File:American homes and gardens (1910) (18158193491).jpg

Title: American homes and gardens
Identifier: americanhomesgar71910newy (find matches)
Year: 1905 (1900s)
Authors:
Subjects: Architecture, Domestic; Landscape gardening
Publisher: New York : Munn and Co
Contributing Library: Smithsonian Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Biodiversity Heritage Library

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386 AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS October, 1910 in these California foothills. It is no wonder that the Duke of the Abruzzi and Prince Ferdinand of Savoy were strongly reminded of their sunny Italy, and felt at home here after traveling so long in foreign countries. At the end of a long avenue of blossoming accacias, flanked with endless rows of vines, the visitor gets his first view of the slate-roofed villa, nestling in the midst of a tall bamboo border, clumps of spineless cacti, feathery palms and orange and olive trees, for Asti, it must be re- membered, lies in the very heart of the northern citrus belt of California. There are several fountains playing as you pass the well-kept lawns and the air is sweet with the perfume of roses, heliotrope, and jasmine. Almost before you realize it, you have passed through the gleaming white columns of the vestibule entrance to caught through the embroidery of flowering shrubs and ampelopsis that drape the colonnade. In the center of the garden, a small fountain rises above the blossoms and beyond, as a fitting background for the open peristyle, are two venerable oak trees, their thick trunks covered with green moss and their lofty crests fes- tooned with wild grapevines that have been allowed to clamor up their sides and follow their own sweet will, dropping fantastic streamers that sway with every passing breeze. The ancient Romans spent a great part of their time out of doors and in such a peristyle as this, an open-air life must have been very pleasant indeed. One side of the odorous garden is always in the shade and during the hot days the little fountain gives freshness to the surround-
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1 he garden front of tlie villa the villa. You are in a wide hallway that separates reception- and dining-rooms and there, before you, is the peristyle garden with all the rooms of the house facing on it. The sheer beauty of the scene makes you halt and gasp with surprise and delight. The vision is an enchant- ing one. Immediately in the foreground is a slender column of white Carrera marble, with a tracery of ivy leaves in has relief upon it, capped by a double-headed likeness of Bac- chus and Ariadne, a duplicate of the original in the Vetti House garden and commonly used in ancient days for boun- dary stones. At either corner of the court, on pedestals, are nude figures of children each holding in one hand a bunch of grapes and in the other a goose. Glimpses of cinnabar red walls, decorated with broad black bands, are ing air, while at night it lulls one to peaceful slumber with its pleasant babble of falling water. In the dreamy court at night, the silvery moonlight makes it easy for the imagination to conjure up the past in every detail that has been reproduced at Asti. The marble stat- uettes, the fountains, the vases of flowers, the columns, white and tranquil, close every vista; and towering above all are the aged oaks and the same glittering stars that were seen on the plains of Herculaneum before the withering blasts of Vesuvius made scorise of that fair landscape. While Mr. Sbarboro made the court the principal fea- ture of his summer home, he has provided other attractions and beauty spots. There is an open-air breakfast-room, under a canopy of orange trees and an orchard containing a variety of fruit trees.

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