Cottage Chic on the Beach

Kathy Renwald

  When people walk into The Rustic Rose they can’t get enough of the barn lanterns, weathered wood mallets, and peculiar tools.  “Stuff that comes out of the barn or shop, that’s what’s trendy now,” says Eileen Breukelman owner of the cottage nostalgia and décor store on the Hamilton Beach Strip.

  Eileen and her husband Jeff opened The Rustic Rose five years ago, just as the Beach was entering a new residential growth spurt with high priced homes and condos. They bought the building at 538 Beach Boulevard because “the price was right” but were convinced they could never lose on a place so close to the water.

  Nautical nostalgia was the first focus at the store with old wooden buoys and vintage life preservers snapped up by customers living on the Beach. As the collection grew, the couple kept their focus tight and the store curated with a specific vision. Beautiful old tools, vintage Le Creuset cookware, wooden butter and cheese boxes, fishing reels and cheerful picnic ware speak of a simpler time.  What’s striking about so many of the pieces is the colour, the oranges, blues, and sunflower yellow found on bicycles, tool handles, and old toys. “If people buy wood pieces I tell them not to refinish or paint, leave the original colour,” Jeff says.

    Some customers come in once a month to see what’s new, and more are coming from Toronto, “Many of our pieces are perfect for a condo, the patina of the wood, the colour, it warms up modern, industrial style spaces,” Eileen says. She points to a tin rocking horse sitting high on a shelf, “If you had the room, that would be perfect in an entrance way.”

  When the Breukelman’s go looking for new finds for their store, they consider it a holiday. Heading out in their truck, maybe with one of their seven children along for the trip, they search all over Ontario and in to the States for treasures. At auctions, antique malls, and outdoor markets Jeff says they “can see past the dirt for a potential nostalgic "wow" piece.”

  Old wood construction ladders are hot right now according to Eileen. People use them as a place to hang quilts or display other accessories. Multi-pane antique windows are in demand too she says, “We have customers who use them as frames for family photos.”  If pieces need repair, Jeff does the work, fitting it in around his full time business Jef-Re Construction Services specializing in foundation repair and industrial flooring.

  You won’t find fussy china, or fine furniture at The Rustic Rose but you will find crates of old license plates. Vintage car owners like to find ones that match the year of their vehicle. Beautiful metal chocolate molds become a work of art on the wall, and duck decoys never go out of style.  Eileen likes to see what her customers do with the pieces when they get them home.  “People post great ideas to our Facebook page.”

  The Rustic Rose (appleroses.com) is open four days a week. The rest of the time Eileen is looking for new vintage pieces, raising kids or making handcrafted roses from apples. “That’s how it started, I was looking for studio space to make the roses, and then we started displaying vintage pieces when we ran out of room in our house.”

  So the shop is full of the cottage chic stuff they love, and there’s only one piece they are tempted to keep for home says Jeff. “The metal horse, if it doesn’t sell, it’s going in our house.”

 

 http://www.thespec.com/living-story/6883631-cottage-chic-on-the-beach/

 

  

 

 

 

Bees Need Your Help!

  Armed with hammer, nails, hooks and hollow tubes, 22 people cobbled together bee boxes they hope will become home to native bees. The production line took up every flat surface in the Environment Hamilton offices.

  “We can’t keep up with the demand,” says Jen Baker with the Hamilton Naturalists’ Club. The club, along with Environment Hamilton, and the Hamilton Community Foundation is offering the bee box building workshops, as part of the Pollinators Paradise Project (hamiltonpollinatorparadise.org). Every time they offer a class, it sells out.

    Mary Johnston is cutting the hollow tubes where bees will lay their eggs, and pushing them into the small bee box. Though she has a good population of bees on her property, she liked the idea of doing more. “I’m interested in doing anything I can to attract bees and butterflies to my garden.”  Most of the people at the workshop had noticed a sad decline in all types of bees in their gardens. Loss of habitat is an obvious reason for reduced bee populations, and bee keepers are convinced, the use of chemical herbicides and pesticides particularly systemic ones have contributed to bee deaths.

  The bee boxes are designed to attract our native solitary bees. Solitary bees lead a solitary life, do not make honey, and don’t swarm or tend to sting. What they do that’s so vital is pollinate flowering plants. If you like to eat, then fostering a healthy bee population is essential. We all know the bumble bees and the honey bee, but the native solitary bees often do their work unseen and unnoticed. A third of Ontario native bees, including carpenter bees, mason bees, and leaf-cutter bees nest in wood, including hollow stems.

  Ron Roscoe is just about finished with his bee box. The former Hamilton Fincup says he has always had an interest in the outdoors, “I’d like to see more bees than wasps in my garden.”

  The bee boxes do best when placed in an east facing location, the morning sun helps warm the bees up for flight. The hollow stems from plants such as teasel, reeds, grasses, and Queen Anne’s lace should be packed tight.  If the bees do lay eggs they will block the end of the tube-a sign of success. Then it’s important the garden is home to a diverse selection of flowering plants to feed the bees.

  As the bee box builders were told by Stefan Weber, “Native bees need native plants.”  Weber of St. Williams Nursery and Ecology Centre (stwilliamsnursery.com) suggested a variety of plants from serviceberry trees, to fall witch hazel, hepatica, lupins and evening primrose, to provide, food, cover and nesting material for native bees. St. Williams will be part of an Earth Day Native Plant Sale April 18^th at the Royal Botanical Gardens Parking lot on Plains Road Burlington. It’s just one of several more events planned by the Pollinators Paradise Project.

  It’s also important I would add, to not be a fanatic about cleaning up the garden. Leave some areas where the hollow stems of plants sit undisturbed, and even bare patches where the bees that nest in the ground can do their work.

  Jim and Angie Small of Binbrook came in for the bee box workshop, motivated by what’s happening on their land according to Angie.

  “Our plants used to just be humming with bees, now if we see one we say ‘Oh my God, there’s a bee.’”

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

Orchids aren't that hard to grow

My story in the Spectator

In today's Hamilton Spectator Go section, my story on the Cowboy Cave of Claude Lizotte.

Lizotte's Ancaster backyard in a western theme park. He's built all the pieces, the saloon and general store. 

He's built all the pieces, the saloon and general store. The graveyard is filling up.

The graveyard is filling up. bit.ly/1uIDBot

He has half an acre and started building the Cowboy Cave three years ago.

http://www.thespec.com/living-story/4877873-kathy-renwald-say-howdy-to-the-cowboy-cave/

A view of the park, a screened in porch, fish lapping in the pond, life is good in Dundas

 Video of the Perfect Porch

  Mary Jo Hind and Fred Vermeulen are living that snapshot of summer. The architects with Perkins + Will are enjoying the second year of their redesigned garden.   

  Hind had a laser bead on the kind of garden she wanted. Sitting at a table in her linear side yard she opens The Gardens of Luciano Giubbilei, a book showcasing the Italian garden designers elegant, edited, geometric gardens.    To make it happen they worked with Venni Gardens (vennigardens.com) of Hamilton. 

  Candy Venning is a landscape designer, husband Simon Mangan is a UK trained gardener.   The garden in Dundas was ready for a makeover. After 20 years it was a bit bushy, a tad wild, and ready for some discipline. The couple had added the beautiful screen porch to the side of the house to frame views of the Dundas Driving Park and their back yard. 

  Furnished with summery white canvas chairs, the room can be opened up to both views by pushing back big slatted wood doors.    

  Hind and Venni collaborated to add more privacy, order and crisp lines to the garden, while reducing maintenance.   

  The front yard is simple. An understated picket fence marks the property boundary, paths are of black flamed granite squares, and a beech hedge is kept at a height to allow views of the park. White hydrangeas and pots of agapanthus anchor a muted planting scheme. “We wanted to respect the heritage of the home, and have the garden compliment it,” Venning says.   

  Access to the backyard is through the screened porch, or on a narrow path along the formal pond. The serene, rectangular pond with water lilies, reeds and a small fountain is an enticement to walk to the back garden.   

  In the back a public lane way is used to access the couple’s garage. Venning and Mangan were thrilled to be able to use a row of pleached linden trees to add privacy without making the garden a fortress. The pleached trees-a technique where branches are trained to grow together- were found already started at Connon Nurseries. Mangan had the misfortune of planting them last summer after the huge July rainstorm. “The root balls were so heavy with water we had to keep bringing in bigger backhoes to do the job,” Venning says.    

  Black granite cobblestones mix with the square granite pavers in the back, and two huge planters, overflowing with annuals break up the expanse of stone. The plantings in the back follow the same desire for simplicity. Boxwood hedges abut the stone, and a mass planting of pink hydrangeas are at their peak right now. All that’s needed are a broom and a pair of clippers to keep the garden ship shape, and once a year Mangan is hoisted up into the lindens to shear them into their boxy shape.  

  “It was a great project,” Venning says, and wonderful to work in Hamilton.” The couple are still finding that much of their work comes from Toronto.   For Mary Jo Hind, it was a pleasure to find a designer to share her vision of a crisp garden that blended structure with softness.   

  The view from the screened porch, with long shadows on the lawn and the family cat minding the pond is a relaxing summer pause.   

       

Almost a year ago I dropped a note in a mailbox in front of an intriguing house in Burlington. The owners, Richard Walker and Pamela Kempthorne got back to me and agreed to tell me the story of their house. The story is they turned an old radiatior/carpenter/plumbing shop into a stylish home. They both could see beyond the obvious, It looks like a million bucks but costs a lot less. My full story is in the Hamilton Spectator Go section today.

It's all in the packaging. A wonderful before and after in Burlington. bit.ly/1skzmhO

My YouTube video here: http://youtu.be/fRIXBDzliWA

It's all in the packaging. A wonderful before and after in Burlington.

Dead ivy, stunted wisteria, missing maples. Gardens are still recovering from the severe winter.

My neighbour's wisteria looked like this last year, this year it's only now starting to put out some leaves. 

But Hey alliums look fabulous now. Everyone should plant this easy to care for bulb.

 And the red horse chestnuts are so pretty this year, too bad they get blight later in the season. But still a magic tree to have in your yard.

This is what the long weekend looked like last year...

Wisteria was in full bloom.

Shrubs were leafed out and ready to burst into flower.

Annuals were happily settled in their pots.
This year I'm hearing about dead roses, burned ivy and boxwood. We're still recovering from the winter.