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One twenty-four hour period this past winter , after hard rains and heavy winding had buffet Southern California , Michel Perrin flew home from a trip to Asia to regain a massive palm tree tree in his swimming pool . Perrin , a French native who has lived in Beverly Hills since 2006 , was more astounded than chagrined , though it was n’t even his laurel wreath . It had toppled from a city draw . “ For such a big tree , ” he marveled , “ it has such short , shallow roots ! ”
The firm was plan by designer Victor Gruen , the interiors were decorated byChahan Minassian , and the garden were design by the landscape designerJudy Kameon , resulting in a beautifully unified vision of indoors and out of doors . A sliding glass wall enter the keep elbow room to the backyard , where an undulating border mince the grass area used for entertaining . picture by : Steve Gunther
He shook his fountainhead . A plant margin lay in ruin , a fence smashed . But that palm …
As late California transplants , Perrin , his wife Sally , and their teenagers , Chloé and Emma , still shuttle between Los Angeles and Paris , where he is chairman of his family ’s leather goods firm . To them , the Golden State is a novelty , not a cliché , and they inhabit it in a personal way . When the weather condition cooperates , which is almost all year around , they live a classic , indoor - outdoor life in a 1950 house that was made for exactly this lifestyle . The house , “ very Palm Springs , ” in Sally ’s parole , was designed by modern designer Victor Gruen with cheery courtyards for hang around and dining and chalk - wall way that open onto gardens . But inside , with the assist of French decorator Chahan Minassian , who go from Paris for the project , the couple ruled out the kind of sun - dazzle colors often found here in party favour of ivories , piano salvia , and blues . Outside , in a complementary spirit of almost European restraint , landscape painting architect Judy Kameon go along the industrial plant palette just as uncomplicated . Yet the termination , as one movement from the street through the large front garden , into the entry court , then the planetary house and out again , onto the lawn and the patio around the pool , is a detailed though subtle experience of a mix of light , airwave , texture , and tone that seems essential to this piazza but operate in a way that California typically is n’t .
A silverish devotee palm ( Brahea armata ) anchors a corner of the backyard . photograph by : Steve Gunther .
Cool but not cold , the Perrins ' low - slung house and embracing gardens are all of a piece , the ware of a collaboration between the owner and their two designers . It was Minassian , in fact , who play in Kameon ( whose designer forefather once worked for Victor Gruen ) to the project after seeing the Parker Palm Springs hotel , where Kameon had contrive a striking serial of garden rooms using plants to cushion the sleek building while tally exotic lushness to the desert setting .
A Spindel hourglass container is planted withKalanchoe beharensis . This Greenform Spindel Container ( $ 467 ) is available fromSpruce Eco - Studio . Photo by : Steve Gunther .
The Perrins gave Kameon a indirect request list . Michel wanted at least a couple of palm and , give their bicontinental lifestyle , a low - sustentation garden scheme . Avid art collectors , both Michel and Sally request “ sculpturesque ” succulents to harmonize with the mansion and serve , like the prowess within , as focal points . They also asked Kameon to scrap the front lawn and boxwood hedge between their house and the busy street . “ They wanted romance , ” she recollect . “ What exist was classic Beverly Hills , everything clipped and schematic . As the first thing you learn , the front set the tone for the integral garden and the home . ”
The entry courtyard features large , architecturalAgave weberiand rosettes ofAgave parryi , which complement a sculpture by Michael Arntz . photograph by : Steve Gunther .
Minassian walk Kameon through his scheme , show her fabrics and other stuff , which include textured linens and silks , a Tibetan goatskin rug , a curtain of iridescent seashells , all in ghost of cream , bronze , atomic number 47 , and aqueous blue to evoke the ocean and the desert .
Inspired by the look and experience of these , she design a “ demi - screen ” of large specimen agave interspersed with marvelous supergrass to stymie dower of the route and frame the building with organic curves . She carried indoors feature out : The ivory stripe ofAgave americanavar.medio - picta‘Alba ’ presage the life room ’s full-bodied upholstery . Creamy pea plant crushed rock mulch echoes the indoor terrazzo flooring , while the plumes of dwarf pampas gage ( Cortaderia selloana‘Pumila ’ ) mimic the goatskin ’s pettable snooze . Other plants ( Agave weberiandSenecio mandraliscae ) have a racing shell - like shimmer and a dispirited cast deepen by adjacent lime - green ferns . Besides rise the megrims , the shining cat valium also link the front bottom visually to a hillside behind the house , suggesting the landscape painting ’s ties to the Samuel Wilder world .
Prefabricated pavers from a local building supply society , arranged in a blueprint reminiscent of champagne fizz , dish up as whole tone from the master chamber to the backyard . Photo by : Steve Gunther .
As expansive and public as this picture is , the entry court is invitingly private , even as it repeats themes from the front . Here , where birch trees and a lawn once create a bland view for the surrounding glass - in rooms , now more agaves swirl around a sonsie carving by Michael Arntz . But instead of admire these succulent from afar , someone standing inside the courtyard is close enough to appreciate their pattern leaves and the contrast of one variety ’s spine - tipped rosettes with another ’s broad , fleshy strap . “ Tone - on - tone compositions call attention to contingent , ” says Kameon , who make out to play with scale in restricted smear . “ My impulse in a small quad is to put in big thing . ”
The inner court feature an elegant waterwall of ashen stone . Photo by : Steve Gunther .
Inside the front door , the space apace expand again , and it ’s potential to see past the airy living room — where a rotund rug and circular stools foresee the rectilineal architecture — to the bass rear garden , the largest outside room of all . Thanks to an original sliding glass wall , the whole back of the house open up up to the garden . But initially , what was here was n’t desirable . “ The view was miss the middle story , the layered planting between the ground and tree diagram that urinate a landscape painting hospitable to mass , ” Kameon says . To fix the trouble , she fattened and reshaped the flora boundary line around a central lawn that the Perrins want to keep for entertaining , adding tropical shuttlecock of heaven , Aeonium and sage , along with silver fan palms for Michel . She give untouched the angled pool , complete with diving board and surrounding paving material and , repeating the form of furnishings deep down , a house of cards chair was hang from a genus Podocarpus Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree . When the Perrins asked for stepping stones outside their victor suite , Kameon break up pear-shaped concrete pavers in a pattern reminiscent of champagne fizz .
Dwarf Pampas Grass ( Cortaderia selloana’Pumila ' ) was planted in front to echo color in the house . picture by : Steve Gunther .
“ This is what we were looking for when we moved to Southern California from Paris , ” Sally says . “ A tranquil and symmetrical background , from the interior out . ”
And what of the decoration tree in the pool ?
Days after it fall , Michel was still waiting for the city to winch it out , he tell . But he was n’t raring . The tree diagram catch him . Half - submerge , like some stranded , alien fish , it seemed to take a message : California is more complicated and changeable than it seems .
And , as it turn out , so are palms .
Plant ListLandscape designer Judy Kameon developed an oculus for color and composition through her former work as a hunky-dory - art painer . In the Perrin garden , she built her pallet around colors from inside the house and chose organic form and texture to soften the building ’s rectilinear forms .
Juniperus procumbens’Nana '
This priming coat cover - in slightly greener gray than that of the American aloe nearby - sweep through the entry court , adding color to the crushed rock carpet and a rough grain among the smooth leafed succulents .
Echeveria’Afterglow '
An graceful succulent with 12- to 16 - in - wide little potato in dusty blue with pink tips . It rise on a short bow , reaching a maximum altitude of two foot , and leave an likeable alteration of texture when used with other groundcover .
Agave americana var . medio - picta’Alba '
As one of the " sculptural " succulent call for by the Perrins , this plunder variety captures the flatware - commons and pearl of the home ’s interior in a sea - creature Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe that Kameon repeats throughout the garden .
Senecio mandraliscae
One of the garden ’s bluest plants , winds through the front garden border like a flow , knit together the moody blue - gray of agaves and the greener blueness of the pampas grass .
Echeveria elegans
Commonly known as Mexican Snowball , this succulent forms clumps of small , tight , six - inch - tall rosettes . Wonderful in container or as a fast growing groundcover . Its blue - gray leaves outride true to the strict color palette of the Perrin Garden . Like all succulents it prefers well - drained filth .
Aeonium arboreum ' Zwartkop '
In a arden with few flwoers , Kameon relied on the russet scab - shaped leafage to suggest florals yet line with other leafy greens . With its coppery - bronze hurl , ' Zwartkop ' also picks up the patina of the court carving .
Asparagus densiflorus
" A bright green among blues can step up all the tones , " say Kameon . In the front delimitation , this plant not only contribute a shot of vivid chartreuse , it also emerges from the whirl of senecio with the striking textured tentacle .
Artemisia’Powis Castle '
A silver - leafed perennial , ease the front garden ’s more fixed , static constituent , such as the large agaves and aloes .
SourcesJudy Kameon , Elysian Landscapes
Susan Heeger is the coauthor ofFrom Seed to Skillet . Her most late narrative forGarden Designwas " Top of Their Game " ( April 2010 ) .
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