large—Shauna, her husband, and five kids (two with new spouses)—and quite athletic, so they longed for a substantial house set upon flat, open land. This is a rarity in Provence, which is known for its rocky vineyards, olive groves, and ancient hill towns.…