When my husband and I went to New England in Sept., we stayed in Plymouth, Mass. for a few days.
One of the nicest places we visited was the Mayflower Historical Society Museum. We took a guided tour of the beautiful home that it was located in and learned a lot about the history of its inhabitants.
When we were done with the tour, the guide suggested we visit the formal garden. I hadn't even realized there was a garden in back of the home but boy, am I glad we checked it out.
This formal garden isn't huge but it was beautifully laid out and had all sorts of attractive perennial plantings.
As you can see by the photo, the garden designer had done a good job of what P. Allen Smith calls "framing the view." I loved the arbor gates that defined the view of the historical home. If you click on the photo above, you can see an enlarged view of the home and gardens. Isn't it wonderful?
I think framing the view is a really important landscape design concept. Take a walk around your garden and see if there are some views you would like enhance. Then choose how you'll frame them -- using an arbor gate, an opening in a hedge or fence, by adding garden art, or even by planting some accents like specimen trees or shrubs on either side of a view you'd like to emphasize.
If you would like to take some photo tours of the museum and garden, just go to this site.
