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Even when it ’s cool in Los Angeles , every few sidereal day Lari Pittman gets up early to turn on the sprinklers in Parque Oaxaca , the three - quarter - acre private garden he and his partner Roy Dowell have been build for nearly a XII days . It ’s mostly cacti and succulent , olive and pepper trees — drought - broad plants that can endure the heat without watering .
TallAloe bainesiiandEchinocactus grusoniiflank a house designed by Los Angeles architect Michael Maltzan . picture by : Ann Summa . SEE MORE PHOTOS OF THIS GARDEN
“ I think of it as community service , ” Pittman says , smile and watching the hummingbirds and blue jay flit through the spray . The thick coastal scrub in the steep arroyo just beyond the garden is full of athirst Bronx cheer and beast — cervid , bobcat , quail , fox , even bears . Occasionally he encounters a 4 - foot - long green - stripy garden serpent during his watering task . Rather than panic , as he might once have done , Pittman says hello .
Pittman and Dowell have been pillars in the modern fine art world for 30 twelvemonth , exhibit their work in gallery and museums around the world . A couple since the mid-70s , their artistic styles are in many ways polar antonym . Pittman ’s tumid canvases are often a topsy-turvydom of images and messages frozen in a pleasing clarity , a humorous tumble down Alice ’s hare maw . By direct contrast , Dowell ’s collages are abstract , phase and colors that speak to the emotion mutely , like free - form nothingness .
Their garden high in the Verdugo Hills is a collaboration of both sensitiveness : playful , dramatic , perfectly staged , and expertly balanced . It ’s impossible to separate individual influences on this private botanical canvas . age before Dowell and Pittman met at the California Institute of the Arts in the ’ 70s , they severally collected cacti and succulent . Now they have let loose the design and gloss possibilities of these industrial plant in a carefully crafted build . There are hulk and pygmies , the spineless paddle cactus and the horrendous Pisces the Fishes sweetener . The scene is softened by fleshy agave , thick rosemary , and the fronds of palo verde and California pepper trees overhead . The garden is anchored around an open - air marquee that serves as an outdoor kitchen and living room .
Among the garden ’s many succulent and cacti areCereus peruvianus‘Monstrosus’,Agave americana , andC. peruvianus . photograph by : Ann Summa . SEE MORE PHOTOS OF THIS GARDEN
In 1998 , when the twosome heard about a 6 - acre parcel for sale in the foothills , they leap at the probability to get such a large chunk of res publica just minute from downtown Los Angeles . The dimension had been an unfinished development undertaking of iconic Modernist architect Richard Neutra and include a 1953 woodwind instrument - and - ice building with views all the way to the sea . After living there for a few years , the couple commissioned local architect Michael Maltzan to build an additional home on the property , where they now reside . burnished livid and modernistic , it sits below the Neutra house ( which now hosts guests ) , nearer to the garden .
shortly after the two bought the belongings , they had the garden blank level and authorize with a tractor . From this bare canvas they begin to lay out the introductory structure in the form of parterre , squares , and rectangles within an irregular trapezoidal space . Working with their longtime gardener , Jose Amaya , they used a 200 - metrical unit stretch of roofy and stakes , marking the line with granite boulders collected from the land .
“ It was like Haussmann redoing central Paris , ” says Pittman , referencing the urban preparation superintend by Baron Georges - Eugene Haussmann 150 years ago , found the ballpark and boulevard of New Paris . “ We roll in the hay it was big and we could n’t simply start put in genus Petunia here and there . ”
The first planting were dozens of firm - growingSchinus molle(Californian pepper tree ) in 15 - gal pots , selected for their architectural knockout and the shade project by their feathery leaves . The trees , native to Peru , can grow 50 feet tall . Twin gravel nerve tract were lay , mention Reforma and Insurgentes after the main avenue in Mexico City . Reforma forms the spine , start at the western edge within a 12 - tree diagram Olea europaea grove . It run straight as an arrow to the back of the incline where it is frame by manicure hedges of rosemary . A small tearoom was installed early on at the steep recession of the arroyo ’s walls . “ We wanted a place to sit and look out things grow , ” says Dowell .
Once the boulevards were in , section by section , they started filling in the parquet circle , and the physical composition began to take shape : hundred of golden gun barrel cactus ; blue - gray tequila agave ; squat ball - shapedEuphorbia obesa ; candelabrum - likeprickly pear opuntiawith their broad 2-dimensional paddles , some gullible and others pink ( the Santa Rita variety ) ; blue - greenCereus peruvianus‘Monstrosus ’ , tall and columnlike , its ribs winding in a twisting figure . The absolute majority came from growers Worldwide Exotics in nearby Sylmar .
“ We ’re not connoisseur , ” Pittman articulate . “ It ’s not about placing the flora in a context in this idea of naturalism . realism itself is a form of simulation . The musical theme of multiple [ planting ] is a form of order . The core logical system of the garden is repeating . ”
When put in their plants , Roy Dowell and Lari Pittman eschew traditional landscape gardening rules in party favor of an esthetic vision prevail by mathematical proportion and repetition . exposure by : Ann Summa . SEE MORE exposure OF THIS GARDEN
“ When you have a good deal of one plant together , like the barrels or the aloes , you see what they do , how they grow and behave in certain environments , ” contribute Dowell .
The force strength was esthetics , on constructing sight and private moments that get the eye and challenge the have a bun in the oven perspectives . They repose out the favorable gun barrel using paper plates as markers . Each is precisely equidistant from the other , no matter the viewing slant . With each step , the position change yet impossibly persist the same .
In natural spring , the garden ’s multiples expose the sleeping colour palette in breathtaking profusion . Rose , red , and orange bud pop out like gumballs from mammillaria , wan gold ping - niff musket ball - size of it blossoms come up above theLeucospermum cordifolium‘Yellow Bird ’ , Dame Muriel Spark of red fire adorn theFerocactus pilosus , and everywhere the vermillion - transcend angry walk of aloe sway .
come up summer , the orotund specimen , like thePachycereus pringlei , dominate the middle , imposing and statuesque . The bigger cactus , like the black pepper trees , are snip . The tight - grow paddle cactus , Opuntia , are harvested for propagation elsewhere , most recently along the foresighted private road that wind up to the house from the street below . And in wintertime , the garden sleep .
While any visitant can appreciate the blend of viewpoint , the names of the garden ’s sections stem from a more secret language , a whimsical logic that produce signified only to the two creative person . There ’s Sicily , predominantly olives but also compact with protea ‘ Pink Ice ’ . To the right is Tribeca , name for its triangular shape , watch by East Village , referencing another New York neighborhood . San Miguel de Allende is next , a reminder of the couple ’s 2d home in central Mexico . Provence is in the back where the farsighted coastal rosemary edge flank Refoma , evoke a snap of a European garden way of life . And down front is Oaxaca , the cardinal essence next to the pavilion , named in honour of the garden ’s inspiration , the Jardin Etnobotanico in Oaxaca City , Mexico . Built on the grounds of an honest-to-god monastery by creative person Francisco Toledo , the Jardin is a political statement about the grandness of the Zapotec , Mixtec , and 14 other indigenous kinship group of Oaxaca .
Their garden also contains a political content , say Pittman . He and Dowell are successful and well - educated but live in a world that can be hostile to their lifestyle . “ All jolly people , young and old , tacitly and with a keen sense of personal survival , understand that ‘ public space ’ is ‘ heterosexual blank space ’ and that ‘ private space ’ is our best wager , ” he pronounce . “ secret infinite , including gardens , can be modify , give voice , polemize , and decorated . ”
At one head , when the cactus were going in , the match began questioning the wiseness of the project , occupy that it was too much , that it was becoming a betise . But the uncertainity overtake as they step back and considered the ephemeral nature of their project as a whole . “ The garden is bigger than us and more substantial , ” Pittman suppose , smiling . “ And the bush is here naturally , ” Dowell adds . “ Eventually , it will occur back and take over . Some of the cactus will die but some are still go bad to live on and take off . ”
Jeff Spurrier write on a regular basis about gardens in Los Angeles . This is his first piece forGARDEN DESIGN .
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