Lotusland Every garden is someone's vision of Paradise. Ganna Walska created Lotusland between 1941 until she died in 1984, with the help from professionals such as Kinton and Ralph Stevens, Peter Riedel, Lockwood de Forest and Isabelle Greene. This elaborate series of gardens gave life to her passion. As she turned away from the disappointments of her career as an opera singer and a series of failed marriages, her garden became an obsession. Her abalone-edged pool, decorated with clam shells and surrounded by South African aloes, was her interpretation of 'paradise'. Her collections of cacti, euphorbias and succulents are gathered together in forbidding numbers, dramatic and eccentric.
Today Lotusland is managed by a Trust guided by the wish expressed in Madame Walska's will. A Foundation invites guests to experience the garden as created, neither censuring its exuberance nor hiding its whimsy.
My journey began in Los Angeles, home of the world famous Huntington Gardens. Shaped by cultural traditions and the sublime beauty of the natural landscape, this garden is a reaction to its environment. In this gently rolling 207 acres, Henry Huntington employed William Hertrich in 1903, and together they created this huge garden with 15 separate gardens within, each with its own extensive plant collection. You need a full day to explore the gardens and the galleries at Huntington.
The utopian climate here has encouraged the cultivation of exquisite gardens including this one, set into the slope in the Santa Ynez foothills behind Santa Barbara. A series of shallow, irregular terraces have created flat planes, onto which this garden has been imposed, rather like an abstract painting. Much of the planting is drought tolerant, with succulents providing colour and texture in this clever design.
The Zen garden is an entrance courtyard with irregular pool, with use of Australian plants in hymenosporum and a soft pendulous grey, green eucalypt.
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