Lavender for All Seasons by Paola Legarre

Paola Legarre Is the author of a new and enchanting book by Timber Press called Lavender for 

All Seasons A Gardener’s Guide to Growing and Creating with Lavender Year-Round.

This book is not just «dedicated» to people interested in planting, cultivating tons of lavender, but to all the passionate ones, intrigued by the topic or with the desire of embellishing their homes, with some plants.

Everything started in the San Joaquin Valley, California,  when little Paola understood the power of plants, and their beauty thanks also to the ability of her ancestors and relatives in transmitting this passion.

The contact with nature became part of her. She writes in the foreword: «Experiences of scent, texture, light, and transformation hold on and have the power to lead one to a destiny one never would have imagined or predicted».

Fascinated by lavender, at first Paola planted just 40 plants: then she decided to move on, buying a farm in the high desert at an elevation of 4800 feet. She is cultivating now more than nineteen thousand plants and more than sixty-five cultivars. They have ten acres and six are covered just with lavender.  

They called the farm Sage Creations and this reality is now welcoming visitors. They also hold classes, create a lot of products with lavender. 

This book will help you to find the proper lavender plant based on your climate, but also for the purposes you intend to plant it. 

Then of course you'll understand how to harvest your lavender, discovering also how you can use it in your kitchen, or how you can prepare lavender-crafts or succulent recipes with chocolate and lavender! Honey sounds to be incredibly good and so tasty!

Kenneth Redding, the photographer of this book has done a beautiful work!

Highly recommended book to the appassionate of lavender and nature in general.

Anna Maria Polidori 

Dalle Marche con Amore di Natasha Stefanenko

Dalle Marche con Amore

di Natasha Stefanenko è un libro che dovrete portare con voi se volete visitare le Marche o vorrete saperne di più. Perchè?

Perché è stato scritto con amore, con passione, con conoscenza da parte di una marchigiana d'adozione che, ascoltando suo marito, ha deciso di fare un salto non da poco: passare dalla Milano cosmopolita magari sempre elettrizzante, a una dimensione più vera e sincera quale è quella di Sant'Elpidio a Mare. Le Marche sono capaci di incantare con le  montagne, il mare, le colline e il passato di eccellenza. Ricordiamo solo Rossini, nato a Pesaro,  Raffaello, urbinate e Giacomo Leopardi di Recanati.

Dico la verità: non sono riuscita a ritrovare il file PDF che la casa editrice, la Cairo mi aveva inviato, purtroppo di pessima qualità,  lo scorso luglio, sebbene avessi dato un'occhiata in generale alla struttura della guida e a Urbino, che era la parte che più ci interessava.

Però ogni angolino di questa regione, almeno le città più grandi sono tutte prese in considerazione.

Non saranno, però, solo le città le principali protagoniste di questo testo  ma anche il cibo, i ristoranti, le osterie, la natura, il dialetto. 

Quello della Stefanenko è un viaggio sentimentale: la scoperta di una regione che l'ha abbracciata e che lei ha abbracciato apprezzandone ogni aspetto. 

Imperdibile!

Anna Maria Polidori 

Paris on Foot by John Baxter

 It's always a joy to receive a PDF of a new guide book from Museyon Books.

And, what an enchantment when this book is written by John Baxter and the theme is Paris.

The latest work by this creative, attentive author in grade to penetrate the real essence of Paris is: Paris on Foot.

Well, it is so true that a capital can't be visited by car or bus, but that it is indispensible to walk per miles and miles for discovering gems here and there.

Although it can appear tiring, it is the best way for a best understanding of the beauty of a city.

Why not, once in Paris, walking alone all along the city, meeting the real capital? It's a great suggestion, this one by Baxter. 

 

There is also, add Baxter, a special word for these walks: they are called flaneries. Which ones would you want to attend to Paris? Which ones will inspire you?

These walks are all captivating. 

You afford to Paris and you cannot think to skip the thematic: food.  La Cremerie Polidor, for example must be visited. There, you can eat at a cheap price, remembering that you'll find maybe close to you some students of La Sorbonne, still pretty pennieless people, but also people of culture (not all the time plenty of money, but for sure in search of good food at a cheap price): why, then, not visiting the Palais Royale where Colette lived at long and wrote, when unfortunately she couldn't walk anymore wagons of tales observing people from the window of her flat? 

The studio of Pablo Picasso should be another important place to see but also the ones where in the 1920's most of the fertile intellectual life took place: the site where there was La Maison des Amis des Livres created by Le Monnier, the companion of Sylvia Beach and  the site of Shakespeare and Company, founded by Sylvia Beach: another place could be Monnier's apartment.

Another walk involves Montmartre. Some suggestions? The Musée de Montmartre but also the espace Montmartre-Salvador Dalì, Hastings & Modigliani Apartment, the apartment where lived Van Gogh when stayed in Paris in company of Theo, his brother who was the owner of an art gallery, the cemetery of Montmartre. If you are a fan of some of these creatives, you will be so happy to visit their graves: there is Stendhal, Léo Delibes, Degas, Francois Truffaut, Niijinsky famous and unlucky dancer, Dalida, Emile Zola, Marie Duplessis, Alexandre Dumas, son. You can't avoid of course the Basilica of Sacré-Coeur.

Oh, and if you plan to buy some souvenirs or you send frequently postcards wherever you are, (it would be a great thing to do!), stops by at rue de Steinkerque: there you'll find everything for your friends and dear ones.

But Montmartree is not just that: and in chapter 3, we meet the boulevards. 

Of course you can't miss the Moulin Rouge, the most iconic local, but you will discover sites, absolutely eccentric, and wonderfully suggestive.

The Site of Le Rat Mort has its own original story, like also the sites of Cabaret L'Enfer et Cabaret du Ciel. Le Musée de la Vie Romantique will let you understand who George Sand was, and dont miss to visit the Serge Gainsbourg birth place. 

Chapter 4 is about fashion. Le maison Baccarat, the offices of Christian Dior and La Galéerie Dior the most remarkable sites.

The Luxenbourg Gardens: if you love Nicolas Barreau and his romantic books, you'll know that this one is one of his favorite locations.

What to see? The apartments of Hemingway, Francis Scott Fitzgerald and Murphy , the monument to Paul Verlaine, and the one at Frédéric Chopin, the Medici Fountain and the statue of a Faune Dancing and the one of George Sand.

It's a beautiful and inspiring place for sure!

From the Opera to the Louvre offers some great chances: a visit to the museum most iconic of Paris, but also a visit to the Opera Garnier, for a show or just a touristic guide: if you love Turgenev, in this  section of the city there is his apartment like also the one of Camillo Pissarro. 

In the next chapter, the Left Bank you can visit, just some examples, L'Ecole des Beaux-Art, Anatole France's apartment, the studio of Eugene Delacroix and Camille Corot, like also the one of Voltaire! But you must visit absolutely the Musée d'Orsay, where there are paintings of Monet.

Montparnasse is a site dedicated to the eating: La Coupole, La Rotonde, Dingo Bar, La Closerie des Lilac. 

A chapter includes also the Nazi occupation. During these walks you must also visit Notre-Dame.

A chapter is dedicated to Paris in revolt, so describing the sites of Saint-Germain.

The final one treats that Paris populated by single women.

So, why not to visit the house where lived Gertrude Stein and her companion Alice B.Toklas? If we read Hemingway, if we watch Picasso's paintings, it's because of that influential woman and her companion.

Another important place the one where lived Isadora Duncan, dancer and coreographer and Josephine Baker's place.

What a trip! 

I thank again Museyon Books for this beautifu, informative PDF that you must absolutely bring with you when in Paris for living the city with more knowledge and appreciation. 

Beautiful for sure! Highly recommended.

Anna Maria Polidori