276 
The Garden Magazine, June, 1924 
A PRIZE-WINNING WALL NICHE 
This dignified treatment shown by the Rye Garden Club at the March International 
Flower Show (New York) received the Garden Club of America’s ist Prize as the most 
successful example in its class. The walled garden may be interestingly broken by 
such a niche which serves as a focal point and an opportunity to introduce color 
under-drainage so that water will not collect, this type of terrace is service¬ 
able in most weathers and very pleasant to both eye and foot. If gravel be 
used, as occasionally seems desirable in situations where grass will not grow 
and the more elaborate brick or slate work is not wanted, be sure to select a 
WOVEN WOOD FENCE 
Simple, unobtrusive, and sheltering, this type of fence is 
especially desirable for the more informal country home 
where a frame and not an architectural feature is wanted. 
Weathering to silver grey, it affords support and a 
pleasant background for Ivy, Honeysuckle, or other vines 
spot for cool days, a shaded one for midsummer hours, and at 
all times seclusion. These desirables are by no means in the 
elusive “ luxury class” either but are at the beck of the smallest 
householder who has the wit to include them. 
When you build a house, or if you buy one, turn its face 
gardenward. Don’t think of it as a building on a plot of ground 
but of the two together as available living quarters. Link your 
dining-room with outdoors—a French window will do it—or run 
the terrace along to the kitchen if need be. Whatever your 
plan, make it convenient, readily usable. When considering 
furnishings, remember that the garden is to be your living room 
for nearly half the year and that though its appointments are 
undoubtedly simpler and fewer than those of its cold-weather 
and rainy-day indoor counterpart, comfort and suitability re¬ 
main prime requisites. Let us remember, too, that though 
nature is sometimes exquisitely delicate, subtle, and intricate 
in the expression of her inexhaustible fancies, she is also funda¬ 
mentally straightforward and enduring, so that the tawdry, 
cheap, and vulgarly ornate have no place in a garden. 
Terraces That Are Really Lived On 
F REQUENTLY the terrace is just grass—a flat, slightly 
higher part of the lawn with a step or two leading down to 
the main sweep of turf. If carefully made with plenty of 
fine clean gravel; preferably the ocean screened gravel which 
is uniform in size, somewhat translucent, and pretty in color. 
The most satisfactory way to finish a terrace is, of course, 
by some sort of permanent paving and for this purpose there 
are to-day available a number of interesting mediums. Brick 
offers considerable diversity of color and pattern, as do tiles 
with their velvety surfaces, smooth but not glossy. My per¬ 
sonal preference is for slate which comes in a half-dozen or so 
pleasing colors and combinations of color—grey, grey-green, 
terra-cotta, buff and so on—affording great decorative pos¬ 
sibility and merging without violence into adjoining sward and 
shrubbery. The house itself—the architecture and the ma¬ 
terial of which it is built—rather than individual predilection 
is, however, sometimes the determining factor as the terrace 
must be made to match or harmonize. Colored insets are 
sometimes very nice, giving a jewel-like effect to soft-toned sur¬ 
faces. Like jewels, however, they should not be overdone and 
are best used sparingly in small patterns. 
The terrace is a logical place to put a small inconspicuous 
wall-fountain with goldfish. People love life and gravitate 
naturally toward it—in summer the play of goldfish under 
the sky, in winter the leaping of flames on the hearth¬ 
stone. In placing your fountain remember this and put it 
where there is room for chairs or a seat—folk like to do their 
day-dreaming comfortably, in fact ease is a necessary 
precursor of any day-dreaming at all. Choose a modest 
fountain; for the terrace it must not be elaborate, the 
elaborate fountain properly belongs in the formal gar¬ 
den or court. Caged birds too, little love-birds and 
parrakeets act as a link and bring into sheltered places 
a note of life and color. Italian pots filled with flowers 
lend a fitting touch to some terraces, or a well-placed 
oil jar may furnish a needed accent. Dating back to 
the time of the “Forty Thieves,” at home in the gar¬ 
dens of Greece and of Rome, the oil jar still challenges 
interest and curiosity. 
To be thoroughly livable the terrace demands over¬ 
head protection from disconcerting dews and devastating 
noons. Awnings are a very practical and quick solution 
of the problem but present pitfalls for the unwary in 
the matter of color and pattern. Eschew narrow stripes 
and fancy scallops—they are prone to dance before the 
eye distractingly and completely shatter the quiet of the 
