Tour Italian gardens, virtually
Are you waiting for the day you can travel again and see new sights? Aren’t we all?
In light of that, the members of the Marin Rose Society invite you to join them Tuesday, as Jerry Georgette takes them on a virtual Zoom tour of public and private Italian gardens.
Georgette, a consulting rosarian and longtime member of the San Mateo and Peninsula rose societies, will present an illustrated talk, followed by a Q& A session, focused on the gardens and roses he saw on a special 2014 trip of just 20 people.
He signed up for the sevenday, small-group tour of Italian rose gardens after seeing an advertisement in the American Rose Society magazine.
Organized by Leo Watermeier, of the New Orleans Old Garden Rose Society for Sterling Tours, the trip began in Rome and ended in Florence.
It promised sightseeing, picnics and dinners, wine tasting and tours of famous Italian public gardens, such as Giardini della Landriana, the Gardens of Ninfa, Villa d’Este, Foundation Carla Fineschi and Villa Poggio Torselli.
“The Fineschi has the world’s largest collection of roses, over 8,000, from different rose companies,” he says. “There were roses from Kordes, some from Belgium and France, and lots of different roses that you wouldn’t see here.”
The tour also promised tours of the private gardens by their owners, rarely open to the public.
“The private gardens were family gardens in more informal and rustic settings than the public ones,” Georgette says. “There were hillside gardens, terraced gardens, gardens with views, but not manicured or laid out in formal beds. They were more wild and natural.”
The owners, he says, were “well-known in the rose world, but very down-to-earth and very passionate about their roses, about gardening and about they had developed and maintained.
“They supplied lunch and wine in the garden for us, and talked about the history of their
gardens, their homes and told their stories about roses,” he says.
He saw collections of rare roses, roses from China, India, Persia and the Himalayas that had been introduced to Western Europe, old garden roses and species, or wild, roses.
So many of the roses took his fancy, but if pressed, he says his favorite might be the purezza, a white, large-flowered climber with a pleasing fragrance, bred by Quinto Mansuino in Italy in 1961.
Georgette says he enjoyed the water fountains and waterfalls of Villa d’Este and was impressed with one garden whose owner had amassed every David Austin rose ever produced to create the most complete David Austin collection in the world.
“He grew them in different ways, too,” he says. “Some spiraled up poles and others were mixed in with irises and peonies.”
His favorite private garden, though, might be the one that belongs to Helga Brichet, the former president of the World Federation of National Rose Societies.
“Her property dates back to the 1500s and the house was once part of a church,” he says. “It still has a chapel with a frescoed wall, a large section of olive trees and more than 500 roses in a natural landscape.”
When he remembers his time in these Italian gardens, it’s their naturalness that first comes to mind.
“They weren’t just beds of roses and they weren’t laid out in parterres or geometric shapes like you’d see in France or England,” he says. “These gardens had winding paths and the roses were mixed in with lots of other varieties of plants. They had a wild, informal look to them.”
• “A Tour of Private Italian Gardens” is at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday. Call 1- 669900- 6833 just before the meeting time. When prompted, enter the meeting ID number (843 5066 0449), then press 0, and the password (951738). Admission is free. Contact andrewsmith415@gmail.com at least a day before the meeting if you would like help to learn how to join the meeting.
Show off your garden
Since so many of the popular home and garden tours are off the calendar this year, consider this your invitation to share with fellow readers the images and description of your home garden.
Please send an email describing what you grow in your garden, what you love most about it and a photograph or two. I will post the best ones in upcoming columns. Your name will be published and you must be over 18 years old.
Don’t-miss events
• Join Sasha Duerr and author Jennifer Jewell in conversation, as they discuss Jewell’s book, “The Earth In Her Hands: 75 Extraordinary Women Working in the World of Plants,” in a Zoom webinar from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m. Tuesday. The presentation, sponsored by the Marin Art & Garden Center, costs $20. Purchase a copy of the book with your registration for a 10% discount. Call 415455-5260 or go to maringarden.org.
• Learn to watercolor for free from architectural designer Calla Chang, thanks to a three-part webinar sponsored by the Institute of Classical Architecture & Art. The first class, from6 to 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, will feature a monochromatic landscape using a “coffee wash” or single paint color. Register at classicist-nocal.org and download the reference image by Edward Wesson and a short list of supplies.