Dramatic Presence
When garden designer Eric Nagelmann first saw his client’s property in Santa Barbara, his advice was: “Sell it.” Surrounded by wan oaks, pittosporums and pines, its funky house--scarred by smoke and water damage from a suspicious fire--was an eyesore. Thigh-high grass, blighted roses and a dog run made up its “garden.” The 2 1/2-acre spread was so devoid of character, in fact, that Nagelmann only gradually understood its potential. “As overgrown as it was, the place was a blank canvas,” he remembers. “It was ripe for drama.”
His client, a San Fernando Valley native, loves the desert, the tropics and the eclectic plant mix of old California gardens. Nagelmann, who started gardening when he was 10, is an avid collector of exotic plants that shine in his painterly compositions. Together, owner and designer conceived new courtyards, terraces and walks that showcase subtropical specimens with an emphasis on foliage, not flowers.
Work began on both house and garden in the mid-’80s, during Southern California’s last drought. Accordingly, the lawn was banished, and most large trees, especially the oaks, were cleaned up and preserved. From there, Nagelmann proceeded without a planting plan, drawing only his hardscape details--for ponds, paths and paving. “The first plants I chose dictated what followed,” he explains, “since plants tend to create themes.” Among his green themes were the shaggy palms he installed in most new garden spaces--the pindo in the entry court, the bunched Guadalupes behind the house and the Mexican blues flanking the pool cabana. Succulents were another refrain: Massed opuntias and cereus edge the motor court, and beyond that there’s a walled roomful of euphorbias. Elsewhere, assorted succulents spike a tapestry of mixed lavender and pennisetum grass.
Such living tableaux, Nagelmann says, are built on contrasts of form (“the upright, the splayed, the soft”) as well as color. The dreamy meadow that replaced the lawn, for instance, is now a field of decomposed granite punctuated by silver century plants, feathery green-and-pink grasses, specimen aloes and palms. Winter rains turn the field a rich emerald; summer bakes it dry, accentuating the plant shapes. “A garden is about change,” Nagelmann observes. “You’re always nurturing, improving, refining.”
Part of the process, for him, involves prowling favorite nurseries (Turk Hessellund in Santa Barbara; Chia in Carpinteria), visiting plant brokers and calling friends for tips on backyard oddities that someone’s brother wants to sell. The result, he says, is a garden with strong individual character and a lot of excitement. “Walking around is like diving through a shipwreck. You spot a string of pearls here, a trunk of gold there; your eye never gets bored.”
So much for his initial advice to dump the property. “Luckily,” he says with a laugh, “my client chose to ignore that.”
