Sharon Lovejoy at the AK Smiley Library in Redlands

Every person has a story. Every story is better when you know the people.

In August 1990, Country Living Magazine featured Sharon Lovejoy as the proprietress of Heart's Ease Herb Shop and Gardens in Cambria. My admiration for her obvious affection for feminine bonding with the natural world was instant and lasting. Meeting her for the first time at a Garden Writers Association event two years back confirmed my initial impression. This is a woman who might sprout wings at any moment. If she did: I would want to be there to write about it ):-

Now, I in this new role as a grandmother in-waiting, when the children's author, illustrator and speaker's book tour   brought her to Redlands, of course I would be there.

When it comes to creativity- Sharon knows no bounds in getting children to smile.  Don't you just love    her very  neutral clothing- and then these vividly wild sandals and pedicure?

 Four of her books came home to inspire a love of garden and nature in our family's impending population explosion .  Somewhere in a file it doesn't belong, is the card with the name of the woman pictured with Sharon. She is evidently  a master gardener and cook. The "recipes" they bantered from their dinner- I'm still salivating.

You can order personalized book's of Sharon's here.

We said our goodbyes. It was time to explore the magnificent A.K Smiley Library.  Just a few images to whet your appetite. We will revisit this palace to literacy on a stand-alone  visit.

For now- admire the building's likeness in an oil painting.



Let the center rosette stained glass window fill your spirit with awe.

The hand-carved oak banisters - this building wasn't just built with money . It was built with love.

Illustrated Redlands has a lovely story  on the history of the identical twins,  Alfred H and Albert K Smiley.  East coast educators, the Quakers are probably better known as  real estate developers. Their 

Monhonk Mountain House  resort in upstate New York remains in the family. 

 Taking up residence on the west coast, they brought their shared spirit of philanthropy with them. Alfred wanted a park. Albert, a library. Neither demanded their names be attached to the projects. On behalf of their residents, a grateful City Council surprised them.

I hope you've enjoyed reading this snippet about men who did a great thing not for honor or glory- but simply because they could.

Homeward Bound

 

I haven't even packed for my next trip but I am already longing to be back  home in my garden.

Sipping lemonade. Clipping roses.

Dreaming of dragonflies. Wondering what adventurous lives they might live.

Breathing in deeply the heady scent of English roses.

Remembering where I bought each one. Who was with me and the dreams we shared.

Revelling in the diversity as plants ebb and flow in their seasonal glory.

Smiling at the surprise combinations.  I never thought of combining the blue blooming plumbago with the yellow shrimp accent. The plumbago is a monster. It cannot be allowed to take over this spot. It's like a summer love between a good girl and the handsome bad boy. It should last long enough to take a picture and then it must end.

Sometimes the garden gets ahead of me. I have learned to say a prayer in thanks,

For nature will reward me with new guests. Like yellow butterflies. They make up for the other surprises like overgrown scorpions and rollicking rodents.

 There are few formal areas in my garden. The wildness of it suits me.

The surprise of a tossed cutting making itself comfortable as curls over the edge... a little aster popping up through it...3 cheers for the underdog. Its an American tradition to thrive whatever the circumstance.

My husband's do is the one really in charge here.

My little Reno happy to spend her life looking like a used Swiffer duster.

After a day in the garden, I am tired. But I will never tire of this place where the skies light up like in Gone with the Wind.

Before you go, take a moment to hear Simon and Garfunkel sing Homeward Bound.

Denver's Molly Brown and Vance Kirkland Museums~ St John of the Wilderness

"To become truly immortal, a work of art must escape all human limits: logic and commonsense will only interfere. But once these barriers are broken, it will enter the realms of childhood visions and dreams."

-Giorgio DeChirico

.                                          

Markets crash. Sometimes with the help of the government. This home by architect William Lang was originally built in the 1880's for  a couple who got caught up in the 1893 financial crisis. 3 years prior our government had designed a financial program meant to help farmers. It was known as the Sherman Silver  Purchase Act. Unfortunately, 3 years later the government was facing The Law of Unintended Consequences. Banker JP Morgan put together a consortium that did not rescue the architect, who met a bad end, or original owners of the home. It did, however, staved off bankruptcy of the United States government.   

The new owner, JJ Brown is best known for being married to Margaret "The Unsinkable Molly" Brown. Tall with flaming red hair and a killer wardrobe with some dresses reputed to cost as much as her 7,500 square foot home- $30,000.

This postcard is sold here

 "The House of Lions", the home was lavishly decorated as well as featuring the latest accoutrements of the day: electricity, steam heating, indoor plumbing (the only bathroom with hot and cold running water is on the third floor) and telephones.

All this brick and stone. A spot of verbena and agastache are the smiling counterpoint cheering up  stern architecture.

At the Sam Maloof Home and Gardens near where I live, there was a brochure recommending the historic homes of notable artists. One mentioned is the Vance Kirkland Museum of Fine and Decorative Arts. It turned out to be really handy as it is directly behind the Molly Brown House and Museum.

Get ready to be wowed!  This museum is FUN.

 In the center courtyard of the late Colorado artist Vance Kirkland's home and studio, found objects, welded and braised metal and rubber were turned into the skeletal sculptures of The Saxophonist, String  Instrumentalist and Flute Player with Corn Row Hair by Bob Ragland, the non-starving artist. 

William Long created these fabulous vases  where aquatic life grows and swims through waves expressed in matte glazes.

A small corner of  "The Illusion of Floating Mysteries in Blue Space" ...Vance Kirkland worked in many styles over the course of his career. One of popular techniques is known as dot. How exactly do you get dots evenly over a large canvas?

You suspend yourself over a table with straps.

This is just a small sampling of the salon style galleries where useful art- such as Frank Lloyd Wright chairs- are set in vignettes abundant with sculpture, painting and all manner of decorative arts. We leave the Kirkland museum with random shots from my visit. Reminders that art is everywhere.

It was time to head to the airport. But not without stopping at a church. St John's In the Wilderness was not the building I was seeking, but I am not going to say it is the wrong church. Just the one I found when I was lost.

It had a garden with roses

A vegetable plot with the most ingeniously painted compost container.

The wonderment of flying buttresses 

 The long hall lined with 2 stories of stained glass windows.

An organ in the front. An organ in the rear. A piano. Accompaniment,  I am certain, for every angel in heaven. I read recently that people have styles where worship is most natural. Amidst this man-made grandeur with promises of orchestral chorus, such a setting is where my heart is at home.

I suppose there was time to fit in one more attraction. But when one has sat in the presence of the Almighty God- that is when it is time to stop.

Top image courtesy of Wikipedia

Historic Denver ~ Castle Marne Bed and Breakfast

"The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes,

 but in having new eyes." 

– Marcel Proust

 

When I travel, I am a student of all who passed before me. 

William Lang was architect to the rich and famous in 1889 Denver.  Built for investment banker William S. Raymond, the three-story articulated Rhyolite stone mansion was the first upscale home built away from the congested downtown.

Built in the late Victorian era, in this last incarnation as a destination bed and breakfast establishment with bona fide historic credentials, the imposing structure clearly reflects the  European eclecticism favored by the nouveau riche of the soon to end silver boom.  Please walk through the images and note the steeply pitched roofline, elaborate cornices, bay windows and balconies embraced by its charming garden. 

 

Named the Marne during the ownership of the Edwin Van Cise family from 1918 to 1938, the home was divided into apartments. It was a mixed-use development. It served as a processing center for the Department of Corrections. 

It spent some time as too many buildings do when they fall out of fashion- vacant, vandalized and most likely to be raised. 

Then the Peiker and Feher- Peicker Family saw past what it was to what it could be. They purchased and completely renovated the building as a bed and breakfast in 1 year- opening in 1989 to acclaim for their tireless hospitality. 

They saw past the flooded basement and ceiling open to the stars to understand this was a project worth undertaking. The 22" walls offer protection from extreme temperatures that blow through the Mile High City. 

The visual heaviness of the structure

softened by flowers.  Alyssum, petunias and spider plants. Simple garden staples add more than the pennies they cost.

Inlaid tile floors are a hallmark of the architect Lang. Built in the days before air conditioning, broad porches fitted with swings  were popular places for corseted women dressed in cumbersome layers to fan themselves.  

The 6' wide Impressionist Movement stained glass representation  of a peacock with tail feathers fully fanned out was designed for the original  home by M. Watkins. 

The original lincrusta wallpaper may be the largest example of its time still in existence. Invented in Britain in 1877, the name of the first washable wallpaper is derived from it base material -Lin for Linum (flax) and Crusta (Relief). The  depth of golden sheen is unlike anything modern. 

Melissa Feher-Peiker shares a good laugh.  Notice the painted ceiling border. The exquisite painting of the pipes- at the time the inn was built, indoor plumbing was something to show off, not hide behind a wall. 

Not to intimidate my tablemates at breakfast, the camera was put away.

The Presidential Suite features a half-tester bed. 

Louis J is the remarkable inn-keeper in the making. With patience, poise and confidence the young man guided me through Castle Marne, with a love of history and our nation obvious in every sentence. Someday I hope he runs for Congress. Whatever his party of choice will be, I expect I should like to vote for him.

Click here for more information on Castle Marne Bed and Breakfast.