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In most Romance languages, the word for the pale red color pink comes from the same word as rose (the flower). In English, however, the most common word for this pale red color is now “pink”—which was originally the common name of a little garden flower with a frilled edge–the dianthus. The usage of the word “pink” to describe the pale reddish color became standard in the late eighteenth century, but before that the word described the flower–and occasionally idiomatic expressions which involved the flower. Coincidentally English borrowed the name of the flower from Dutch, since, even in the middle ages, the Dutch were apparently the flower merchants of northern Europe.
To further complicate this story, in the 17th century, “pinke” was a name for stil de grain yellow–a pigment which was traditionally manufactured from unripe buckthorn berries. This yellow pigment was also known as yellow madder and it was mixed with natural blue substances to make murky greens.
So not only is it possible that pink does not exist as a color (or, at any rate, bright bluish pinks like magenta do not seem to exist naturally but are a trick of the brain) it also seems that the name for pink has fundamentally changed nature over the course of time.
It is a confusing color with a confusing nomenclatural history, but it is still very beautiful.
Flowers on a Tree Trunk (Rachel Ruysch, ca. first half of 18th century)
Every once in a while, things go right for artists: Rachel Ruysch (1664-1750) lived a long prosperous life and found international success as a still life painter in an era when there were few women in the arts. Her father, Frederik Ruysch, was a famous professor of anatomy and botany who was renowned for his highly informative yet artistic anatomy displays (somewhat in the manner of famous contemporary body displays by the anatomist Gunther von Hagens). Professor Ruysch built strange and delicate landscapes out of preserved human organs and dissected bodies—particularly those of infants. He was renowned for his skill with various preservative regents and his secret liquor balsamicum was one of the wonders of the day—as were the novel human specimens he preserved within this embalming fluid. Rachel was expected to help by creating lace for the pieces and then arranging the bodies, limbs, appendages, and organs in an artistic fashion along with seashells and flowers (you’ll have to look that stuff up on your own, because it is the stuff of nightmares).
Because she worked closely with her father, interacted with famous artists of Holland’s golden age, and drew and organized the objects in her family’s famous curiosity cabinet, Rachel was well positioned to launch her own art career. She usually painted in the “dark background” still life style of de Heem and Willem Kalf, however many of her works demonstrated her background in the natural sciences. For example in “Flowers on a Tree Trunk” she boldly moves her composition from the parlor to the forest. A highly artificial flower bouquet of cabbage-roses, lilies, and irises dominates the composition—however, since this flower arrangement is located on the ground floor of a forest, the meaning is extremely different from more conventional vase paintings. Surrounded by wild creatures the bouquet invites the viewer to contrast the artificial beauty of flower arranging (or indeed of cultivated flowers themselves) with the chaotic beauty of a wild ecosystem of snakes, lizards, snails and butterflies.
Portrait of Rachel Ruysch (Godfried Schalcken, ca. 1706)
The latter half of the summer is the silly season for journalism. During August, in particular, when legislative bodies are on break and the titans of finance are estivating in Gstaad, the papers are filled with stories about pie-eating contests, surfing dogs, and other similar bucolic follies. The evocative Swedish phrase for this indolent time is “rötmånadshistoria” which literally means rotting month—a time when every Swede is on holiday elsewhere and the forgotten leftovers rot in the fridge.
Silly Season 2011?
Well that is how it is supposed to be anyway. This summer the paper is filled with disasters. America’s leaders have collectively decided they would prefer to see the country ruined as long as the opposite party is blamed. US Government bonds have been downgraded. The markets are crashing. Darpa’s experimental scramjet is lost. London is on fire. Internecine wars grind on in west Asia. Bullet trains are crashing in China. Syria is taking another step on the road to genocidal civil war. This year seems like a dark literal version of rötmånadshistoria–in which everything is revealed to be rotten. The silliness is simmering over into madness.
Rushton Triangular Lodge (1595)
Sadly there are no facile solutions for any of those problems here. This post is not meant to be a blueprint for fixing society, but rather a paean to the traditional summer silliness we should be enjoying. Instead of concentrating on the bad news, let’s pretend none of it is happening! Sit back, imagine that it is a traditional silly season, and enjoy this post dedicated to frivolity. In keeping with the finest tradition of Erasmus we will embrace absurdity and literally praise folly—or actually follies. So here is the first half of a two-part post concerning garden follies–extravagant ornamental structures intended solely for the amusement of bygone aristocrats. Such structures were expressly built not to be useful. Oftentimes follies were purposefully manufactured as ruins or were designed with a glaring structural anomaly—like a tower without stairs, or a greenhouse without windows. A folly was often the centerpiece of a large garden and tied together the disparate themes. Additionally, like powdered wigs, hoop skirts, and most other luxury goods, the very uselessness of a folly was testament to a nobleman’s power and prestige: he could afford to throw away princely sums on a decorative building.
Rococo Folly from Painswick Garden (Ca. 1750s)
Follies originated just prior to the 17th century. It was customary for gentlemen of that era to take a grand tour of southern Europe when they came of age. As they traveled through Italy and southern France these elite tourists were exposed to actual Roman ruins. When they returned to England or northern France they built copies of Greco-Roman temples to symbolize various classical virtues and ideals (which were already enshrined in the educational system of that time). Although the first wave of garden follies in the Seventeenth century was motivated by classical and religious ideas, the craze for extravagance and eccentricity deepened in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. As France and England reached the apogee of their economic power, the ruling classes of those nations went all out to show their taste, sophistication, and rank with increasingly lavish and increasingly novel garden architecture. Follies proliferated and took the shape of the eclectic pursuits of the lords commissioning them. An interest in the Levant filled England with orientalist fantasies. The gothic revival led to a host of spooky medieval towers and pseudo-crypts. The Earl of Dunmore, a Scottish Earl who loved tropical fruit commissioned an immense stone pineapple as a cupola for his hothouse.
Painshill Turkish Tent (mid 18th century)
The Dunmore Pineapple (1776)
Follies were meant to be beautiful and/or striking. Since they were designed specifically to be interesting ahead of all other concerns they often possess unique fantasy flourishes. In many cases the purpose of an architectural folly was to provide a direct allegorical lesson, however, even when no clear lesson was meant the structures clearly reflected the nature of human beliefs and desires…
The Chanteloup Pagoda (1775)
Perrott's Folly (1758)
Claude Mollet, Innovator and Gardener to the Kings of France
Devoted readers may have noticed that I haven’t written a garden post for a while. That’s, um, because my garden is kind of…well…flat. It got hit by triple punches in the form of a tornado, a giant hail storm, and now winter. All that’s left is to plant my bulbs, put my roses to bed, and sadly stare at the little yew bush in the corner until Spring comes again with its ancient magic.
During this cold dead season, gardeners fantasize about spectacular gardens they can never have or even see in person. I personally have been reflecting on parterre gardens and wanted to present a little gallery with pictures of great parterre gardens around the world. Parterre gardens are highly formal gardens which make use of gravel walkways, flat planted beds, and tightly clipped hedges and topiaries to create extremely precise geometric designs. They were created at the end of the16th century by Claude Mollet (ca. 1564 – shortly before 1649), the first gardener for three French kings. The Mollets were a dynasty of exalted gardeners who were much in demand by the French nobility. Claude’s father was chief gardener at the Château d’Anet where young Claude saw formal style Italian herb gardens being planted. He admired the geometric precision of these small geometric her beds or compartimens as they were known in France and wondered if they could be made larger. From this concept sprang a vast world of “embroideries (passements), moresques, arabesques, grotesques, guilloches, rosettes, sunbursts (gloires), escutcheons, coats-of-arms, monograms and emblems (devises)” to quote Jacques Boyceau, another luminary of the early parterre movement.
But enough words! Enjoy this tiny gallery of parterre gardens from around the world as you plan your spring gardens and get ready to pass the long winter.
Waddesdon formal flower garden
Villandry garden
Tatton Park Gardens
Parterre at le Chateau de la Hulpe
Longwood Garden Topiary Garden
Leaning Pine Aboretum at CalPoly
La Casa Pacifica flower parterre
West Parterre of Hatfield House
Parterre Garden at Hampton Court Palace in London
Parterre at Château de Courances
Bourton House Topiary
Brodsworth Formal GardenHillwood Garden Fountain
ferrebeekeeper 