Stormy Weather

These pictures are not of the current storm, but of Typhoon Basyang four years ago.

It's been raining four days straight today and many places are flooded.

Classes in local schools have been called off for the rest of the week.

Angelica and Mataji were still in Manila four years ago.

  

They lived down the block and would come over every weekend--and anytime school would be called off.

The girls did lots of things together.

Later that same year, there was the devastating typhoon Ondoy which was much worst than Basyang. Then last year, in 2012, typhoon Habagat drowned the city.


Our garden is a bit different now, and the kids are much bigger.

Angelica and Mataji are also back in New York where they now live and go to school.

But these storms still come every July and August and cause so much damage.  Today there's finally some relief from Typhoon Maring.

I hope this is the last typhoon of the season.

Wanted: Lush Garden

It's been unbearably hot this summer and the plants in my garden are complaining and withering away! In Laguna though, plants seem to thrive all year round.  Ponce Veridiano's hideaway in Laguna is the ultimate in LUSH. His Laguna house has a beautiful garden--or actually it would be more appropriate to say that his beautiful garden has a house in it! 

The sitting area of the 2-bedroom villa

At the we visited, he was in the middle of building the pool for the 2-bedroom villa he is going to rent by-the-day to vacationers. This is his first attempt at interior design and it was coming along really nice and tasteful--but what still really stood out was his landscape design. This guy is naturally talented!

Healthy and happy calatheas

Ponce is a self-taught landscape artist from Laguna. He is an electrical engineer by training and in another life, he worked for Meralco in a very junior post. It was during this time that he the Meralco Garden Club (!)  at the prodding of one of his office mates.  He won the second garden show he joined and got the attention of  a Chinese lady to asked him to create a pocket garden inside her condo. From there her friends saw it, and also hired him.

View from the master bedroom of the main house

Eventually he found himself rubbing elbows with chi-chi personalities in Manila, and he got his first "commercial" job when Tony Floirendo (the father, not Tony-boy) asked him to landscape the family-owned Pearl Farm Resort on Samal Island. He had quite a long stint there because the family took to him and treated him like family.  Not only did he design the gardens of the different members of the family there, he also styled parties and weddings. He is that creative.

the open living room of his house

Through working with the Floirendos, Ponce got to meet other prominent families. I think it was about this time that the Ayalas either heard about him or saw his work. He was then tasked to do the gardens of Greenbelt in Makati.

View from the den--don't step out though--those are all waterlilies covering a pond.

His style was strikingly different from whatever landscapers did in the past. He plays with a monochromatic palette of green and hardly uses any flowering plants. relying on the shapes of the leaves and massing for his design statement. The gardens he creates are ultimately simple but extraordinary, low-key but elegant.

At the entrance of Kawayan Cove

After Greenbelt, he did the landscaping of Kawayan Cove, an exclusive seaside community in Nasugbu, Batangas. His style fit the development perfectly since Kawayan is elegant in its simplicity. His restrained use of plants and colors contributes to the harmony of the place--nothing jarring to the senses here. In fact, as soon as you pass through the entrance, you are overtaken by a sense of calm.  Definitely very tasteful.

Back to his house in Laguna...aside from the main house and the 2-bedroom villa, he has this bahay kubo structure across the street, for hanging out. 

From here you can listen to the raging river below. Ponce said he used to swim in it as a child.

I like the contrast of the crystal chandelier in a structure that's in the middle of the boonies.

He continues to be in demand for residential projects in Forbes, Dasmarinas and Urdaneta Villages in Makati. Inspite of his talent, and being highly sought-after by "people-in-the-know",  he remains down-to-earth and humble. He doesn't even want his picture taken or published.

From the garden looking into the main house (this is still Ponce's house, not mine!)

Every now and then, I call Jess, his top landscaper, to take peek at my small Ponce-designed garden (good thing Ponce still has ongoing projects nearby so Jess can easily swing by). He said my gardener is basically just cleaning and tidying the garden instead of caring for the plants. Jess tried to teach him twice, how to prune certain plants, but it seems that the gardener didn't want to learn new things.

My (once) lush garden when it was newly planted. Grass was not put in yet.

I think I'll have to put in new plants after the summer and right before the rainy season (first they steam in the humid heat of the summer, hopefully they don't drown next). By that time, I hope I have a better gardener! I'm learning so many things about these plants that soon I will be able to do my garden by myself.

The Greens are In!

While I was gone, mom offered to have the garden done even if the house wasn't completely finished. "It will make the workers go faster",  I was told by two other friends. So of course I accepted. "Offered" as in she would organize and make arrangements. I already got Ponce to agree to do the garden in between mom's garden and another one.

I was all set to get someone else, but after I got to know Ponce well, I decided I like him a lot personally and I think he is very talented. A natural talent who knows his craft by instinct.

What I like about his style is his massing, his choice of leaf shapes (texture), and the way he layers his colors--cooler greens at the back, warmer greens up front. Gives his gardens lush depth. And he does this all by feel.

At first, he loaded the garden with tons of plants. I was overwhelmed when I first saw it. I knew plants had to be reduced by half. He still used the plants I liked such as calatheas and bougainvilleas.

This garden is a departure from his usual Asian style. and his first time to specify flowers too, so let's see how it will grow out. It's not done yet. Still need to ground the bougainvilleas and the pink vine.

These photos show the overwhelming amount of plants. It doesn't show the front wall lined with Podocarpus Maki, and other plants. However,  it's much less than this now. We diverted some plants to the outdoor shower of the den, and returned some plants to the supplier.