Stop 02

Charlotte Frieze: The first impression of a garden is always important. It either makes you feel welcome and leads you into its embrace; or else you don’t know what’s there, but you really want to see it.

Narrator: A few steps from the garden’s entrance, you’re on a gravel surface, next to a noisy fountain. Above you, water pours down through a hole; it comes from the overlook, where you began this tour.

[SFX: Meier fountain]

This elaborate fountain isn’t considered part of the garden, but its water does have a vital connection to it, resurfacing in other forms, downhill.

Now turn around, and you’ll face a curtain of trees. Go to the left of the trees and an expansive vista opens up. There’s a green lawn, curving down the hillside. Grass carpets have their origin in the estate gardens of England and France...

Charlotte Frieze is a landscape architect who writes about gardens.

Charlotte Frieze: The sense of enclosure that’s created by the walls focuses your attention on the skyline of Los Angeles. It brings it into the garden, as if it were a borrowed landscape.

Narrator: In Japanese and Chinese gardens, the concept of “borrowed scenery” is about framing distant views and incorporating them into a garden’s design.

But there’s drama right here, too. Sharply clipped London Plane trees—a type of sycamore—form a tall, hedge-like forest that ambles down the hill. Clumps of ornamental grass connect these trees with the lawn. A path zigzags in and out of the forest; its angular lines lead your eye right up to looming buildings.

Narrator: Go back toward the fountain, to the other side of the trees. As you travel along the forest’s edge, see those small plants with spike-y shapes? Imagine what it’s like to touch their textured surfaces. Those are succulents—drought-tolerant plants that actually hold water. This is a garden that often references water.

Now enter the zigzag path.

Charlotte Frieze: You hear the sound of rushing water, but you don’t see it. The sound of water actually draws you along the path.