The walled garden at Grey Gardens (circa late teens or early 1920s) from Forty Years of Gardening via Stephen Orr
It's pretty obvious that we're excited for the upcoming HBO Grey Gardens movie. Even though we've seen and loved the Maysles' documentary, we hadn't really thought much about the gardens for which the home is named. When reading fantastic New York garden writer and editor Stephen Orr's blog, What Were the Skies Like, we were psyched to see that he had dug through old gardening books to uncover historic photographs of the walled garden.
Grey Gardens from Beautiful Gardens in America via Stephen Orr
Somehow we never realized that the gardens of Grey Gardens were walled. Walled gardens near the sea? Doesn't that just sound like the most romantic place ever? Before the home was purchased by the Beales, Mr. and Mrs. Robert C. Hill bought the home in 1913 as a summer cottage. (The home was built in 1897). Anna Gilman Hill, who was a dedicated horticulturist and garden writer, imported magnificent concrete walls from Spain to enclose the garden and temper the fierce winds and sea spray of eastern Long Island.
"It was truly a gray garden. The soft gray of the dunes, cement walls and sea mists gave us our color scheme as well as our name....nepeta, stachys, and pinks....clipped bunches of santolina, lavender and rosemary made gray mounds here and there. Only flowers in pale colors were allowed inside the walls, yet the effect was far from insipid....I close my eyes and sense again the scent of those wild roses, the caress of the hot sun on our backs as we sauntered to and fro from our bath and lazy mornings on the beach." — Anna Gilman Hill, former owner of Grey Gardens in her book Forty Years of Gardening
For more about the gardens of Grey Gardens, check out What Were the Skies Like and Grey Gardens Online.
I can't believe that Drew Barrymore was cast as Little Edie. Can she even act?
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http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/sf/inspiration/grey-gardens-set-design-are-you-excited-082141
-on the set design
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sflily,
the word excited was supposed to link to the set design post... it does now...
-amya
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I never went in for the snide, cruel, and cutting remark about people, celebrity or otherwise, just for the sake of putting them down. Especially when they are not in a position to speak for themselves.
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Drew Barrymore was on Fresh Air with Terry Gross this week. They played a clip of her as Little Edie and she was amazing. Go listen the podcast If you don't believe me. Amazing...Wish I had HBO.
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I can't wait to see this. I saw a preview of Grey Gardens....Drew Barrymore is amazing! Jessica Lange is wonderful, too. I wished I had seen the original documentary. At one time they were at the top of high society. The mansion, back in the day, was gorgeous.
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the new york times article about the garden, was so interesting, and thanks for the vintage photo of the walled garden. i am watching the documentary right now and edie mentions hill by name when pointing out the garden.
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