Upcoming Lectures; 'The Pleasure Garden'

I will be giving 3 lectures this Spring on 'The Pleasure Garden; Creating Paradise on Earth'

Madrasa  Bou Inania, Meknes, Morocco

This lecture will incorporate images from this winter's travels in Andalusia and Morocco along with places I have visited in other parts of the World, and gardens that I have built that express the idea of manifesting pleasure in the garden, and thus a kind of paradise.  I will discuss the historic role of gardens as a symbol of paradise, and the elements that make it so.  I will then delve in to the decadent elegance that for me makes a garden truly pleasurable, which is ultimately an intimate bond with the wonders of nature.  Lie down on a soft bed with pillows, or better yet take a hot bath surrounded by lush gardens, serenaded by fountains, inhaling divine fragrances, succumbing to visual beauty.  I hope to see you at one of these talk.  Ciao, Jeffrey

March 1  Real Jardin Botanico (Royal Botanical Garden), Madrid, Spain    www.rjb.csic.es

April 11  San Diego Horticultural Society, San Diego, California   www.sdhortsoc.org

April 14  Southern California Horticultural Society, Riverside, California   www.socalhort.org

Hotel La Mamounia, Marrakesh

Hotel La Mamounia

La Mamounia Gate

For many years the Hotel La Mamounia in Marrakesh has been another one of those legendary places I longed to see some day if I ever made it to Morocco.  I had read celebrity lists of their favorite hotel in the World and La Mamounia was the one that was mentioned most.  In photos I had seen rose petal strewn fountains, something I borrowed and often do in my own garden whenever I have a special event.  So when I arrived in Marrakesh, I looked at their website and sent an email saying I was working on a book on Moroccan gardens and with an accompanying lecture, and would it be possible to tour the gardens.  I received in response a series of official press releases, but not an invitation to come in.  I went by the front gate and was told the hotel was closed to the public for special events until after the New Year.   I sent another email and got a standard reply that tours were available  in the morning and afternoon on weekdays by appointment, but photos were not allowed.  “Send us a copy of your magazine when it reaches publication”.  Hmmm, a magazine article with no photos?

La Mamounia had been closed for 3 years for a complete renovation  and had reopened the end of September of 2010.  It originally had 50 rooms and was enlarged to 100 in 1946.  There were three subsequent renovations over the years, but the last one more than doubled the number of rooms to 210.  The website is beautiful, with music and brief slide shows of the various types of accommodation at www.mamounia.com . 

A Pavilion to the side of the entry

The hotel was built in 1922 on the site of a garden given to Prince Moulay Mamoun by his father, King Sidi Mohammed Ben Abdellah as a customary wedding gift.  Built in a blend of Moroccan and Art deco styles, the hotel became legendary, hosting a long list of celebrities and political power houses.  Winston Churchill, a frequent guest called it ‘The most lovely spot in the World’.  The Rolling Stones, Elton John, and Led Zeppelin came here.  Salma Hyack and Gweneth Paltrow attended the latest reopening ceremonies.  Whoop dee do.  I am not a celebrity beyond the pebble mosaic circuit, but I showed up at the gate on January 3^rd at 4:30 in the afternoon for my tour appointment.  I was told at the gate that tours were only conducted in the mornings.  I insisted that I had made a reservation and was told to arrive at 4:30.  I was wearing my best clothes and even shaved for this. So they let me in.  I immediately started taking photos of the beautiful new entry gardens now that I was unsupervised, though I felt like I was breaking the rules, but once inside I was treated quite well.

The Entry Garden

I went to the reception desk and told a desk clerk I was here for a tour of the gardens.  A man who looked like a member of the secret service was summoned and asked me to have a seat on plush sofas surrounding a low table with a huge brass tray with a mandala of Medjool dates arranged on it.  I love dates and was tempted to start chowing them down but I restrained myself to feign dignity in case my host suddenly arrived.  A young man in a fine dark brown suit approached me and told me he would take  me on a tour of the hotel grounds.  We walked through the lobby as very ordinary guests wandered around in shorts and T shirts, and I no longer felt at all out of place.  As long as you pay your room bill you can do as you please without pretension apparently.  Passing the Churchill Bar, which hadn’t opened for the evening, we entered a fabulous covered swimming pool pavilion as elegant as a pool can get.  The pool is surrounded by whitewashed Moroccan arches with tile zellij columns.  Centered on the far end of the pool is a keyhole arch framing a white lounge bed with pillows.  This is my kind of embellishment for sure.  I asked if I could take photos and the young man said yes, as long as I didn’t photograph guests.  I wasn’t the least bit interested in having guests in my photos unless it was Mick Jagger or Robert Plant, so that wasn’t a problem.  We walked from there through a classic courtyard with central fountain and out on to a terrace where guests were relaxing in the late afternoon. 

The Indoor Swimming Pool

The terrace is adjacent  to large Moroccan gardens with green lawns and rows of orange trees covered in fruit.  I can only imagine the sublime aroma when the trees are in bloom.  On one side are three luxury Riads, 3 bedroom apartments, each with a private swimming pool.  There is a VIP entrance here for famed guests that don’t want to be seen entering through the lobby.  Straight axial paths took us out and around an exercise  pavilion with the traditional green glazed tile hip roofs, and a very elegant place to play ping pong.  We then approached a restaurant terrace with a series of very beautiful courtyards, one with a long central pool lined with candle lanterns ending at a tile zellij wall fountain.  The proportions of the courtyards was in line with the best of Andalusian design, with tastefully restrained plain whitewashed surfaces rather than carved stucco reliefs.  The adjacent courtyard was empty of furnishings as if it were only for the contemplation of its simple square blue tiled pool and white marble fountain.  I was loving every second as we were the only people in this area.  Everything was perfectly brand new but exquisitely crafted and spotlessly clean, like seeing a palace in it’s heyday rather than worn down by the ages like so many historic places I had visited on this trip.

Ping Pong Pavilion

Pool and Colonnade by the restaurant

The long pool

Restaurant Courtyard

We returned to the main hotel building and entered a room that used to be the dining room but had been refurbished as a grand hall next to a bar.  The ceiling was a large decorative panel painted by the French artist Jacques Majorelle.  This was the end of the tour, and I was quite happy.  I milled around the staggered stepped tinted cement panels of the entry gardens again for some time before I left through the front gate, stopping to visit with the men who originally let me pass.  They were quite friendly by this point and I shared photos of my work in a copy of the book I published last year.  I’ll be publishing another book when I get home including images I took at the hotel during this visit.  Ironically, I didn’t notice any rose petals in any of the pools.  Oh well, I’m sure they still do it, just not today.

Entry Garden Fountain

Thanks for reading, Jeffrey

The Entry Garden

Jardin Majorelle, Marrakesh, Morocco

Jardin Majorelle, Marrakesh

The Entry Fountain

Some 20 years ago I saw photos of a garden in Morocco with  the most extraordinary electric blue walls and lush plantings.  I was captivated by the vivid hue of blue and after some searching, managed to find a close approximation at a local hardware store.  I bought a gallon and painted my bedroom ceiling and back door.  A Glenora seedless grape I had planted and trained over the door and bedroom window takes on a similar hue when the fruit is ripe making a delicious color combination. 

My Back Door painted Majorelle Blue

This past summer I bought another gallon and painted the foundation of my house as if in anticipation of what I hoped would be the fulfillment of a dream to travel in Morocco and visit the garden where this blue color made it’s debut.  A few months later  I was there.

Majorelle Blue Paint

The place is the Majorelle Garden in Marrakesh.  Jacques Majorelle was a French painter who’s garden became his ultimate creation.   Born in 1886 in Nancy France, he was the son of Louis Majorelle,  a famous furniture designer in the Art Nouveau style.  He went on to study painting at the Ecole de Beaux-Arts in his home town and later in Paris.  In 1910 he  traveled to Egypt and became captivated by Northern Africa.  9 years later he went to Marrakesh, Morocco to recover from heart problems caused by Tuberculosis.  Establishing himself with the French upper class in the city, he acquired a 9 acre property in palm groves of the El Hassania district outside the city and built a villa.  In 1924 he commenced to build a painting studio designed by the architect  Paul Sinior, which he painted the iconic color of blue he developed and named after himself as Majorelle bleu.  He even had the color patented.   Shortly after that he began to transform the palm grove in to a botanical garden.

Kalanchoe beharensis

Cactus garden

The Painting Studio

He continued to paint and travel in Africa in a style that could be categorized as Orientalism, but is more specific to actual experience rather than romantic conceptualism.  At the same time he became an avid collector of plants.  The garden contains many species of palms, aloes, succulents, yuccas and bamboos. There are two massive specimens of Beucarnia recurvata, the Ponytail Palm, near the painting studio.  Numerous cactus, which are all native to the Western Hemisphere, and Euphorbias, native to the Eastern Hemisphere surround a shallow pale turquoise pool with a blue central fountain.  A long axial pool runs perpendicular to the pond, terminating at a pavilion painted mint green with a carved white  stucco band and a green glazed tile roof in the Moroccan style. Bougainvilleas were planted on walls and trellises for their vivid colors, and a large square pond was filled with a collection of water lilies.  He opened the garden to the public in 1947.

The Lily Pool

The blue painted walls and pool edges give the garden a cohesive cooling feel.  Clay pots painted in bright lemon, orange, and blue line the raised polished terracotta colored cement paths that wind through immaculately maintained beds of carefully spaced plants.  It is these vivid colors that give the garden it’s signature character.  Their brilliant hues set off the various shades of green and blue in the plants.  The ground is mulched with a pink crushed stone that is native to the area and is the predominant color of buildings in Marakkesh.  Plant specimens are ringed in carefully sculpted craters to maximize the absorbsion of water in this hot dry climate.   A crew of gardeners continuously rake the ground of every last leaf and petal except in the bamboo groves, which probably need the mulch and defy tidiness.  Numerous species of birds are attracted to the garden because of it’s lushness and the availability of water.

Red path and Aloes

Majorelle was the victim of two automobile accidents, the first after which he had his foot amputated.  He returned to France after the second accident in 1962, and died shortly afterwards.  The garden remained open to the public but went in to decline from lack of maintenance.

Checkerboard Tile Steps

Lily Pool and Art Nouveau Balcony

In 1980, fashion icon Yves Saint Laurent and his partner Pierre Berge’ purchased and restored the property, supervised by the American landscape architect Madison Cox.  The Moroccan botanist Abderrazak Ben Chaabane was responsible for the redesigning of the plant collections.  Yves Saint Laurent and Pierre Berge lived in the house until Saint Laurent’s death in November 2009 on the adjacent property called Villa Oasis.  These extensive gardens are unfortunately not open to the public, though there is a tantalizing view  through a small window grille from the street.  I hoped to find a way to visit but so far have not been successful.

New Years Collage Gallery

The painting studio was converted in to a Museum of Islamic Arts, displaying the couple’s collection.  At the time of my visit there is a wonderful exhibit of African inspired fashion by Saint Laurent.  The exhibit was designed by Pierre Berger using fragrant cedar wood wall panels cut with Moroccan door shapes and an incredible round room lined with large mirrors, and a ceiling of LED lights mimicking stars that reflect in to infinity.  An adjacent building contains an elegant gift shop, café courtyard, and a small gallery displaying New Years collages that Saint Laurent made every year to send to clients and friends.  The message was always love.  There is a simple monument to him on the far side of the garden, a marble plinth with an ancient weathered fluted column standing at it’s center.  His ashes were spread in the garden as was his wish.

Painting a fresh coat on one of the pots

When I get home I am definitely going to try my hand at painting some terra cotta pots, and my old house could use a coat of paint too to compliment the Majorelle blue foundation that I painted this summer.  Perhaps mint green and turquoise with a lemon trim and some orange.  I like to do things that remind me of places I have visited that I love and want to bring in to my consciousness on a daily basis.

Painted Pots

Mint Pavilion and Long Pool

Cycad Fronds and Shadows

Steps of the Painting Studio

Mint Green Pavilion

Turtle and Water Lilies

Blue Fountain

The Cafe

Summers are incredibly hot in Marrakesh, and the shade and cooling colors of the garden make for a welcome respite from the harshness of the climate.  In the winter the weather is mild, pleasantly warm in the day time and chilly to downright cold at night.  The light in winter is beautiful and there are great sunsets to be had after the garden closes at 5 in the evening.  Once in a more suburban setting, the garden is now walled in by luxury condominium buildings and heavy traffic as Marrakesh explodes with development.  Jacques Majorelle would not recognize his old neighborhood.

Villa Oasis

The garden was ridiculously crowded the first day that I visited as Marrakesh was full of tourists for the New Years holiday.  The city had become a very trendy destination, with the garden being one of it’s primary draws.  So I returned early the next morning and was the first person to enter that day, for a short and blissful time having the garden to myself.  There was a mourning dove drinking from the lovely tiled entry fountain when I walked in.  And then the first busload of people arrived…

Bismarkia nobilis Palm frond

Dove by the Entry Fountain

Real Jardin Botanico, Madrid, Spain

The Royal Botanic Garden, Madrid, Spain

Larix Bonsai in fall color

Before I left on this trip I sent a message to Jean Vache’ of the Mediterranean Garden Society in Pasadena telling her I was going to Spain and Morocco.  She very kindly sent messages to members in Spain and a few of them actually contacted  me.  So when I was in Madrid, I had the fortune of meeting with Silvia Villegas Navarro, the Conservator of Living Collections at the Royal Botanic Garden.  Before we met outside the gate, I toured the Royal Botanic Gardens on a beautiful afternoon bathed in wonderful light. 

Museo del Prado

The garden is located next to the World-renowned  Prado Art Museum.  It was originally commissioned by King Fernando VI to house a collection of 2,000 plants collected by the botanist Jose’ Quer y Martinez on another site, and was moved to it’s present location by King Carlos III, the new garden opening in 1781.  The garden was designed on four terraces, with a reservoir at the top level to provide water  through out the garden.  One of the most pleasant features is the siting of circular stone fountains fed by natural water  pressure at the center of each parterre, where gardeners could conveniently scoop water with a bucket to irrigate the surrounding beds.  The beds were arranged using the taxonomy system developed by the Swedish botanist Carl Linnaeus.  The Garden’s Herbarium contains over 1 million specimens of plants from all over the World.  The garden is also home to a large number of stray cats, which for some reason is typical of botanical gardens I’ve visited in other cities.

Terraza de los Cuadros Fountains

The terraces are divided by clipped hedges of Laurus nobilis punctuated by statues of historic figures in the field of botany.  The uppermost terrace is called the Terrace of the Laurels, with a fine collection of bonsais added in 1985. Below this is the Villanueva Pavilion, which was exhibiting a fantastic collection of botanical paintings called Images of Paradise.  This show featured stunning botanical paintings of tropical flora from South America from the renowned collections by José Celestino Mutis (1783-1816), and the modern private collection by Shirley Sherwood from Kew Gardens in London.

Oval Pool and bust of Carl Linnaeus

One of the Grape Arbors

The Desert Garden

The Terraza del Plano de la Flor fronts the Villanueva Pavilion, centered on an oval pond with a statue of Carl Linnaeus at it’s center.  There is a nice Taxodium distichum, the Bald Cypress from the S.E. of the U.S to one side in full bronze fall color.  Trees and shrubs are arranged around curving symmetrical paths.  One of my favorite parts of the garden were the iron arbors with varietal  grapes grown throughout Spain, and an alley of types of olive trees, though many of these were not in the greatest of health, possibly due to shading by other trees.  On the north side of this terrace are two greenhouses containing a nice little desert garden, a tropical garden with misters, and a temperate garden.

Terraza de las Escuelas Botanicas

Below this is the Terraza de las Escuelas Botanicas, which  contains 12 square beds with plants arranged phylogenetically,  from the most primitive species to later states of evolution.  There is a small fountain at the center of each of these beds.

 

Terraza de las Escuelas Botanicas

The Terraza de los Quadros is the lowest terrace with 16 parterres containing ornamental, medicinal, aromatic,  endemic, and edible plants, and a small orchard of fruit trees.  The parterres are lined with low clipped boxwood hedges in either linear, square, round, or octagonal shapes which breaks up the monotony that is often found in formal gardens. 

Vegetable Beds, Terraza de los Cuadros

The plantings were expanded considerably by a collection of some10,000 plants brought to Spain by the remarkable explorer Alessandro Malaspina in 1794.  This sea captain traveled extensively all over the World, including the Pacific Northwest and Alaska, mapping coastlines and establishing relations with native peoples with the goal of expanding Spain’s colonial influence. 

Square Parterre, Terraza de los Quadros

Ulmus minor, the Field Elm

Each parterre in the garden contains a different grouping of plants with varying themes, though the academic and scientific aspects have given way to more ornamental ones, such as displays of flowers and vegetables , and the ubiquitous rose garden. Some plants are grown simply to show that they can be and are struggling along, but there are many beautiful specimens.  Many of the largest trees were  lost in an 1886 cyclone so there are few ancient trees.  Perhaps the largest remaining tree in the garden is a two trunked Ulmus minor, the Field Elm which I believe is named for it’s resemblance to a pair of pants.  There are some lovely specimens of Sophora japonica and it’s weeping form as well.  I noticed some plants common to the Pacific Northwest, such as Mahonia aquifolium, our Oregon Grape, Symphoricarpos albos, the Snowberry, which was sporting lots of nice white berries, Pseudotsuga menziesii, the Douglas Fir, and Calocedrus decurrens, the California Incense Cedar.

Steps cut around the roots of a Cypress Tree

Nice details in the garden include a set of stone stairs cut around the roots of an old Cypress tree.  There is a beautiful gate called the Puerta del Rey that fronts the Paseo del Prado with two round guard houses.  The primary gate is the Puerta de Murillo, facing the Museo del Prado with a ticket booth and small funky garden shop selling sad little plants, seeds, bulbs, books and gifts.  It is here that I met Silvia and her husband after my self guided tour.  We went to a nearby café for a beer and talked about our careers and the joys and pitfalls of gardening and garden maintenance.  She described the volcano concept where the gardeners continuously remove all the fallen plant matter leaving a cone of bare earth at the base of each plant.  Her English husband is doing a private garden consulting business for estates around Madrid.  They met in London while working at the Kew Gardens.

Puerta del Rey

From there we walked to the nearby Caixa Forum, where French designer Patrick Blanc has installed on of his fantastic vertical gardens on the north facing wall of a building.  Looking something like an abstract painting, the wall has grown into an organic tapestry.  The plants are tucked in to small pockets cut in a kind of black fabric with an irrigation system built to water and fertilize the plants by saturating the fabric.  He has a fantastic book called Vertical Gardens that I bought earlier this year, with many of his projects in his native Paris.

The Caixa Forum Vertical Garden

I hope to give a lecture at the Royal Botanic Garden before I fly home in early March, perhaps the prelude to a lecture I will be giving twice in Southern California in April on ‘The Pleasure Garden’ including fantastic Islamic gardens and architecture I am seeing while traveling in Morocco and Andalusia in Southern Spain.