Lifestyle

How to get an inside look at gorgeous private gardens in and around L.A.

Published

4 months ago

March 19, 2024

How to get an inside look at gorgeous private gardens in and around L.A.

With all the recent rain, 2024 is shaping up to be a fabulous year for flowers, not just in the wild but also in private gardens around Southern California. Lucky for garden enviers, many of those gates will be opening wide this spring as part of the annual fundraising tradition known as garden tours.

They come in all shapes and sizes, from the Theodore Payne Foundation’s two-day opportunity to admire more than 30 native plant landscapes across Los Angeles to more intimate events that include just a few exquisite gardens, such as the Garden Conservancy’s Open Days tours in the San Fernando Valley and Pasadena.

These tours will fill weekends through May, so you’ll always find someplace to go, and the entry prices are usually modest — typically less than $40 per person, and sometimes even free, although in those cases, such as the annual open house at Prisk Elementary School’s Native Plant Garden, donations to these worthy causes are greatly appreciated.

Grab a friend, a water bottle and a hat, don good walking shoes and prepare to enjoy all the beauty that follows a good California downpour and the hard work of creative gardeners. If we’ve forgotten someone, please email jeanette.marantos@latimes.com to see if it’s an event we can include.

April 6
Mediterranean Garden Society of Southern California Garden Tour of a private garden in Mandeville Canyon in Brentwood, 10 a.m. to noon. Designers Marilee Kuhlmann, Tom Rau and Johanna Woollcott will be on hand to discuss the 2-acre project, which includes water harvesting, fire prevention, fruit trees, a vegetable garden, native and water-wise plants and a succulent garden. Tickets are $35 ($25 for members). mediterraneangardensociety.org/branches-us-cal-south.html

A Swallowtail butterfly rests on Apricot Mallow at Prisk Native Plant Garden in Long Beach.

(Dania Maxwell / Los Angeles Times)

April 7 and 14
The Prisk Native Plant Garden Open House features a free visit to the native plant garden usually closed to the public. From 1 to 4 p.m. both days at William F. Prisk Elementary School, 2375 Fanwood Ave. in Long Beach. The garden is behind the school, at East Los Arcos Street and Albury Avenue. facebook.com/prisknativegarden

An oasis of native plants grows at Raul Rojas and Thomas Zamora's 1923 Highland Park bungalow.

April 13-14
The Theodore Payne Foundation Native Plant Garden Tour features 41 gardens around Los Angeles devoted to at least 50% native plants. Ticket holders get a map for self-guided tours to gardens on the Westside of L.A. on April 13 and the Eastside on April 14, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. both days. One ticket gets you into all the gardens on both days and provides an opportunity to see gardens for larger spaces as well as residences, including Kuruvungna Village Springs, Casa Apocalyptica, Garden Butterfly, Washington Elementary Native Habitat Garden and the Gottlieb Native Garden. Participants will receive a map in the mail once they purchase their tickets for $55 (children under 16 do not need tickets). nativeplantgardentour.org

The Frank Lloyd Wright Garden Symposium and L.A. Garden Tours by the Garden Conservancy involves a symposium from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. April 13 examining how Wright and other early 20th century architects responded to Southern California’s landscape and climate, followed April 14 with guided tours of Wright’s Hollyhock House and Garden in East Hollywood from 10 a.m. to noon and a tour of the Rudolph Schindler House & garden in West Hollywood from 10 a.m. to noon or 2 to 4 p.m. Garden tours are $30 each and reserved only to people who attend the symposium on April 13. Tickets for the symposium at the Wilshire Ebell Theatre are $175 ($150 for members, $50 for students). gardenconservancy.org

April 14
The Creative Arts Group Art of the Garden Tour includes self-guided tours of five gardens in Pasadena and Sierra Madre from 10:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tickets are $40, or $45 if purchased the day of the tour. The tour is the biggest annual fundraiser for the nonprofit group, which provides programs, exhibitions and classes in the arts for children and adults. Executive Director Gwen Robertson said the tour strives to include at least one “gobsmacker” estate along with more modest but still inspiring landscapes created by local designers. Photography, pets and children under 12 are not permitted on the tours. The Creative Arts Group Gallery will be open at 108 N. Baldwin Ave. in Sierra Madre for people who want to purchase tickets in person and view work by more than 25 local artists. creativeartsgroup.org

Rocks and cactus fill a desert garden landscape.

April 21
The Morongo Basin Conservation Assn. Desert-Wise Landscape Tour is scheduled from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. The event features six self-guided tours of water-wise Morongo Basin landscapes in Yucca Valley, Joshua Tree and Twentynine Palms, along with docent-guided visits to the Mojave Desert Land Trust. Tickets are $15 ($10 for members) and can be purchased online. The website also features videos of “desert-wise” landscapes from past tours. mbconservation.org

The Garden Conservancy Pasadena Open Days Tour invites you to explore three elaborate private gardens at historic homes — the Schumacher Garden Retreat and Bennett-DeBeixedon Garden in Pasadena and the Absacal Family Garden in Altadena. Tickets are $10 per garden and available online only. Children 12 and under enter free with an accompanying adult. gardenconservancy.org

Roses hang from a trellis in front of a white house.

April 27-28
The Redlands Horticultural and Improvement Society Garden Tour: Pollinators Paradise — Gardens in Bloom features six private pollinator gardens and the student garden at the Grove School in Redlands. The self-guided tours are available from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. both days. The society also is hosting a plant sale at 1352 Prospect Drive on Saturday only from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Tour maps are provided with tickets, which are $15 (children 13 and younger enter free) and can be purchased with cash or check at the Grove School and some local retailers. redlandsgardenclub.org

Riverside Community Flower Show & Garden Tour: Garden Friends With Benefits, a celebration of native pollinators, with self-guided tours of six Riverside-area gardens that demonstrate how to attract pollinators. The tours run between 10 a.m. and 5 p.m. both days, along with a free flower show from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Riverside Elks Lodge, 6166 Brockton Ave., with floral displays, crafts and garden art for sale. A wristband for admission to the garden tours is $10; children under 16 enter free. riversideflowershow.com

The 31st Floral Park Home & Garden Tour in North Santa Ana features tours of historic homes and gardens from the 1920s to the 1950s from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. both days. The tour also includes a vintage automobile display, food from local restaurants and shopping opportunities. Proceeds support community scholarships and nonprofit organizations. Tickets for the tour are $45 if purchased online by April 22, $50 on the day of the event. floralparkhometour.com

April 28
The Garden Conservancy San Fernando Valley Open Days Tour will showcase three elaborate private gardens at historic homes — the Wrightwood Estates Hillside Garden and the Sustainable Storybook Garden in Studio City and Longridge in Sherman Oaks. Tickets are $10 per garden and available online only. Children 12 and under enter free with an accompanying adult. gardenconservancy.org

May 4-5
The Mary Lou Heard Memorial Garden Tour features self-guided tours of 38 gardens from Long Beach to San Clemente from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. both days. A list of the gardens and their addresses is on the Mary Lou Heard Foundation website, but plan ahead because some are open to visitors on only one of the days. The tour is free but donation jars will be set out at the gardens to support the Sheepfold, a crisis center for women and children in Orange that has long been the beneficiary of the foundation’s annual tours. heardsgardentour.com

May 4
Los Angeles Flower Farm Tour, a free self-guided tour of nine small flower farms in urban Los Angeles from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. A map will be sent to people who register online to visit Frogtown Flora, Allie Cat flowers, Golden Heron, Drive by Flora, Bloomtown Flower Co., Mamabotanica, Pia Flora Design, Flowerbox Studios and Rose Lane Farms. The farm owners will be selling fresh bouquets, U-pick flowers and other related items during the tour day, so visitors are encouraged to bring a bucket of water to keep their flowers fresh as they make their tour. partiful.com

The Laguna Beach Garden Club 19th Gate & Garden Tour begins at the Laguna Beach County Water District’s Bruce Scherer Waterwise and Fire-Safe Gardens at 306 3rd St. in Laguna Beach, with special buses shuttling ticket holders to tours of several area gardens. Mexican fare and artisanal margaritas will be available for purchase; also look for free homemade baked goods. Artists will be painting canvases in several gardens, and visitors wearing a “festive garden party hat” will be entered in the tour’s hat contest. Proceeds support school gardens, local scholarships and community projects, such as the new bee mural at the water district, painted by artist Matt Willey as part of his the Good of the Hive initiative to raise awareness about the importance of pollinators. Garden tours run from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m, with the last entry scheduled at 2 p.m. Children are not permitted. Timed-entry tickets purchased by April 28 are $60 or $80 for entry anytime between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m., along with tickets for one food item and one drink. lagunabeachgardenclub.org

A tall tree stands in front of a pool with hedges to the side.

May 5
Blooms With a View Spring Garden Tour, sponsored by Inspired Garden Artistry, celebrates its 11th biennial tour and vendor fair at nine home gardens in View Park and Ladera Heights from noon to 5 p.m. The fair will be at the southern entrance of Ladera Park, 4750 W. 62nd St., in the View Park-Windsor Hills neighborhood of South L.A. The tour includes a waterfall, a rose garden, fruit trees, a Zen garden and an outdoor art studio with a 37-foot mosaic storybook wall. Tickets can be purchased online until April 15 for $30; $35 if purchased after April 15 or on the day of the event at the park. inspiredgardenartistry.com

The 2024 Livingston Memorial Visiting Nurse Assn. & Hospice Camarillo Garden Tour features art exhibits and demonstrations, live music, refreshments and a garden-themed boutique in addition to tours of five Camarillo gardens from noon to 4 p.m. Artists from the Pastel Society of the Gold Coast will give demonstrations at each garden. Tickets are $30 online. Proceeds benefit the association’s hospice program in Camarillo. lmvna.org

May 11
West Floral Park and Jack Fisher Park Neighborhoods Open Garden Day features at least eight tours in two tree-lined neighborhoods of vintage homes in North Santa Ana, along with live music, art displays, garden talks and demonstrations, a classic car display, free bottled water at the gardens, coffee and doughnuts available for purchase in the morning and vendors selling food and garden products from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. (Tours are 9:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. with a shuttle service between the two loops of tours to minimize wait times.) Ticket sales begin March 19 online for $20, or $25 if purchased the day of the event, at West Santa Clara and North Westwood avenues in Santa Ana. opengardenday.com

May 16
The 27th Newport Harbor Home & Garden Tour features tours at seven locally designed homes and gardens near Newport Harbor High School between 10 a.m. and 3 p.m., along with a morning reception at 9 a.m., luncheon between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. and online specialty boutique of home decor and accessories between 10:30 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. The event is a fundraiser for the Newport Harbor Educational Foundation to support academic programs and faculty at Newport Harbor High School. Tickets can be purchased online for $110 ($125 after April 26, if still available). newportharborhometour.com

May 18
San Clemente Garden Club 2024 Garden Tour features self-guided tours and live entertainment at five San Clemente-area gardens from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tickets can be purchased online before the event for $35 ($30 each if purchasing four or more). Day-of tickets are $45 and must be purchased in person, at a location that will be announced on the website on May 17. Proceeds support the San Clemente Garden Club College Scholarship and Junior Gardeners programs as well as conservation organization and civic beautification projects in San Clemente. sanclementegardenclub.com

The Tustin Area Historical Society 25th Old Town Tustin Home and Garden Tour includes tours of the community’s vintage homes and gardens from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., along with maypole dancing, artists painting, live music, horse-drawn trolleys and vendors selling garden-related merchandise. Tickets can be purchased online or at the Tustin Area Museum in Tustin for $40 in advance, $45 on the day of the event. tustinhistory.com

Flowers and vines climb poles outside a building.

Virginia Robinson Gardens 35th Spring Rhapsody Garden Tour includes three of the historic estate’s private gardens not normally open to the public, along with tours of the house decked out in floral arrangements, live music, a catered luncheon on the great lawn, a silent auction and an on-site marketplace, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. in Beverly Hills. Purchase tickets online for $350, as well as valet parking for $50. robinsongardens.org

May 19
The Rossmoor Woman’s Club 19th Garden Tour features self-guided tours of five private gardens in the Rossmoor-Los Alamitos area of Orange County, just north of Seal Beach, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. The event also includes tours of two elementary school gardens cultivated by students and their mentors from the Orange County Master Gardeners program. Tickets are $20 and can be purchased online in April or, on the day of the tour, at the club’s outdoor marketplace, featuring music, food, craft and plant sales in Arbor Village, 10651 Los Alamitos Blvd. in Los Alamitos. Net proceeds from the tours support local charities and college scholarships for Los Alamitos High School students. rossmoorwomansclub.org

Lifestyle

'Wait Wait' for July 27, 2024: With Not My Job guest Kathleen Hanna

Published

4 hours ago

July 26, 2024

Press Room

'Wait Wait' for July 27, 2024: With Not My Job guest Kathleen Hanna

Kathleen Hanna of The Julie Ruin performs onstage at the 2016 Panorama NYC Festival – Day 2 at Randall’s Island on July 23, 2016 in New York City. (Photo by Nicholas Hunt/Getty Images)

Nicholas Hunt/Getty Images/Getty Images North America

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Nicholas Hunt/Getty Images/Getty Images North America

This week’s show was recorded in Chicago with host Peter Sagal, judge and scorekeeper Bill Kurtis, Not My Job guest Kathleen Hanna and panelists Meredith Scardino, Peter Grosz, and Mo Rocca Click the audio link above to hear the whole show.

Who’s Bill This Time

Momala Takes Over; Assigned Seats Are Back; And The Heat Is On

The Olympic Torch Reporch

Our Summer Olympics Preview

Bluff The Listener

Our panelists tell three stories about someone committing an office faux pas, only one of which is true.

Not My Job: We quiz Bikini Kill’s Kathleen Hanna on Hanna-Barbera

Punk icon Kathleen Hanna plays our game called, “Kathleen Hanna Meet Hannah-Barbera.” Three questions about the animation studio.

Panel Questions

Hide Your Receipts; VR Meets ER; Avocado Apologies

Limericks

Bill Kurtis reads three news-related limericks: Situation Room Cocktails; Burrito Bird; Hopped Up Sharks

Lightning Fill In The Blank

All the news we couldn’t fit anywhere else

Predictions

Our panelists predict what will be the big story out of the Paris Olympic Games

Lifestyle

L.A. Affairs: At 77, I had a crush on my best friend’s widower. Did he feel the same way?

Published

4 hours ago

July 26, 2024

Press Room

L.A. Affairs: At 77, I had a crush on my best friend’s widower. Did he feel the same way?

At 77, I had given up. After two failed marriages and years of unsuccessful dating, I accepted what seemed to be my fate: single for almost 40 years and single for however many remained. You don’t get it all, I told myself. I was grateful for family, friends and work. Life settled into what felt like order.

Until Ty.

As the husband of my best friend, he was no stranger, but he was usually peripheral. Then 10 years ago, my friend got lung cancer. I watched during visits, stunned at how nurturing Ty could be, taking care of her even though they had separated years before at her request.

After she died, Ty and I stayed in touch sporadically: a surprise sharing of his second granddaughter a year after we scattered my friend’s ashes, an invitation to the launch of my book a year later. Ty attended, hovering in the back, emerging after everyone left to attentively help load my car.

Two more years passed. During quiet moments, I remembered his sweetness. I also remembered his handsome face and long, tall body. Confused about what I wanted, I texted Ty, who’s an architect, under the guise of purchasing a tree for my backyard.

We spent an afternoon at the nursery, laughing, comparing options and agreeing on a final selection. When the tree arrived, I emailed a photo. He emailed a thank you.

Another three years passed, broken only by news of his third granddaughter and my memories of how good it felt to be with him. Alert to his attentiveness, but unsettled by both his remove and my growing interest, I risked reaching out again, this time about remodeling my garage.

Ty spent several hours at my house making measurements, checking the foundation and sharing pictures of his home in Topanga. His sketches for the garage arrived two weeks later via email.

I was grateful for his help but unsure over what sort of friendship we were developing, at least from his point of view. I, however, was clear. I wanted him to wrap his long arms around me, tell me sweet things and make me his.

Instead, I sent a gift card to a Topanga restaurant to thank him for his drawings.

“Maybe we should spend it together,” he texted.

We dined in the dusk of late summer. Our talk was easy. Discomfort lay in the unspoken. Anxious for clarity, I repeatedly let my hand linger near the candle flickering in the middle of our table. It remained untouched.

And that was as far as I was willing to go. I refused to be any more forward, having already compromised myself beyond my comfort level with what seemed, at least to me, embarrassingly transparent efforts to indicate my interest. Not making the first move was very important. If a man could not reach out, if he didn’t have the self-confidence to take the first step, he would not, I adamantly felt, be a good partner for me.

Two weeks later, Ty did email, suggesting an early evening hike in Tuna Canyon in Malibu. The setting was perfect. Sun sparkled off the ocean. A gentle breeze blew. We climbed uphill for sweeping coastal vistas and circled down to the shade of live oaks, touching only when he took my hand to steady me where the path was slippery. At the end of the trail, overlooking the juncture between the mountains and the sea, we stood opposite each other and talked animatedly for almost an hour, both of us reluctant to part.

Our conversation was engaging, but my inner dialogue was louder. When, I kept thinking, is this man going to suggest we continue the evening over dinner? We didn’t have to go out. We could eat at his house. It was 7 p.m., for God’s sake. Passing hikers even stopped to remark on our matching white hair and how well they thought we looked together. It was like a movie scene where the audience is yelling, “Kiss her, kiss her,” rooting for what they know is going to happen while the tension becomes almost unbearable. But bear it I did.

Each of us ate alone.

A few weeks later, at his suggestion, we were back at Tuna Canyon. This time Ty did invite me to end the evening at his house. Sitting close on his couch, but not too close, we drifted toward each other in the darkening room. His shoulder brushed mine reaching for his cup of coffee. My hip pressed his as I leaned in for my tea. Slowly, sharing wishes and hopes for our remaining years, we became shadows in the light of the moon. And in that darkness, in that illuminated space, he reached out.

This reticent man, this man who was so slow to move toward me, this sensitive man who hid himself behind layers so opaque I was unsure of his interest, released all that he had inside him.

“I wanted you,” Ty repeated again and again. “I was afraid of ruining things. You were her best friend. I didn’t want to lose your friendship.”

Our pent-up tension exploded.

Stunned and thrilled, I leaned into the space he opened.

Three years later, it is a space we continue to share: a place where neither of us has given up, a place where he wraps me in his long arms, a place we hold carefully against our diminishing days.

The author is the owner of a preschool in Venice as well as a psychotherapist, photographer and writer. Her first book, “Naked in the Woods: My Unexpected Years in a Hippie Commune,” was published in 2015. Her newest manuscript, “Bargains: A Coming of Aging Memoir Told in Tales,” is seeking a publisher. She lives in Mar Vista and can be found at margaretgrundstein.com, Instagram @margwla, Medium @margaretgrundstein and Substack @mgrundstein.

L.A. Affairs chronicles the search for romantic love in all its glorious expressions in the L.A. area, and we want to hear your true story. We pay $400 for a published essay. Email LAAffairs@latimes.com. You can find submission guidelines here. You can find past columns here.

Lifestyle

'Deadpool & Wolverine' is a self-cannibalizing slog

Published

11 hours ago

July 26, 2024

Press Room

'Deadpool & Wolverine' is a self-cannibalizing slog

Ryan Reynolds stars as Deadpool and Hugh Jackman as Wolverine in an odd-couple action hero pairing.

Jay Maidment/20th Century Studios

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When Fox Studios released the first Deadpool movie back in 2016, it played like an irreverently funny antidote to our collective comic-book-movie fatigue. Wade Wilson, or Deadpool, was a foul-mouthed mercenary who obliterated his enemies and the fourth wall with the same gonzo energy.

Again and again, Deadpool turned to the camera and mocked the clichés of the superhero movie with such deadpan wit, you almost forgot you were watching a superhero movie. And Ryan Reynolds, Hollywood’s snarkiest leading man, might have been engineered in a lab to play this vulgar vigilante. I liked the movie well enough, though one was plenty; by the time Deadpool 2 rolled around in 2018, all that self-aware humor had started to seem awfully self-satisfied.

Now we have a third movie, Deadpool & Wolverine, which came about through some recent movie-industry machinations. When Disney bought Fox a few years ago, Deadpool, along with other mutant characters from the X-Men series, officially joined the franchise juggernaut known as the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

That puts the new movie in an almost interesting bind. It tries to poke fun at its tortured corporate parentage; one of the first things Deadpool says is “Marvel’s so stupid.” But now the movie also has to fit into the narrative parameters of the MCU. It tries to have it both ways: brand extension disguised as a satire of brand extension.

'Deadpool' Is a Potty-Mouthed Splatterfest. A Really Funny One

It’s also an odd-couple comedy, pairing Deadpool with the most famous of the X-Men: Logan, or Wolverine, the mutant with the unbreakable bones and the retractable metal claws, played as ever by a bulked-up Hugh Jackman.

The combo makes sense, and not just because both characters are Canadian. In earlier movies, Deadpool often made Wolverine the off-screen butt of his jokes. Both Deadpool and Wolverine are essentially immortal, their bodies capable of self-regenerating after being wounded. Both are tormented by past failures and are trying to redeem themselves. Onscreen, the two have a good, thorny chemistry, with Jackman’s brooding silences contrasting nicely with Reynolds’ mile-a-minute delivery.

I could tell you more about the story, but only at the risk of incurring the wrath of studio publicists who have asked critics not to discuss the plot or the movie’s many, many cameos. Let’s just say that the director Shawn Levy and his army of screenwriters bring the two leads together through various rifts in the multiverse. Yes, the multiverse, that ever-elastic comic-book conceit, with numerous Deadpools and Wolverines from various alternate realities popping up along the way.

Grim 'N' Gritty Is Out, Glib 'N' Smarmy Is In: 'Deadpool 2'

I suppose it’s safe to mention that Matthew Macfadyen, lately of Succession, plays some kind of sinister multiverse bureaucrat, while Emma Corrin, of The Crown, plays a nasty villain in exile. It’s all thin, derivative stuff, and the script’s various wink-wink nods to other shows and movies, from Back to the Future to Furiosa to The Great British Bake Off, don’t make it feel much fresher. And Levy, who previously directed Reynolds in the sci-fi comedies Free Guy and The Adam Project, doesn’t have much feel for the splattery violence that is a staple of the Deadpool movies. There’s more tedium than excitement in the characters’ bone-crunching, crotch-stabbing killing sprees, complete with corn-syrupy geysers of blood.

Clockwise from top left: Inside Out 2, Thelma, Twisters, Hit Man, Fancy Dance and Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F.

For all its carnage, its strenuous meta-humor and an R-rated sensibility that tests the generally PG-13 confines of the MCU, Deadpool & Wolverine does strive for sincerity at times. Some of its cameos and plot turns are clearly designed to pay tribute to Fox’s X-Men films from the early 2000s.

As a longtime X-Men fan myself, I’m not entirely immune to the charms of this approach; there’s one casting choice, in particular, that made me smile, almost in spite of myself. It’s not enough to make the movie feel like less of a self-cannibalizing slog, though I suspect that many in the audience, who live for this kind of glib fan service, won’t mind. Say what you will about Marvel — I certainly have — but it isn’t nearly as stupid as Deadpool says it is.