Garden design inspiration in Bad Pyrmont

Summer is my best travel season, particularly around Germany. While on the road, besides my usual travel assignments, I always keep my eye and the camera open for some inspiration, especially in the field of interior design. As on a trip in the picturesque Bad Pyrmont, I noticed some interesting decorations ideas that I am sharing right now...

Big balconies need life. Even if you are situated at an upper level and from there, you can have a view over a beautiful landscape - the case in Bad Pyrmont - you still need to create your special environment in your near vicinity, the place where you take your coffee every morning. The combination between suspended pots of generous vegetations and the bottom decorations brings life and colour to a very sober and cold. It also bring a warm touch to the entire house ensemble.

The choices of the garden decorations are mostvy determined by the local offer and the specific climate. Only green little - bonsai - trees, not much higher than the upper part of the ground level windows bring more dynamism - also given the different sizes and shapes of the trees - to the building and embelishes the view.

 Huge trees, almost the size of the building, need time to grow up, but given the many years, decades maybe of ages of the trees, gives an air of sobriety and seriosity.

The wrought fence is not always an elegant view, but when you use the metal holes to let the vegetation go by and fill the space, everything looks much better and more inviting. During the summer, it also creates a green curtain that gives more privacy to the yard.

When you do not have the privivedge of living in a big house with garden, your balcony is your breath of green life. You can spend time there to relax after a long day in the office, have breakfast, meet your friends or read a book. Why not make it a cozy spot and add, besides flowers, some beautiful art too?

At Home and Garden Exhibition in Berlin

 The Home and Garden Exhibition is celebrating 20 years in 2016. With a special focus on outdoor decorations and inspiration, it is an itinerant event organised between May and September in several big cities across Germany, such as Cologne, Hamburg, Düsseldorf, Berlin, Stuttgart or Essen. In Berlin, it was organised at the Ritterstadium Olympia. 

Reuniting exhibitors from all over Germany, it offers a variety of products and ideas especially to private owners. Swimming pools were one of the main products featured, even though the usually rainy weather in Germany does not allow it a long time use. The prices for such special whirlpools may vary between 2,000 and 8,000 EUR.

Some outdoor products are also adapted for indoors. Those tables, for instance, have a detacheable platform that can be used as a tray in the house too. 

Ideas for the garden abund. With a minimal investment, you can make your dream corner in the middle of the nature. Personally, I am for keeping the garden as wild as possible, but some may want just to bring some city feeling there too.

As lon as I can have a lazy corner where I can read and write, I am happy. Hopefully, it is not that difficult to find the right pieces of furniture.

Decorations for the garden are a different category of products, with many statues and colourful items to hang out. These metal cones with filigran cuttings can bring a lot of entertainment in the night, when you burn something as trivial as toilet paper in the middle.

From your comfy, beach-like chair, you can just watch the show - or the latest soccer challenges. The choice is yours!

 Or to get ready for a barbecue, by using these massive, but easy to use machines.

For a big family gathering, you need not only your Zen moment, but also a serious furniture. This corner costs at this fair 7,995 EUR.

Some antiques stores are also present, suggesting some classical, high-end and top notch price corners. First and foremost, you need the big space and the money. The rest just can be arranged.

Overall, the exhibition was a good experience, with a lot of interactions and interesting ideas and products. It also had some food and clothes section, not necessarily outstanding but offering some affordable shopping options if you do not want to leave this place without some purchase.

Strongly recommended to anyone looking for good deals of products for garden and outdoors decorations.

5 Flower inspiration for your garden

Springs and summers are the time of the year when I love this city more than ever. With its sunny and green corners and the trees adorning and embelishing even the most boring and ugly looking streets. If you are lucky enough to have a big garden or you just want to decorate your small balcony, here are some suggestions you can find to any flower store in Berlin, at very cheap prices. Most of them do not request special assistance or more than average knowledge.

Rhododendron - There are thousand of varieties, many of them edible, in salads or tea. The national flower of Nepal, a woody plant, it requires a well drained soil.

Member of the sunflower family, Bellis is an ornamental flower that is not only a beautiful ornamental bedding, but also brings joy to any garden arrangement.

There are more than 400 species of English Geranium a must-have for any respectable English Garden. From the spring until early summer, it brings beauty and grace to the garden.

Forget-me-not is indiscutably a gracious and beautiful presence in any balcony and garden. Discrete, romantic, uncomplicated, there are resistant to cold weather and suit well the shady areas too.

Blaukissen Aubretta are a bit pretentious as they need more light and special watering. Spring is the best season to plant them and they have a late bloom in the mid-summer too.

Bonus, two beautiful bouquets from one of my favourite flower stores in Berlin, Le Orchid, on Joachimsthalerstr. 14. One year ago, I ordered there some special flower arrangements for a client's wedding and they were more than friendly. They can make a beautiful wonder out of everything. These two arrangements are just two of the many seasonal bouquets they make every day.

What about you? What are your favourite flowers arrangements and garden flowers?

DIY tips: Repotting my cactus

I travel a lot and I move even often and having too many flowers is not possible. The easiest plant we can keep at home is the over-resistant cactus. We bought our little Y. almost two years ago, but since then he grew up. The small pot seemed very small and improper for our growing cactus and a re-potting operation was necessary. My lack of practical skills, limited time and last but not least the scare of doing something clumsy enough to damage it prevented me from doing it. 

Yesterday, it was the big day for the cactus and with a little bit of advice from the flower specialist from the shop nearby, we did it! Everything was done within 30 minutes and went smother than ever expected.

Here are the main steps:

1. 

The investment was minimal, less than 6 Euro: we bought special cactus soil, that has all the special ingredients needed usually by the cactus in their natural environment. We also bought a bigger pot - but medium size as the cacti, even our very simple sort doesn't need too much space - with a quite boring appearance for the moment, but we plan to do some nice paintings later.

2. 

We set up a newspaper for keeping the space clean during the earth removals. Added 3/4 of new soil in the new pot. 

3. 

Smoothly removed the cactus from the old pot with a knife. Use a kitchen glove for not getting scratched by the needles, but be careful not to damage the needles either. As we noticed, the roots of our poor Y. were overcrowded and definitely needed more space to develop. 

4. 

I installed the cactus in its new home and covered it with earth. 

5.

We added enough water for the next 3-4 days and looked satisfied to the happy results of our work. Now, our cactus has the best conditions to grow up as a big boy.

PS: Special thanks to S. who helped me with the pictures as well as with the main steps and suggestions for a fast and efficient re-potting.