"And after all the weather was ideal. They could not have had a more perfect day for a garden-party if they had ordered it. Windless, warm, the sky without a cloud." -- Katherine Mansfield
The Coral Tree at Virginia Robinson Gardens
Morning Room at Robinson Gardens decorated for the Garden Tour, 2011
"The first time I saw her, which was in a garden in Bloomsbury -- we were both at a delightful tea party -- she was quite at her best and was then wearing a soft lavender muslin dress. I don't remember her clothes well in themselves, because they seemed merged in her. I remember this original mauvy dress, and the hat worn forward over her face."
-- Elizabeth Bowen, "Recollections of Virginia Woolf"
"...Only is the sunlight ever normal at Garsington? No, I think even the sky is done up in pale yellow silk, and certainly the cabbages are scented..." -- Virginia Woolf
Now that spring has arrived, give yourself a treat this May and take a little journey into the gracious past with a garden tour of some magnificent private gardens. After the tour, you are invited to a beautiful garden party at the Virginia Robinson Gardens. Dress up in your garden best and don't forget to wear your hat! Come to the "2012...into the garden Tour" (May 18, 2012) put on by the Friends of Robinson Gardens and take a little vacation from the rat race of daily life. Turn off your computers, put away your cell phones and readjust your time frame. Enter the world that Katherine Mansfield, Elizabeth Bowen, and Virginia Woolf were writing about, a time when friends would dress up and meet over tea and champagne and garden parties were a common occurrence. Enjoy the splendor of five private gardens in West Los Angeles and then come for lunch and tea at the enchanting Virginia Robinson estate in Beverly Hills. The house will be decorated by talented Los Angeles florists and designers and the gardens will be blooming. This is truly the garden party of the year.
I hope you can make it this year to the annual "2012...into the garden Tour." Click here to order tickets.
Be sure to dress up in your garden best and don't forget to wear your hat! It is always a day of elegance and beauty. There's nothing like it for getting ideas for your own garden, enjoying a visual feast, and meeting some wonderful garden friends. You will be inspired!