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House Beautiful: More than window dressing

When people think about attractive homes and gardens they typically assume a team of professionals such as architects, interior designers, landscape architects, creative builders or specialty decorators were involved.

When people think about attractive homes and gardens they typically assume a team of professionals such as architects, interior designers, landscape architects, creative builders or specialty decorators were involved.

Allison Brodie is none of these things, but she has worked as a window designer for 30 years and so she was able to draw upon this flair to create a beautiful, original setting in both her house and garden.

The latter is being featured on the 11th annual Teeny Tiny Garden Tour, a fundraiser for Victoria Hospice being held on Sunday, June 12. Every year, that society chooses fabulous small gardens with big impacts. The idea is to inspire city and country dwellers alike — anyone who wants to create a verdant impression without excessive spending, or lavish space.

“I am all about vignettes,” said Brodie, who did windows for more than 45 stores in Victoria, including the Bay, Rogers’ Chocolates, British Importers, and dozens more.

“I was always building props and painting backdrops,” said the visual presentation specialist who admits these capacities came in handy when designing her own residence.

“I think display people are good at decorating homes because they come at things from a different angle. They know how to cut corners and do things that look expensive but aren’t. It is totally different from interior design.”

For instance, she explained, many people would hide a garden shed off to the side or behind some bushes.

But in her Cedar Hill area garden, rather than camouflaging her shed, she tucked it into a corner of the front yard, on an angle, created a little path up to it and positioned a pretty little child’s chair at the front door, along with other appealing details

“The idea is to always try to find an asset, no matter what you’re doing. It’s like dressing, or putting on makeup. You want to show off your assets and camouflage the negatives,” said Brodie, who is now a full-time artist.

On the opposite side of her front garden, under the shade of an enormous chestnut tree, she has created another pleasing detail by placing a double swing at an angle across the corner. Surprisingly perhaps, rather than drawing attention to it by painting it scarlet or purple, she painted it black.

“I used the swing because I didn’t want to plant a lot of things there and disturb the roots of the tree — which I have a love-hate relationship with because it drops stuff all the time — and I like dark backgrounds because green shows up so well against it. That’s why my fence is dark grey, too.”

It’s the same reason she doesn’t like colourful pots.

On either side of the swing she has clustered tall clay-coloured planters. “I used to have different coloured pots in the garden, but with all the foliage and hardscape I decided it needed to be more subdued. I want to see the plants, not take away from them.”

The one exception is a single red pot under a sphere in the front garden that’s painted to match her front door.

The artist, whose work is sold at The Gallery at Mattick’s Farm, does add light brush strokes to shady areas here and there, by planting “spotlights” of pale green grasses or white-rimmed hostas.

And inside her home she uses similar tricks of the trade.

Her 90-year-old cottage is relatively small at 1,200 square feet, but it feels spacious as she and her late husband, Dave Kenning, removed many of the interior walls. Metal clad, industrial-looking stairs and light colours add to the brightness, and her white-painted furniture and use of wood give her home a beach cottage ambience.

The sunken living room extends to the outside pond area at the back where she and her husband used paving stones and wooden decking to cover everything except the flowerbeds, which now brim with hellebores, rhodos, grasses, agapanthus and sedum.

“I’m not a shrubby person. I prefer perennials.” And she likes to “divide and conquer,” which means she has not purchased any in decades.

She enjoys the contemplative areas around the pond, and the several protected seating areas at various levels.

This is another thing she recommends: “Different levels in a garden create interest, like in window dressing.” That’s one reason she likes tree stumps, too, with huge pots balanced on them.

“And I like a garden with a tropical feel so I have bamboo, Japanese grasses and tons of euphorbia,” an elegant genus of plants known for their interesting floral structures.

“My house is like an island in a sea of gardens,” she concluded, noting it sits right in the midpoint of her property. “It feels like a condo, but with a yard.”

And she is more than happy to lend her garden for the Victoria Hospice fundraiser, as her husband died there six years ago, on Father’s Day, after having been marvellously cared for.

“I literally lived in his room at Hospice for a week, and the care he received was amazing. It was a huge load off my shoulders, absolutely the right place for us to be.”

He and she had lovingly restored their home over many years.

“When we first went inside the house we saw really dark floors, walls that were racing car green, a tiny living room, galley kitchen and dining room. We took out several walls and halls to open it up — with an old house like this you have to go with the quirkiness.”

She has a new partner now, Glenn Davies, and they have plans for another addition in the near future, so she will soon have another opportunity to flex her creative muscles.

 

Note: Brodie will be painting in her garden during the tour, along with Nancy Slaght, and will also raffle a painting to add to the fundraising effort.