My newly painted outdoor garden furniture looks so wonderful out on my terraces - a new coat of paint is an easy way to update and transform these metal pieces.
Not long ago, I decided to paint a large number of metal furniture pieces my signature "Bedford gray". Some of the items were old, weathered, and in need of attention, while others were simply painted the wrong shade or color. It took several days to prime and paint the furniture, and then a few more until everything was completely dry. Last week, we put them all out where they could be used and enjoyed by visiting family and friends.
Here are some photos.
Earlier this month, I gathered all my mismatched, timeworn, metal garden furniture along with some pieces that had been incorrectly painted, and prepared a painting area outside my Winter House carport, so all the furniture could be repainted the same Bedford gray.
Two of my crew – Pete and Fernando – took on the task of spray painting every piece – first with a primer made especially for metal and then with an oil based finishing paint.
All the pieces looked so great once finished. Then it was another three days of drying to make sure everything was completely dry. Drying time is heavily dependent on the surface of the material. Oil-based paints take longer to dry on metal than on wood or drywall. There was no rain in the forecast, so it was fine to leave them all drying in my carport.
The first pieces I moved were these benches. They look so nice outside my Flower Room. It creates a whole new space for rest and contemplation here in this passage way to my Winter House kitchen.
Last Friday, Pete and I began moving the rest of the furniture to their new summertime homes.
On this terrace, I placed this charming plant stand. I’m looking forward to filling it with small potted plants from my greenhouse.
Have you every seen one of these? It is called a “conversation chair.” Over the centuries it has also been known as the courting bench, a tête-à-tête, a chaperone chair, the vis-à-vis, or the gossip chair. It was considered a piece of sophistication and style during the Gilded and Victorian age.
Here’s another view. Conceived in 19th century France, the basic setup shows two seats conjoined in a serpentine shape, allowing sitters to have a quiet, more intimate conversation while also preventing too much physical contact because of the shared armrest cleverly doubling as an elegant barrier.
Over in front of this window is a dainty single chair – also in the same Victorian era style. But look closely…
It is actually in miniature size – for the youngest of guests.
And here is an average sized Victorian style bench – also painted the same Bedford gray.
In the courtyard behind my Winter House kitchen, Pete and Dawa transport this large plant stand.
It looks very nice behind this table. Once the glass tabletop is returned, this will be a great spot for summertime brunches.
Another small table is positioned on the terrace behind my Summer House. These chairs are Francois Carre Sunburst chairs, also known as Pinwheel chairs.
Nearby is another Sunburst chair sitting behind a small glass covered metal desk looking out at the formal sunken garden. These chairs were made in both France and the United States until the 1940s. They have a spring mechanism on the seat and backs.
And look at the garden now – so lush and green with all the beautiful foliage. When I first designed this garden, I called it my Boxwood Room. It measures 60 by 120 feet. The garden’s focal point is the old Ginkgo tree at the back of the garden. On the sides are smaller ginkgo trees planted over the sculpted boxwood shrubs and hedges.
And over on the terrace parterre in front of my Winter House kitchen – this circular bench, ready for visiting friends and family.
Over on the other side, tables and other seating arrangements – everything is now all matched and ready for summer entertaining.
One single bench is placed in front of the herb garden with a perfect view of the paddocks and stable beyond. We are in desperate need of some rain here in the Northeast and in much of the country, but the gardens are looking beautiful this season.
Here is another view over one of two hand-casted antique fountains I purchased many year ago. They are 19th century fountains with a hexagonal shape. I installed them about four years ago and the birds love them. I hope you are all enjoying your summer and the beauty of your gardens.
Another good pruning job is complete at my Bedford, New York farm - this time, on the hedges surrounding my swimming pool.
In 2018, we planted more than 170 purple columnar beech trees, Fagus sylvatica 'Dawyck Purple' along the inside of the pool fence. The columnar beech is a splendid tree with deep-purple foliage that holds its color all season long. Around the outside of the pool fence, I have a hedge of two dark-colored burgundy-black leafed specimens - Physocarpus opulifolius ‘Diabolo’ and Cotinus coggygria ‘Royal Purple' shrubs. I always try to incorporate unique and interesting plantings into my gardens - all these have superlative color and appealing form. This week, my crew gave the hedges a good pruning to keep them all healthy and looking their best.
Enjoy these photos.
When planning the gardens around my pool four years ago, I wanted to create a natural border along both sides of my pool fence, so I chose a dark purple color palette. These Physocarpus and Cotinus shrubs have grown quite a bit since last year – it’s hard to see the beech trees behind them.
Here is the inside hedge of columnar beech trees. These are fastigiate meaning their branches slope upward more or less parallel to the main stem. I knew these would be perfect around the pool, but like all garden specimens, they must be well-maintained. It was time to prune them all at least a foot.
The leaves of the columnar purple beech are rounded ellipses, two to four inches long and one to three inches wide, with an undulating margin and a slightly pointed tip. They are smooth and softly lustrous in the sunlight. In spring the new leaves are a vibrant, deep purple-red. As they mature in summer they become dark burgundy-purple, holding this color well through the hotter weather.
Physocarpus is commonly called ninebark, and is an upright, spreading, somewhat coarse, deciduous, Missouri-native shrub which is closely related to the genus Spiraea. It boasts a deep burgundy foliage with ovate to rounded, usually three to five lobed leaves that are dull green in summer changing to an undistinguished yellow in fall. Then its color veers toward bronzy red by the time the leaves fall in late November.
After the white flowers of the physocarpus bloom, what follows are these seed pods – a favorite food of small birds.
Also known as smoketree or smoke bush, Cotinus is a genus of two species of flowering plants in the family Anacardiaceae, closely related to the sumacs. They are a great choice for massing or for hedges. The stunning dark red-purple foliage turns scarlet in autumn and has plume-like seed clusters, which appear after the flowers and give a long-lasting, smoky haze to branch tips.
In fact, the name “smoke bush” comes from this – the billowy hairs attached to the flower clusters which remain in place through the summer, turning a smoky pink to purplish-pink. I have many smoke bushes around the farm.
Here’s Chhiring starting to prune the outside shrubs. Pruning means to lop or cut off any superfluous branches or shoots for better-shape and better growth. These look fuller every year – in part because of our regular pruning.
Chhiring cuts off any dead or crisscrossing branches first. The rule of thumb when pruning is to cut the dead, diseased, damaged, non-productive, structurally unsound, or otherwise unwanted plant material. The branch on the right is dead – it is woody and hollow.
To remove the top, Chhiring uses our STIHL HSA 94 R Hedge Trimmer, which is ideal for making clean pruning cuts.
Chhiring carefully goes over the top of the shrubs with the trimmer keeping them all at the same height as the fence itself.
Here’s a look after a section of it is cut – it looks so much better.
It doesn’t take long for the ground to fill with clippings. Once all the pruning is done, Pasang rakes up all the trimmed branches…
And then loads them all up in our trusted Polaris vehicle, so they can be taken to the compost pile where they will decompose for next year’s garden dressing.
Here’s a view from the other side. They’re the perfect height and still disguises the fence very well – one cannot see it at all.
To ensure the pruning is perfectly straight on the beech trees, we always use a landscaping twine, so it is visible and can be pulled taut.
Here’s a look at one side of the newly pruned beech tree hedge – so straight all the way around.
These trees create such a gorgeous privacy screen around my pool.
I wanted the pool to look as natural as possible where I could enjoy the panoramic views of the landscape with my family and friends. At the far end of the pool I have five staddle stones. Staddle stones were originally used in the 17th and 18th centuries as support bases for granaries, hayricks, and game larders. They typically looked like giant stone mushrooms, but mine are square – a more rare and unique version.
The pool is so inviting. This is one of my favorite summertime areas of the farm. And the perfect place to cool off – it’s expected to be a very hot, humid week ahead.
It's going to be another dry, humid day here at my Bedford, New York farm with temperatures in the high 80s. We haven't had any rain at all for at least two weeks - hopefully we'll get some soon.
Despite the uncomfortable summer weather and lack of precipitation, the vegetables are thriving, and the gardens are looking excellent. It's so much fun to visit right now because of all the growing produce - there’s something new popping up every day. We have broccoli, cauliflower, artichokes, lettuce, peas, fava beans, Swiss chard, peppers, cilantro, and so much more.
Enjoy these photos.
Here is one side of my vegetable garden down by the chicken coops. The vegetable gardens are entirely fenced in to protect the crops from hungry creatures. I try different configurations every year to see which ones work best for what we are growing. I like to use the most amount of space possible for planting.
Swiss chard is a leafy green vegetable often used in Mediterranean cooking. The leaf stalks are large and vary in color, usually white, yellow, or red. The leaf blade can be green or reddish in color. This year, the Swiss chard is near the front entrance of this garden.
We’ve already harvested many beans. Bush beans are second only to tomatoes as the most popular vegetables in home gardens. Bush beans, or snap beans, are eaten when the seeds are small. They are also called string beans because of a fibrous string running the length of the pod, but most varieties grown now do not have that fibrous string. Purple beans are so pretty – violet-purple outside and bright green inside with great flavor.
We’re always growing lettuce. Lettuce, Lactuca sativa, is a cultivated plant of the daisy family, Asteraceae. Lettuce is a fairly hardy, cool-weather vegetable that thrives when the average daily temperature is between 60 and 70-degrees Fahrenheit. We always grow several varieties.
In one garden along the fence we have lots of peas – one section for shelling peas, which need to be removed from their pods before eating, and another for edible pods, which can be eaten whole, such as our snap peas. They are best grown on supports to keep them off the ground and away from pests and diseases.
By early July every year, these peas are plump, and ready to be picked. The pea, Pisum sativum, is an annual herbaceous legume in the family Fabaceae. The pods can range in size from four to 15-centimeters long and about one-and-a-half to two-and-a-half centimeters wide. Each pod contains between two and 10-peas.
The onions look wonderful too. We planted a lot of white, yellow and red onions. Onions are harvested later in the summer when the underground bulbs are mature and flavorful. I always look forward to the onion harvest!
Kale or leaf cabbage is a group of vegetable cultivars within the plant species Brassica oleracea. They have purple or green leaves, in which the central leaves do not form a head.
Look at our bed of kale – very pretty with ruffled leaves and a purple-green color. One cup of chopped kale has 134-percent of the recommended daily intake of vitamin-C – that’s more than a medium orange, which only has 113-percent of the daily C requirement.
Broccoli is a hardy vegetable of the cabbage family that is high in vitamins A and D. And, according to the National Agricultural Statistics Service, USDA, the average American eats more than four-pounds of broccoli a year. Because broccoli is a cold weather crop. The recent warmer weather causes it to bolt, or go to flower sooner, but these heads are looking terrific.
Cauliflower is filled with nutrients. They hold plenty of vitamins, such as C, B, and K. Cauliflower is ready to harvest when the heads are six to eight inches in diameter. When picking, cut the stalk just below the head, leaving a stem of about two inches long.
Our cabbages are growing nicely. To get the best health benefits from cabbage, it’s good to include all three varieties into the diet – Savoy, red, and green. Savoy cabbage leaves are ruffled and a bit yellowish in color.
Here’s a perfect artichoke ready to pick. Globe artichokes, Cynara scolymus, are popular in both Europe and the United States. Artichokes are actually flower buds, which are eaten when they are tender.
See how it grows on its stem? When harvesting, always use sharp pruners and carefully cut them from the plant leaving an inch or two of stem. Artichokes have very good keeping qualities and can remain fresh for at least a week.
There is also a lot of fresh and fragrant cilantro. Often known in the United Kingdom as coriander, cilantro comes from the plant Coriandrum sativum. In the United States, the leaves of the plant are referred to as cilantro and the seeds are called coriander. Cilantro is also commonly known as Chinese parsley.
Vicia faba, also known as the broad bean or fava bean is an ancient member of the pea family. They have a nutty taste and buttery texture. I always grow lots of fava beans. We used many fava beans from my garden at my 20-year plus party last week here at the farm.
Basil, also called great basil, is a culinary herb of the family Lamiaceae. Basil is native to tropical regions from central Africa to Southeast Asia. It is a tender plant, and is used in cuisines worldwide. Since basil grows in tropical climates, it grows well in hot weather. Actually, this plant can thrive in very warm temperatures, and it grows amazingly well up to 90 degrees Fahrenheit.
Also always growing here – parsley. This will find its way into my morning green juice. Parsley is rich in vitamins K, C, and other antioxidants. It has a bright, herbaceous, and slightly bitter taste.
This is curly parsley. This comes from the same family, but curly parsley leaves are thicker and ruffled. Some also say its flavor is a bit stronger in curly parsley than in the flat-leaf varieties.
Our herbs are planted in the center of the garden. Thyme is an herb whose small leaves grow on clusters of thin stems. It is a Mediterranean herb with dietary, medicinal, and ornamental uses. Fragrant variegated thyme is green with white leaves. It is delicious with fish or poultry and imparts a lemony flavor.
And here is Moises weeding the areas beneath our tomato plants. I like to use bamboo canes for my tomatoes. They’re easy to buy in bulk, and can be found in a variety of sizes. They should be seven to eight foot tall stakes that are at least an inch in diameter. Staking is the best way to ensure the plants get the support they need for the many vegetables they will produce this season.
Look at these beautiful young tomatoes. There are already so many growing. Most tomatoes are red, but other colors are possible, including green, yellow, orange, pink, black, brown, white and purple. We’ll be harvesting a lot of tomatoes later this summer.
We always extend the harvest season by re-planting in two-week successions. Succession planting is the practice of following one crop with another to maximize a garden’s yield. It is an efficient use of gardening space and time. Everyone always asks what I do with all the vegetables I grow. I share them with my family, but I also love sharing the bounty with friends, colleagues, and my hardworking crew here at the farm. I provide fruits, vegetables, and eggs for magazine and video shoots. And, of course, all my birds get vegetables too. I hope your gardens are doing well – share their progress with me in the section below.
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