A Study in Texture

 

Tufts of grass undulate and hopefully hold tasty morsels for a hungry coyote.  I love how this looks soft yet scratchy at the same time.

This building facade in downtown San Rafael seems superfluous, but I find myself fascinated.  How wonderful that the architect decided to add these aerodynamic rock-studded panels.  The repeating pattern sets an imposing tone by visually elongating the height of the building.

First grass, then rocks and now grass with rocks!  I know the owner of this garden meant for the rocks to suppress the weeds, but the harsh edges of the rocks are softened by the thin blades of grass and create layers to the surface.  Serendipity. 

How funny to have come across this composition of gravel and Fescue a week later at Osmosis spa in Freestone.  It's the varying sizes of grasses that really captured my attention, spreading as if they were a contagious condition.

This fuzzy fence at the Pierce Point Ranch in Pt. Reyes combines two of my favorite textures:  weathered wood with the ruffled softness of mosses and lichens.  Here's a detail.

I love the juxtaposition of the deep, clear lines of wood grain and the tiny details of the different plants growing on it.  The closer you get to look at it, the more you see.  It also doesn't hurt that it's following my favorite new color palette that I can only describe as faded dull. 

Field Tripping Through Google Images: Veggie Edition

I'm preparing myself for the Winter veggie season and by preparing I mean obsess over my Seed Savers book and dream of having a neat, orderly set of plantings (really this time!  I mean it!)  I keep picturing a little knot garden, but I would substitute boxwood for lettuces or radishes as the delineating boundries and filling the remaining spaces with squares of perky Carrots, Golden Chard and sweet little leaves of Mache, not to mention a bevy of cutting annuals such as red poppies (last photo), Baby Blue Eyes and Collinsia heterophylla.

My favorite method of instant inspiration these days involves sticking a phrase in the Google and clicking on images to see what comes up.  Many times I get quite relevant images, such as this one from the Better Homes and Gardens site:

And sometimes I go careening afield, to wonderfully unexpected places.  This morning, I landed onto Instructables.com to find my next "brilliant" installation against the fence of my triangular vegetable bed.

I picture getting two or three of these to grow the diminutive Mache or maybe even some Nasturtium 'Empress of India' to trail down the sides.  Can you just imagine all the possibilities?!  With a shoe rack of all things!

Bits and Pieces of Inspiration

These pine cone bits sit on my desk- bringing some nature indoors for constant inspiration. I like the idea of seeing the pieces that make up the whole- in this case the "petals" of the pine cone.

Inspirasjon Fra Norge

I'm fighting the urge to SLEEP after coming home last night by going through our photos of our trip! I won't bombard you with too many fjord photos (and believe me, I have plenty!), but here's a few things I found inspiring. The photo above is of a wall inside the Olso Opera House. I'm usually not a fan of monstrous modern architecture, but I have to admit that I'm an admirer of this one.


Here we have a little mini-house sporting a traditional slate roof. The lichen gives it a lovely pattern. This was along the edge of the Aurlandsfjord.



Here's a grating that was part of the art college in Oslo. The flourishes reminded me a bit of my logo, but it's also providing some inspiration for some bent lamination I'm working on.


Seriously, how cool is that?! It's got a Barbarella/Mid-Century starburst aesthetic that makes me want to be a copycat!

I like the barren landscape around the Hardangerjokulen (jokulen = glacier). It's above the treeline, so only rocks and lichen littered the landscape. When taken out of context, it seems like some textural study of modern art.