Blue Planet Garden Blog

Garden Designers Roundtable: The History of the American Lawn

Turf is the largest irrigated “crop” grown in the United States. There are approximately 30 million acres of lawn in the U.S. – roughly the size of the state of South Carolina. Annually, all those lawns use 80 million pounds of pesticides and 100 tons of fertilizer.

So how exactly did we get here?

A nation of copycats
To begin with, the history of lawns in America really starts in England. Unlike the warm summers we enjoy here, the cloudy, temperate English climate is ideal for turf.  Even so, until the mid 19th century, lawns were a symbol of wealth, as landowners relied on grazing sheep or labor intensive methods like scything to keep the grass low.

This began to change with the invention of the lawnmower in 1830.  Suddenly, an average middle-class homeowner could enjoy the prestige of a lawn.  And indeed, the association of lawns with wealth and a refined lifestyle existed from the beginning, as this excerpt from inventor Edwin Budding’s patent shows: “Country gentlemen may find in using my machine themselves an amusing, useful and healthy exercise.”

Meanwhile, wealthy Americans in the 19th and early 20th century were heavily influenced by English architectural and garden styles.  American estates slavishly copied the greenswards of England, making lawns a symbol of wealth and class in the New World as well as in the Old. 

Lifestyles of the not-so-rich and famous
For the average American, however, lawns were virtually non-existent. The yard, both front and back, was a utilitarian space devoted to supporting basic domestic needs like caring for livestock and if a family had time,  growing vegetables.  A lack of public sanitation meant that yards typically housed outhouses and cesspools, and often the backyard was treated as a giant refuse heap.  In fact, it’s not unusual for current day owners of Northeastern brownstones to find old bottles, buttons and cutlery when digging around in older parts of their yards.

New York City, circa 1900 courtesy of Smoke and Mirrors

This began to change when advances in public transportation created the first suburbs.  Combined with the creation of public sanitation services and electric refrigeration, yards were no longer required to be strictly utilitarian and homeowners were free to consider other alternatives.

The beginning of the suburban stereotype
So where did Americans turn for guidance on what to do with their suddenly liberated landscapes? Garden clubs and the media, of course! Garden clubs and civic beautification committees heavily promoted an ideal suburban landscape of shrubs and lawn.  By the 1930’s nearly all garden advice in books, newspapers and magazines advocated lawn and foundation shrubs.  In a 1937 Better Homes and Gardens article extolling the virtues of regional architecture, despite the local character of the houses themselves, all featured virtually identical lawn and foundation plantings in the yard. 

What now?
Fast forward to today. Oversized lawns, considered by some to be an American icon, are in reality an English import, poorly suited to much of our climate, and glamorized by an historical version of bossy HOAs and Martha Stewart wannabes. Happily, for the first time, many of us are questioning our unthinking devotion to our lawns and the tyranny of weekly mowing and instead considering alternatives that sustain the environment, reflect our regional cultures and support our personal lifestyles.

Are you ready to join the revolution?

If you'd like to learn more about the past (and future) of lawns in America, I highly recommend From Yard to Garden, The Domestication of America's Home Grounds by Christoher Grampp, which served as primary source material for this article.

This month, the Garden Designers Roundtable has teamed up with the Lawn Reform Coalition. Be sure to check out what bloggers from both groups have to say on the topic of lawn alternatives (and thanks, Susan Harris, for the bonus post!):

Susan Harris : Garden Rant : Takoma Park, MD

Susan Harris : Gardener Susan’s Blog : Takoma Park, MD

Billy Goodnick : Cool Green Gardens : Santa Barbara, CA

Evelyn Hadden : Lawn Reform.Org : Saint Paul, MN

Saxon Holt : Gardening Gone Wild : Novato, CA

Ginny Stibolt : Florida Native Plant Society : Green Cove Springs, FL

Tara Dilliard : Vanishing Threshold: Garden, Life, Home : Atlanta, GA

Susan Morrison : Blue Planet Garden Blog : East Bay, CA

Shirley Bovshow : Eden Makers : Los Angeles, CA

Scott Hokunson : Blue Heron Landscapes : Granby, CT

Rochelle Greayer : Studio G : Boston, MA

Rebecca Sweet : Gossip In The Garden : Los Altos, CA

Pam Penick : Digging : Austin, TX

Lesley Hegarty & Robert Webber : Hegarty Webber Partnership : Bristol, UK

Laura Livengood Schaub : Interleafings : San Jose, CA

Jocelyn Chilvers : The Art Garden : Denver, CO

Ivette Soler : The Germinatrix : Los Angeles, CA

Genevieve Schmidt : North Coast Gardening : Arcata, CA

Douglas Owens-Pike : Energyscapes : Minneapolis, MN

Debbie Roberts : A Garden of Possibilities : Stamford, CT

Vertical Gardening Round Up

 
 
Have you noticed that immediately after you purchase a new car, you find yourself spotting the new make and model everywhere? For my fashionista friends, the same effect occurs with designer shoes or handbags, but for me, the catalyst was writing a book on vertical gardening. Is it my imagination or are vertical innovations popping up all over? Here’s what I’ve noticed lately:

 My design-school chum Baylor of Lila B. Design has come up with an ingenious way to keep the succulent wall art she recently added to her dockside storefront irrigated: Supersoakers! I’ve been relying on plain old drip irrigation for my own Woolly Pocket wall, but admit the resourceful method Lila B team member Shannon came up with looks like a lot more fun. 

Above photos by Sophie de Lignerolles

I’m also pleased to see that more and more restaurants are adding living walls to their décor. We featured photos from the innovative design of New Hampshire's Cava Restaurant in Garden Up! (a particularly notable achievement given their harsh weather conditions) but I especially enjoy when a new one appears close to home. In my reader Friday was a new post on Sunset’s Fresh Dirt blog highlighting this stunning example from True Food Kitchen in Southern California. As post author Sharon Cohoon puts it:  "Usually my husband and I fight over who has to face the wall.  This time I was perfectly content to take that position."

But enough about living walls! If you’ve read Garden Up! then you know it goes far beyond living walls to celebrate the ingenious vertical solutions every day gardeners have experimented with in their own patch of Eden. Of course as many of you know, some of the photos in the book were from our own gardens. As several of you ALSO know, my co-author Rebecca can be very competitive, and I suspect has long secretly envied my kooky, purple wall. Could jealousy have been part of her motivation in adding this charming focal point wall to her own garden?  Whatever the reason, it’s a smashing addition to her already magnificent garden, and I encourage you to check out this post where she explains how she put it together.

How about you? What’s on your radar this week, vertical or otherwise?

If it happens to be lawns (or why we don’t really need them) be sure to come back next Tuesday when I revisit my serious side as part of a joint Garden Designers Roundtable and Lawn Reform Coalition extravaganza all about lawn alternatives. Members of both groups are passionate about the topic, and more than 20 bloggers are expected to participate, including well known lawn-reform advocates Saxon Holt (photographer of The American Meadow Garden), Ivette Soler (author of The Edible Front Yard) and Evelyn Hadden (author of the upcoming Timber Press book Beautiful No-Mow Yards).  Hope to see you here!

Update 9-26-11: In case the original post was unclear, the succulent wall art on the exterior on the Lila B. Design premises was designed by Lila B. Design.

Wildflowers of Crater Lake

In the days of ancient photography - as in, before we all relied on our digital cameras to paper over our amateur mistakes - rumour has it that Kodak used to include a note of apology to customers who sent in photos from their Crater Lake vacations to be developed.  It seems they did not believe a lake could be so blue, and assumed there was a problem with their color processing. 

Its extreme depth of 1943 feet accounts for its richly satured color, but on a recent visit to this majestic Oregon landmark, facts and figures were the last things on my mind.  Fortunate enough to be there during peak wildflower season, Nick and I were able to enjoy the picturesque contrast between the delicate blooms and the sweeping grandeur of the lake and surrounding mountains. My enthusiasm outstrips my knowledge on this particular post, however, and I was unable to ID all the plants.  If you know any of the names, or have an educated guess, please leave a comment!

By far my favorite, brash and colorful Penstemon newberryi played the starring role. Perched dramatically on the edge of rocks leaning over the lake, who could resist such a show-off?

Zoomed in for a closer look.

And cascading along both sides of our hiking path.

We also saw plenty of the bluebell-like Linanthus bicolor, commonly known as Babystars. (Unless it's NOT a linanthus, but a phlox cultivar, as suggested by local California Natives expert Pete Veilleux.)

I loved the way tiny flowers like this yellow and orange Erigonum douglasii variety seemed to actually spring from the rocks.

While away from the lake on the far side of the path, what I think is another Eriogonum seemed happy nestled in a bed of pine needle mulch.

And finally, who could resist these delicate tangerine beauties, their petals lightly dusted with pale yellow highlights?  Any idea what they might be?

In case you haven't figured it out, this whole post is just a sneaky way to get you to look at some of my vacation photos.  If you're in the mood for more, drop by my Facebook page, where I share some of the highlights of Oregon's magnificent coastline and the spooky caves at Oregon Caves National Monument.