Trained Vines Between Trees In Luxembourg Gardens
I could post for 100 days straight and I don't think I would run out of things to say and share about Luxembourg Gardens in Paris. Yesterday, I posted about the green tree boxes. Today are a couple of photos of a fountain area that is in the northeast corner of the garden. It is a reflecting pool with a large fountain at the far Eastern edge that is lined by (I'm pretty sure that they're) London Plane trees or perhaps just Plane Trees since they're NOT in London?!?!
The trees themselves are magnificent. There are four or five on either side of the reflecting pool that are placed in a line. In between these trees is ivy. You can see it in the photos at the top and bottom of this post. The ivy is trained from the central base in between the trees - and the space in between the trees - and trained out in two angles. Where it meets the trees, it is then trained back across in a straight line. Look at it in the photos. Amazing, isn't it? The vines are massive - like 24" in diameter and must be anchored into the trees and posts in some way, but there is no visible wires or hooks that I could see in the trees. But, they *have* to be there, right?
This isn't espalier (oh...wait for the posts about espalier), but it is reminiscent of that idea to me: it is about training a plant (in this case a vine) into a shape that evokes some formality in the garden. I haven't even thought about vines and ivy in our backyard to date, but now? I can't stop thinking about where we could do something like this? The issue, of course is time. Time to creating something like this in terms of planting. But also time in terms of making it mature. This wasn't planted last year or the year before.
Where could we replicate something like this? On the side of our house where I've been threatening to install a belgian fence espalier? Or on the fence line somewhere behind some trees? What about on the northside of our house where I was thinking of planting that Sky Pencil Holly? I could put up a post or two and run it along the fence? Or, maybe *inside* the fence where I could use the fence as support instead of having to use posts at all?
Feels like I'm going to have a few items on my 2020 wish-list/to-do list from this trip to Paris - starting with the tree boxes and now adding this trained and swooping ivy to the list.
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Be nice to each other here.