Highly motivated gardeners don't let a little problem like a lack of land stop them. They just carve out a garden wherever they can.
Those are the people Linda Yang is writing for in "The City Gardener's Handbook: The Definitive Guide to Small-Space Gardening" (Storey Books, $19.95 paperback). The book helps readers take urban spaces such as rooftops, balconies and barren yards and turn them into verdant hideaways.
The handbook addresses city-specific problems, such as pollution, ugly views, hot air from heavy machinery and the logistics of getting a large plant to an upstairs apartment. It also includes a list of plants that grow well in city conditions as well as basic gardening information such as planting techniques, watering, pest control and pruning — or, as Yang calls it, "girth control."
Get real — not!
Decorative art, including faux finishes and mural painting, is the focus of The ARTificial School in the Strip District, owned and operated by Jennifer Rempel and Jim Hopton.
The first and only professional school of decorative arts in Pittsburgh, on the second floor of the pink Springfield School Building, the facility offers hands-on classes featuring a unique auditory-visual-tactile learning process.
The next class, "Glazing, Gilding & Glitz," from 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. June 22, will cover glazing by the parchment technique, real metal-leaf gilding, sheens and metallics. Students will create a stylish wall treatment in the hallway outside the studio. The cost is $135 a person.
The school also has released a videotape, "Fabulous Faux Finishes," which explains parchment glaze, stretch silk effect and French brushing in step-by-step instructions. The 32-minute video costs $20, plus $5 postage and handling ($8 for three to six tapes) and can be paid, by check only, to The ARTificial School, 37 Waterfront Drive, Pittsburgh, PA 15222.
Details: (412) 231-4009.
Flowers for charity
The seventh annual Sewickley Garden Tour to benefit the Pittsburgh AIDS Task Force will be from 4:30 to 11 p.m. June 22. Participants will tour the garden at Ivy Hall in Sewickley, then proceed by shuttle to a party at the historic Singer Estate.
Auction items include artwork by Picasso and Miro; garden items; and a vacation in Orlando, Fla. The cost of the event is $65 and more.
Details: (412) 741-6666 or visit Papier, 348 Beaver St., Sewickley.
Tires for Frick
Waste tires have been reincarnated at the Frick Art & Historical Center. The Frick, 7227 Reynolds St., is treating its 31,000 square feet of lawn with "crumb rubber top-dressing," thanks to a grant from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection.
Made from recycled waste tires, the top-dressing is designed to reduce wear and reseeding costs, lengthen the growing season and conserve water.
The Frick was one of 10 organizations to receive money last year through the Community Waste Tire Recreational Grant Program. Qualified school districts, municipalities and nonprofit organizations in the commonwealth are eligible to participate.
The top-dressing to be applied to the Frick's lawn is made of about 3,100 waste tires.
Details: The Bureau of Land Recycling and Waste Management, (717) 787-9871 or www.dep.state.pa.us .
Somewhere in time
Folks clad in Victorian-era dress will be part of the atmosphere at the Victorian House & Garden Tour sponsored by The Allegheny West Civic Council on July 26, 27 and 28.
A grand selection of Victorian homes and city gardens in the century-old community of Pittsburgh's North Side will be open to tour. Neighborhood streets will be cleared of automobiles to allow people decked in late 19th-century clothes to stroll the area.
On July 26, a Twilight Dinner Tour arranged by Linda Iannotta, a Pittsburgh caterer, will kick off the weekend. The event, which costs $65 a person (reservations required), features dining and tours of seven of the most lavish gardens. It begins at 5:30 p.m.
On July 27 and 28, the public can buy House & Garden tour tickets for $14 a person from the gazebo at the intersection of Beech and Galveston avenues. No reservations are needed for those tours, which will be from noon to 5 p.m. both days. Unusual plants and garden paraphernalia will be sold.
Details: (412) 323-8884.
Wet your appetite
Waterfalls, streams, floating lilies and ornamental fish will star in the Tee Pees Garden Center's annual Parade of Ponds Tour to benefit Phipps Conservatory of Pittsburgh.
More than 20 water gardens from the North and South Hills areas will be featured from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. June 22 for participants in the bus tour, which costs $35. Lunch at Carmody's Restaurant is included in the price.
A self-guided tour also is offered between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. for a cost of $10, which includes a detailed map, directions and descriptions of the ponds, designed and built by Thomas Smith Jr. of Tee Pees Garden Center, Franklin Park.
For ticket information, call (412) 364-5005. Tickets also can be purchased at Tee Pees Garden Center, 2458 Rochester Road, Sewickley.
Send home and garden news to Homework, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, D.L. Clark Building, 503 Martindale St., Pittsburgh, PA 15212. Fax: (412) 320-7966. Or e-mail tribliving@tribweb.com .
