Landscapes & Gardens of Northern California: Creating a Style

29 April - 20 May 2012

Tour Highlights

John Patrick, landscape architect, author and presenter on ABC's Gardening Australia, and Richard Barley, CEO of the Australian Open Garden Scheme and past Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne, lead this exciting new tour. 

• • Join John Patrick and Richard Barley as they explore the exciting diversity of Californian garden design, landscape architecture, urban architecture and natural wonders
• • Meet Alice Joyce, author of California Garden Walks, who will escort us on an exploration of the beautiful gardens of Marin Country
• • In Santa Rosa, visit 'gardening tutor' Mary Frost's intimate garden surrounding her 1920's cottage home, a counterpoint to the showstopping grounds at Santa Rosa's most prominent historic home, the newly restored McDonald Mansion (subject to confirmation)
• • Explore the relationship between garden design and agriculture in the lovely vineyards of the Napa and Sonoma Valleys
• • Spend a day with landscape architect Pam-Anela Messenger, specialist on the eminent landscape architect Thomas Church. She has organised special visits to a number of Church's private gardens including the Donnell Garden in Sonoma, a Modernist icon and one of the best-preserved examples of its time
• • Explore Avalon, Mission Bay and the award-winning North Beach Place 'Affordable Housing' project with designer Cathy Garrett from PGAdesign as she explains these sophisticated redevelopment projects in San Francisco, which integrates contemporary style and sustainable elements
• • Wander through some of California's best art collections, such as the DeYoung Fine Arts Museum
• • Spend a day in San Francisco with Paul Kephart, President of the innovative 'living architecture' firm, Rana Creek. Paul will show us the very latest in environmentally friendly urban architecture with visits to Rana Creek's living roof gardens at Nueva Schooland the California Academy of Sciences. We also view Patrick Blanc's vertical garden at San Francisco's Drew School.
• • Learn about the work of award-winning landscape architecture and garden photographer Marion Brenner, who will open the doors of her garden especially for our group
• • Spend a day in Palo Alto visiting Hanna House and private gardens with landscape architect Ron Herman who is responsible for designing many of North America's largest and most intricate private gardens. He has created more than four hundred full-scale garden designs in his thirty-five plus year career in landscape architecture.
• • Accompany Australian landscape architect and designer Bernard Trainor on a tour of his most successful private gardens and landscape projects in the Monterey Bay Area.
• • See the otters being fed at Monterey's world-famous aquarium
• • Spend a morning on the Big Sur with Paul Kephart, exploring further projects by Rana Creek (Abalone House), and enjoy a superb lunch at the stunning Post Ranch Inn, designed by Mickey Muennig, and overlooking the Pacific Ocean
• • Visit Hearst Castle, Alcatraz and other historic gardens including Filoli Historic Garden, Gamble Gardens and Thomas Church's Sunset Gardens
• • Spend 4 days exploring Sequoia, Kings Canyon and the spectacular Yosemite national parks
• • Enjoy a special visit to Katherine Greenberg's 30 year-old private garden. Katherine, a garden designer with a special interest in Californian native plants, will host us for lunch.

Sites Visited MARIN COUNTY Muir Woods National Monument • Private gardens of Marin County with Alice Joyce, author of California Garden Walks guide book series (Pina Colada garden, Keohane garden, Mandin garden); SANTA ROSA Private garden of Mary Frost • McDonald Mansion garden (subject to confirmation); SONOMA & NAPA Cornestone Gardens • Stone Edge Farm • Private gardens designed by Thomas Church with landscape architect Pam-Anela Messenger incl. the Donnell Garden & Robert Hunter Winery; SAN FRANCISCO Residential project at Mission Bay & North Beach Place 'Affordable Housing' project with landscape architect Cathy Garrett of PGAdesign • De Young Fine Arts Museum • V.C Morris Giftshop by F. Lloyd Wright • Ferry Plaza Farmers Market • Gardens of Alcatraz • Coit Tower Murals • Projects by Rana Creek with Director/Founder Paul Kephart incl. Nueva School & California Academy of Sciences living roofs • Drew School vertical garden, Patrick Blanc • Projects by Andrea Cochran Landscape Architecture (to be confirmed) • Katherine Greenberg's CA Native Plant Garden, Lafayette • Private garden of Marion Brenner, Berkeley • San Francisco Botanical Gardens; SAN FRANCISCO PENINSULA Filoli Historic Garden • Sunset Gardens (T. Church) • Gamble Garden • Projects by Ron Herman Landscape Architect • Hanna House by F. Lloyd Wright; MONTEREY BAY & BIG SUR Projects by Bernard Trainor + Associates • Monterey Bay Aquarium & Cannery Row • Casa Amesti landscape preservation project, PGAdesign • Projects by Rana Creek with Director/Founder Paul Kephart incl. Post Ranch Inn • Hearst Castle; SEQUOIA & KING'S CANYON NATIONAL PARK; FRESNO Forestiere Underground Gardens; YOSEMITE NATIONAL PARK 

Overnight Sonoma Valley (4 nights) • San Francisco (5 nights) • Palo Alto (1 night), Carmel-by-the-Sea (3 nights) • San Simeon (1 night) • Sequoia NP (3 nights) • Yosemite NP (3 nights) • San Francisco (1 night)

About the Tour

John Patrick, landscape architect, author and presenter on ABC's Gardening Australia, and Richard Barley, CEO of the Australian Open Garden Scheme and past Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne, lead this exciting new tour that highlights important contemporary northern Californian garden design and landscape architecture. Professionals and informed enthusiasts will meet with and enjoy excursions led by many of California's most celebrated contemporary designers and garden experts.

Californians have shaped their dramatic environment and magnificent landscapes to create, between the blue Pacific and vast Sierra Nevada, a veritable Eden of verdant valleys, thriving cities and beautiful gardens. We showcase the State's diverse and distinctive gardening traditions evolving from early Spanish missions to contemporary masterpieces, highlighting the opportunities and constraints of California's 'Mediterranean' climate.

We contrast European-inspired designs at historic Filoli gardens and opulent and eccentric Hearst Castle to the innovative designs of Frank Lloyd Wright, Thomas Church, and a myriad other designers who continue to develop the new California Style in gardening and architecture. Thomas Church expert Pam-Anela Messenger shows us his influential gardens, including the Donnell Garden in Sonoma. Here and in the Napa Valley's rolling hills we also explore artful vineyards by landscape designers Andrea Cochran and Roger Warner. Alice Joyce, author of California Garden Walks, leads us through the lovely private gardens of Marin County.

In San Francisco, Cathy Garrett from PGAdesign introduces us to the latest in urban housing. With Rana Creek's Paul Kephart we visit a number of this company's sustainable projects, including the California Academy of Sciences' roof top garden designed in association with Renzo Piano.

In Palo Alto, home of Stanford University, Ron Herman shows us a couple of his masterpieces inspired by Japanese styles and his restoration works of Frank Lloyd Wright's Hanna House.

Australian Bernard Trainor introduces his recent inspirational gardens in the Monterey Bay area. Trainor designed the Australia garden at San Francisco's Botanical Gardens, which also feature a Californian native garden by Ron Lutkso.

Travelling inland, we explore California's sublime wilderness at the Sequoia, Kings Canyon and Yosemite National Parks that inspired creators as diverse as Jack London and the great photographer Ansel Adams. We see majestic waterfalls, extraordinary geological forms and a rich variety of flora and fauna, including giant sequoias. To enrich these interactions with natural and shaped landscapes we also address northern California's vibrant urban culture in heritage architecture and bounteous collections like the DeYoung Fine Arts Museum and masterpieces such as Frank Lloyd Wright's VC Morris Gift Shop (counterpart to his renowned New York Guggenheim). We also meet the otters at Monterey's world-class aquarium.