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At first confluence , garden designer Brandon Tyson and householder Amy Harmon do it they had launch kindred spirit in one another — high - energy , über - creative and passionate about their pastime . By glad coincidence , both are also complete and unembarrassed plant nuts . It was kismet .
A pair of Himalayan fishtail palms ( Caryota gigas , grow by a friend from seed ) tower over the garden ’s piss characteristic . Instead of a typical allée of cypress tree tree diagram leave to the fountain , Tyson gave things a turn by choosing Dr. Seuss - comparable tree bitter aloes ( Aloe barberae , syn . A. bainesii ) , underplanting them with a glittering assortment of succulent . The upshot is of a Iranian promised land garden . Photo by : Marion Brenner . SEE MORE PHOTOS OF THIS GARDEN
Even before Harmon and her family moved into their 1930s Mediterranean - way house in the Berkeley Hills , she already had her sights go under on creating a garden with enough panache to match the nearly unmoved DoI , with its original D&M tile work and molded - iron ignitor fastness . In Tyson she found a designer who was a bull’s - eye fit . As Tyson says : “ I ’m play driven . I require multitude to be draw to a garden and surprised by it . I ’m the Cecil B. DeMille of the plant Earth . ” see the “ undersea garden ” at the Harmons ’ whereStrelitzia junceaandAeoniumtake the place of precious coral and anemones .
That ’s not to say Tyson is over the top . He knows just how far to push the boundaries , which is what gives his gardens their dynamic tension and gumption of play . At the Harmon project , he explored what he calls “ deconstructed formalism , ” where formal element are challenged by the option of textile . For deterrent example , he opt for offbeat , mop - topped Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree aloes as an allée go to the outpouring rather than the expect cypress tree , and for a hedge to screen the place from the street he usedAzara dentata , an evergreen plant shrub with yellow efflorescence that smell delectably like drinking chocolate .
As far as downright theatrics , Tyson promptly admits he ’s fond of immediate gratification and employs a crane to get in flora stuff the way other garden decorator might use a hired man motortruck . And he will research high and low for just the right specimens : like the Himalayan fishtail palm tree a protagonist had develop from seed that Tyson had been eyeing for 20 years , hoping someday to find a garden as suitable as the Harmons ’ to give them a home base . Or the uncommon Chilean wine-coloured palm ( Jubaea chilensis ) Amy Harmon was engrossed on having that Tyson fortuitously ground for sale when the President of the United States of the Northern California Chapter of the International Palm Society was dismantling her assemblage .
Though the garden is small , Harmon wanted pathways and places to sit to appreciate the plantings . Here an antique bench ( a endowment to Harmon from her husband ) looks over architecturalKalanchoe thysifloraand a yellow - flowered groundcover of brass buttons ( Cotula lineariloba ) . picture by : Marion Brenner . SEE MORE photo OF THIS GARDEN
Despite the primo selections , for Tyson the garden is more than an assembly of plants : “ It ’s a string of memories ; each plant has a story . ” It ’s also unquestionably not a gatherer ’s garden . “ There are very few ‘ one ’ in the garden , ” enunciate Tyson , who is impassioned about weaving together gloss and textures — Abutilon , Freesia , Clivia , Sparaxia , Cuphea . For Tyson , it ’s like working with fabric . And no wonderment , since prior to entering the world of garden design , Tyson studied textile design . He still descend into using fabric terms when he talk about garden , say something wait like silk or hemp—“It ’s just the room I see things . ” The layering of this “ material , ” from the tree down to the groundcovers , creates what Tyson calls a “ house of cards . ” “ When you come up into one of my garden , you ’re in another place and metre . Once you ’re capture in the bubble , it ’s about the garden and not about you . ”
Mike Tyson could have found no more appreciative audience or simpatico band together than Amy Harmon , who has been a client unlike any other . From Tyson ’s viewpoint , “ Amy is super knowing — she really keep me on my toes . ” The two of them routinely collaborate on all aspects of the garden . order Harmon , “ I would get excited about certain plants , like coinage tulips , and really explore them . ” Then she and Tyson would go on the Richard Morris Hunt . And Harmon feel the outgrowth of build and keep the garden has been her breeding as a gardener . At the beginning she had one visual sense in thinker for sure — no rose or lawn . Now she ’s pruning her own topiary among the citrus collection in the backyard ( with a piffling motivation from South Carolina topiary artist Pearl Fryar , another ego - taught gardener ) .
In her all-embracing travelling , Harmon has visited a riches of gardens , but it was at the outré Lotusland in Santa Barbara that she found finical aspiration for her own . And she became scheme with the notion of a paradise garden , an oasis from the busy outside world ( an idea in keeping with Tyson ’s house of cards concept ) with a wandering pathway that actuate you to concentre on each individual plant . She and Tyson agreed that the logical centerpiece should be a spring , an essential element in Persian andMediterranean garden . Tyson had a certain look in idea and asked Amy and her hubby Cyrus to find their best-loved natural spring in the world for the projection . They tracked down one they had seen in a book , located in the courtyard of the Andalusia Courtyard Apartments in Los Angeles , design by Arthur and Nina Zwebell in 1926 . act only from photos , their contractor , Ken Cottrell , pull off to double it almost exactly .
For the spring ’s surface , Harmon was resolved to use tile in the tradition of the 1920s and ’ 30s , the “ gilded period ” of California roofing tile companies . She was in luck to find Diana Watson of Native Tile & Ceramics , who create reproductions of D&M Tile — the same as those witness inside the Harmon home . The resulting water feature is the focal point of the garden : an exotic , paradisiacal link .
Stalklike ceramic sculpture by Berkeley artist Marcia Donahue attend animated , emerging from a tapestry of black - foliagedAeonium‘Zwartkop ’ andBanksia spinulosa‘Schnapper Point ’ , and on purpose mimick the timber bamboo in the backcloth . exposure by : Marion Brenner . SEE MORE PHOTOS OF THIS GARDEN
To liven up the garden further , Tyson and Harmon introduced sculptural musical composition by Berkeley artist Marcia Donahue : a custom turtleneck spitter for the fount , ceramic fish , giant beads strung on the Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree aloes , and upright stalks that come out to be a interbreeding between the nearbyArisaemaand jumbo timber bamboo . The gaiety of the garden is not fall behind on the Harmon children , Olivia and Mark . ( Olivia , by the direction , is convince there are fairies live there . )
Indeed it ’s been a magical experience for Tyson , who has worked mostly in Marin County and was hungry for a Berkeley undertaking . Much to his surprisal ( having designed gardens preponderantly for very individual properties ) , the residual of Berkeley seemed almost as fascinated by the building of the garden as he and Harmon . Neighborly Berkeleyites oft stopped by to agree on its progress and readily pop the question opinions , particularly when Tyson was putting in the narrow-minded bottom up by the road . “ I was astonished by people ’s reaction , ” says Tyson . “ The garden caused quite a stir . ”
For his next project , Tyson is going back to his roots in Georgia , having bought a second home 60 nautical mile from Savannah . Originally from the small town of Albany , he can trace his horticulture instincts to both grandmothers , one in North Georgia who favored peony , and one further south who surpass in growing subtropical plant . The difference in the two intrigued him from an early long time , and he feels the South pulling at his heartstrings . He ’s primed to go “ power hammer and tongs ” into progress a young garden , and having home bases east and west seems to him like the best of both worlds : “ move back and forth will be like traveling to a strange country . ” The yin and yang of bicoastal living should provide grist for much drama to come .
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