My photos fail to do justice to this spectacular installation.

Visitors at Glen Villa

Last week was very unusual — after a summer of isolation, living inside a family-only bubble, two groups of visitors came to tour Glen Villa. One group came from NIP Paysage, a landscape architecture firm in Montreal whose name reflects its approach to every project it undertakes. To understand, you need to know that NIP is the…

signs (1 of 2)

In Transit/En Route in 2020

In Transit/En Route is part of Timelines, the trail at Glen Villa that explores ideas about time, memory and our relationship to the land. Dating back to 2009, it was one of the first sections of Timelines I built and was an inspiration for all that followed. Over the intervening years, In Transit/En Route has undergone many changes,…

starting (1 of 1)

The Upper Room in 2020

The Upper Room is the memorial I created to remember and honour my mother. Designed to reflect the things most important to her — her family, her religious beliefs and her dedication to Virginia and its institutions —  the Upper Room is a small formal area set amidst a natural forest on a hillside above…

aqui with spirea (1 of 1)

Flowers, Fields and Food

An assortment of photos shows the variety of what is happening now at Glen Villa, my garden in Quebec’s Eastern Townships. Flowers are blooming everywhere. One that I am particularly fond of is columbine. The native variety, Aquilegia canadensis, grows freely in many spots in the garden. In the photo below, it complements the colour palette…

Will these bare branches ever bloom?

More Befores and Afters

A sudden burst of hot weather brought out shorts, t-shirts and leaves on the trees. It was only two weeks ago, on May 10, that the Cascade at Glen Villa was looking bare and boring.     Less than two weeks later, boring had become a bouquet of blooms.   Yet three days after that, the…