Lighting Tour & Annual Meeting

Dawn Szelc LDG Co-Secretary, Clear Blue Landscapes

The November meeting of LDG bought us to Arlington on the night of a full moon for a lighting tour. It was quite magical as your can see from the picture above!
Olson Weaver Lighting Design & Install hosted the discussion of a recent project with homeowner Betsy. Betsy had completed a very large landscape design project at her Arlington home. The landscape was the work of Brendan Doyle, President of PLANTERRA Landscape Design, and Shorb Landscaping. Betsy wanted a native garden that was not messy. She also developed a love for birding and wanted to make sure that birds would be visiting her garden. With a sloped yard, high in the back and low in the front, hardscaping created separate areas for different types of plants, including a small rain garden and a sunny meadow. 

The site had a number of drainage issues, so Betsy also incorporated rain barrels to collect the rain water off the roof and bayscaping. Bayscapes are environmentally sound landscapes benefiting people, wildlife and water conservation by advocating a "holistic" approach through principles inspired by the relationships found in the natural world. Water-wise landscaping is a big part of it.
Betsy installed the plants in early September 2019, so they had not had much chance to mature when we were there. Some of the points of interest, besides a large selection of natives, include a Hornbeam hedge, a white Cercis canadensis, and a large stone frog.

Thanks to the homeowner and Olsen Weaver Lighting for the tour. 
Afterward the LDG membership met at La Ferme Restaurant in Bethesda for a Savory Tasting dinner with drinks. Our Annual Meeting was held including the new year's officer’s election. A festive celebration of another year of Landscape Programs for LDG!