Little Green Pixels has relocated

HEY! I've moved uptown! Here's my new address:

http://robcardillo.wordpress.com/

Please come see me there.

Beautifully Useful

My favorite reference books are both practical and attractive. Whether it's a guide book, a manual or a monograph, I can find what I need quickly and then enjoy the scenery and side trips if I have the time. It's all about good informational design and The Perennial Care Manual has it in spades.

My first copy just arrived from Storey and it's outstanding (and not just because I did the photography.) The cover is both elegant and contemporary and the inside pages are beautifully organized and presented. Nan's words are clear and concise with just a touch of neighborly advice and flowery passion. She writes from years of trialling plants and testing techniques on her own handwoven perennial beds.

Expertly edited by Carleen Madigen and Gwen Steege who are two of the most efficient and kind-hearted book editors I've met. They know how to rework masses of words and images into graceful passages without roughing them up.

Physically, the paper is bright, the reproductions are sharp and the binding is flexible so it stays flat when opened -- a great feature when your hands are muddy and you need to reread an entry before you tackle a misbehaved perennial.

Only in New York

I've been traveling to and from NYBG for an ongoing assignment this season and on my way home I usually walk the ten or so blocks between Grand Central and Penn Stations to get a little taste of the city. Last Wednesday, I came across this scene on Broadway near 42nd where several blocks have been closed to traffic transforming them into a sprawling pedstrian mall. To make the block party complete, the city set up hundreds of lawn chairs so people could sit, talk and play with their cell phones all the while bathing in one million watts of blazing neon.

Garden Design

Wow! An unexpected cover of Garden Design! This was part of a feature on a Main Line sculpture garden that I photographed last summer. Full spreads to come....

Morven Museum and Gardens

I'll be speaking at Morven Museum and Garden this Thursday morning at 10am. The talk entitled "Finessing the Flower, Lighting the Leaf!" will be lively and I'll be signing books afterward.

This picture is NOT from Morven (I've never been there) -- it's Chanticleer, the endlessly beautiful garden in Wayne which just reopened to the public last weekend.

Spring Collaborations

Even when I'm on my own, shooting a garden is a collaborative act between the garden's creator and myself. A good designer has already established visual relationships and plant combinations that I must then translate and enhance through the lens. But when there's time and resources to bring in talented Art Directors, Photography Editors, Stylists and Producers, the results are often exceptional. Here are a few recently published examples:
Outdoor Rooms, Spring 2009. Produced and styled by Jon Carloftis. Jon is one of the most imaginative garden designers and stylists I know. We've worked together in PA and KY for several years now and I'm constantly floored by how quickly he can toss together a tasty tableau without breaking a sweat. I'm usually panicking as we arrive at a new site with a hot sun rising -- but Jon unfailingly whips the scene together before the magic moment has passed.
Philadelphia Home, Spring/Summer 2009. The Schumacher garden. The king of all difficult sites, this steep hillside has been reformed through thirty years of devoted care by Elizabeth and Ralph. Three main terraces hold sitting areas, exotic plant collections and one-of-a-kind garden objects from Liz's fine store, Garden Accents. Zoey Sless-Kitain, the magazine's most excellent PD, kept pointing me towards angles I had overlooked and Lisa Russell ably assisted with armfuls of tasty props.Country Gardens, Spring 2009. The Anne Spencer garden. This was a last minute find while shooting Lynchburg's famed Old City Cemetery with Marty Ross and James Baggett, editor and lover of literary gardeners. Anne Spencer (1882-1975) was a Harem Renaissance poet who found her muse in the natural world. This one wasn't on our schedule, so we had only a few hours to pull everything together. Marty artfully styled the set views with a trunk full of plants and some indigenous props before the rains arrived. One of the our finest garden writers (and recently knighted GWA Fellow), Marty also penned this sweet story.

Garden Design, April 2009. This Calla Lily feature was shot entirely in the Netherlands when Tovah and I traveled there last spring. With spathes this gorgeous, we couldn't pass them up during our visits to various breeders. Tovah championed the story and found it a beautiful home in the beautiful Garden Design. Our mugshots rubbed shoulders on the contributors page too.

The Horticourt in Session

Just posted my first guest blog at Gardening Gone Wild. Come on over and see!