Cabrini Green Urban Meadow
Backyard Garden
Today we walked around all the community gardens in Red Hook, of which there are quite a few. My favorites are the Cabrini Green Urban Meadow and the Backyard Garden. The first one reminds me of Gilles Clément's concept of the Jardin en Mouvement, with its meadow of wild flowers. The riotous blooms set a nice contrast against the urban background, particularly the view of the shipping dock with the Queen Mary II. The Backyard Garden is more traditional, with a picnic area, an allotment space with individual plots, and a shade garden, with fragrant climbing roses on the fence. I was tempted to put my name on the waiting list for a plot next year. It's certainly a place where I'd like to spend more time and perhaps grow some vegetables.
I went exploring the gardens of Fort Greene today. There were so many different styles of garden, each one a world into its own, reflecting its creator's obsessions, aspirations, and idiosyncrasies. There was a tiny classical garden with tall stiff evergreen hedges leading to a sunken hot tub; another was inspired by Hadrian villa, complete with columns forming a small terrace. More contemporary was a green wall inside a big loft. An artist named Edina Tokodi created a work using whited painted wood panels and sedum, which hung on a roof wall. The slickest garden was done by an Australian landscape designer, complete with a Balinese Buddha, birch and espaliered apple trees, a strawberries bed and a large custom-made marble dining table under a pergola. He even had amaryllis blooming in his front window boxes.
