Gazing Ball
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Gazing Ball
A yard globe, also known as a garden globe, gazing ball, lawn ball, garden ball, gazing globe, mirror ball, chrome ball, or orb, is a mirrored sphere typically displayed atop a conical ceramic or wrought iron stand, and sometimes the grass, as a lawn ornament. Sizes ranges from up to in diameter, with the most popular gazing ball being . Gazing balls were glass but can now be stainless steel, acrylic, ceramic, or stained glass. Unlike hanging friendship balls or witch balls that have a loop, gazing balls come in a variety, with some having a stem so they can securely sit in a stand, while others are more uniform in shape and can sit on grass. Larger sizes can be made but prove difficult to place on the stand due to the weight of the globe. History Gazing balls originated in 13th century Venice, Italy, where they were hand-blown by skilled craftsmen. King Ludwig II of Bavaria, sometimes referred to as Mad King Ludwig, is said to have adorned his Herrenchiemsee palace with ...
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Lawn Ornament
Lawn ornaments are decorative objects placed in the grassy area of a property. Common lawn ornaments Animal forms: animal statues such as frogs, turtles, rabbits, deer, flamingoes and ducks are cast in plastic or cement. Bathtub Madonna: a statue of Mary the mother of Jesus is placed in a bathtub half buried under the ground. Statues of Mary are most often made of white concrete, but are sometimes painted with a blue garment. Bird bath: a structure designed to hold water for birds to bathe in or drink, generally supported upon a pedestal, is known as a bird bath. Bird feeder: a container for foods such as bird seeds is often designed to look like a miniature house or barn, and may be mounted on a stake, post, or column. Concrete Aboriginal, a lawn ornament once common in Australia. Concrete goose, a popular lawn ornament in the United States. Found object art: items such as bowling balls, toilet planters, and antique farm equipment may be repurposed as lawn ornaments. Fr ...
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Art Deco
Art Deco, short for the French ''Arts Décoratifs'', and sometimes just called Deco, is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design, that first appeared in France in the 1910s (just before World War I), and flourished in the United States and Europe during the 1920s and 1930s. Through styling and design of the exterior and interior of anything from large structures to small objects, including how people look (clothing, fashion and jewelry), Art Deco has influenced bridges, buildings (from skyscrapers to cinemas), ships, ocean liners, trains, cars, trucks, buses, furniture, and everyday objects like radios and vacuum cleaners. It got its name after the 1925 Exposition internationale des arts décoratifs et industriels modernes (International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts) held in Paris. Art Deco combined modern styles with fine craftsmanship and rich materials. During its heyday, it represented luxury, glamour, exuberance, and faith in socia ...
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Crystal Ball
A crystal ball, also known as an orbuculum or crystal sphere, is a crystal or glass ball and common fortune-telling object. It is generally associated with the performance of clairvoyance and scrying in particular. In more recent times, the crystal ball has been used for creative photography with the term lensball commonly used to describe a crystal ball used as a photography prop. History In the first century CE, Pliny the Elder describes use of crystal balls by soothsayers (''"crystallum orbis"'', later written in Medieval Latin by scribes as ''orbuculum''). By the fifth century CE, scrying was widespread within the Roman Empire and was condemned by the early medieval Christian Church as heretical. Dr. John Dee was a noted British mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, geographer, and consultant to Queen Elizabeth I. He devoted much of his life to alchemy, divination, and Hermetic philosophy, of which the use of crystal balls was often included. Crystal gazing was a popu ...
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Christmas Ornament
Christmas ornaments, baubles, "Christmas bulbs" or "Christmas bubbles" are decoration items, usually to decorate Christmas trees. These decorations may be woven, blown (glass or plastic), molded (ceramic or metal), carved from wood or expanded polystyrene, or made by other techniques. Ornaments are available in a variety of geometric shapes and image depictions. Ornaments are almost always reused year after year rather than purchased annually, and family collections often contain a combination of commercially produced ornaments and decorations created by family members. Such collections are often passed on and augmented from generation to generation. Festive figures and images are commonly preferred. Lucretia P. Hale's story "The Peterkins' Christmas-Tree" offers a short catalog of the sorts of ornaments used in the 1870s: The modern-day mold-blown colored glass Christmas ornament was invented in the small German town of Lauscha in the mid-16th century. History Invent ...
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Front Yard
On a residential area, a front yard (United States, Canada, Australia) or front garden (United Kingdom, Europe) is the portion of land between the street and the front of the house. If it is covered in grass, it may be referred to as a front lawn. The area behind the house, usually more private, is the back yard or back garden. Yard and garden share an etymology and have overlapping meanings. In North America, front yards, which normally include considerable driveway and parking space, tend to be mostly lawn even when large, but in Europe they are often treated as a flower garden and may be heavily planted. In North American suburbia, there may be no physical barriers marking the front and sides of the plot, which would be very unusual in Europe, where there are generally walls, fences or hedges on three sides of the garden. Builfront yard sitting areain your front yard landscape and create a good impression with your relatives, neighbours and friends, you must design the fro ...
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Garden Ornament
A garden ornament is an item used for garden, landscape, and park enhancement and decoration. Garden ornaments include: * bench *bird baths * bird feeders * birdhouses *columns – cast stone *fire basket * flower box ** window box *fountains *jardiniere **kugel fountain *garden furniture * gazing spheres *hanging baskets *landscape lighting – decorative fixtures * lawn ornaments ** bathtub madonnas ** concrete geese ** garden gnomes **lawn jockeys ** yard globe ** plastic pink flamingos *outdoor candle *outdoor fireplace *outdoor sculpture ** sculpture trail ** found objects such as recycled bowling balls, toilet planters, antique farm equipment ** kinetic sculpture **masks **obelisks ** renewable energy sculpture *pagoda – small versions *pedestals – e.g. terracotta, cast stone *pond – rocks and boulders with basins * pots ** urns **ceramic art vases *rain chains *sundials *topiary specimens *waterfalls – small prefabricated type * weathervanes * wind chimes Histor ...
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Kugel Ball
A kugel fountain (also called a "floating" sphere fountain or by the pleonasmic name kugel ball) is a water feature or sculpture where a sphere sits in a fitted hollow in a pedestal, and is supported by aquaplaning on a thin film of water. Pressurized water flows between the sphere and socket, creating a mechanical hydrostatic bearing that is nearly frictionless. The sphere can weigh thousands of kilograms, but the efficient bearing allows it to be spun by the force of a hand. The sphere does not float, being denser than water; it is often made from granite. The hydraulics of the fountain can be controlled so that the axis of rotation of the sphere changes continually. Ring sculptures that rotate on an axis are also built. Kugel fountains can be found all over the world. Many are at popular tourist destinations, such as science museums, shopping centers, lobbies, and gardens. The term ''kugel'' is from the German word ''Kugel'' for ''ball'' or ''sphere''. Locations of kugel fo ...
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Garden Gnome
Garden gnomes (german: links=no, Gartenzwerge, lit=garden dwarfs) are lawn ornament figurines of small humanoid creatures based on the mythological creature and diminutive spirit which occur in Renaissance magic and alchemy, known as gnomes. They also draw on the German folklore of the dwarf. Traditionally, the garden figurines depict male dwarfs wearing red pointy hats. Typically, gnomes stand between . Originating as a decoration for the wealthy in Europe, garden gnomes are now prevalent in gardens and lawns throughout the Western world, among all social classes. They are regarded by some as kitsch. History Ancient predecessors In ancient Rome, small stone statues depicting the Greco-Roman fertility god Priapus, also a protector of beehives, flocks, and vineyards, were frequently placed in Roman gardens. Gnomes as magical creatures were first described during the Renaissance period by Swiss alchemist Paracelsus as "diminutive figures two spans in height who did not like to mi ...
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Gertrude Jekyll
Gertrude Jekyll ( ; 29 November 1843 – 8 December 1932) was a British horticulturist, garden designer, craftswoman, photographer, writer and artist. She created over 400 gardens in the United Kingdom, Europe and the United States, and wrote over 1000 articles for magazines such as ''Country Life'' and William Robinson's ''The Garden''. Jekyll has been described as "a premier influence in garden design" by British and American gardening enthusiasts. Early life Jekyll was born at 2 Grafton Street, Mayfair, London, the fifth of the seven children of Captain Edward Joseph Hill Jekyll, an officer in the Grenadier Guards, and his wife Julia, ''née'' Hammersley. In 1848 her family left London and moved to Bramley House in Surrey Surrey () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South East England, bordering Greater London to the south west. Surrey has a large rural area, and several significant urban areas which form part of the Greater London Built-up Area. . ...
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Witch Balls
A witch ball is a hollow sphere of glass. Historically, witch balls were hung in cottage windows in 17th and 18th century England to ward off evil spirits, witches, evil spells, ill fortune and bad spirits. The Witches ball is still today used extensively throughout Sussex, England and continues to hold great superstition with regard to warding off evil spirits in the English counties of East Sussex and West Sussex. The tradition was also taken to overseas British colonies, such as the former British colonies of New England, and remains popular in coastal regions. Examples of the Witches ball in use can be seen in the windows of houses throughout the counties anywhere from small rural villages to coastal towns and cities. Examples can also be seen in shop windows as well, often not for sale as they are so highly prized. Origin The witch ball originated among cultures where harmful magic and those who practiced it were feared. They are one of many folk practices involving objects ...
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William Robinson (gardener)
William Robinson (5 July 1838 – 17 May 1935) was an Irish practical gardener and journalist whose ideas about wild gardening spurred the movement that led to the popularising of the English cottage garden, a parallel to the search for honest simplicity and vernacular style of the British Arts and Crafts movement, and were important in promoting the woodland garden. Robinson is credited as an early practitioner of the mixed herbaceous border of hardy perennial plants, a champion too of the "wild garden", who vanquished the high Victorian pattern garden of planted-out bedding schemes. Robinson's new approach to gardening gained popularity through his magazines and several books—particularly ''The Wild Garden'', illustrated by Alfred Parsons (artist), Alfred Parsons, and ''The English Flower Garden''. Robinson advocated more natural and less formal-looking plantings of hardy perennials, shrubs, and vine, climbers, and reacted against the High Victorian era, Victorian patte ...
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Versailles
The Palace of Versailles ( ; french: Château de Versailles ) is a former royal residence built by King Louis XIV located in Versailles, about west of Paris, France. The palace is owned by the French Republic and since 1995 has been managed, under the direction of the French Ministry of Culture, by the Public Establishment of the Palace, Museum and National Estate of Versailles. Some 15,000,000 people visit the palace, park, or gardens of Versailles every year, making it one of the most popular tourist attractions in the world. Louis XIII built a simple hunting lodge on the site of the Palace of Versailles in 1623 and replaced it with a small château in 1631–34. Louis XIV expanded the château into a palace in several phases from 1661 to 1715. It was a favorite residence for both kings, and in 1682, Louis XIV moved the seat of his court and government to Versailles, making the palace the ''de facto'' capital of France. This state of affairs was continued by Kings Louis XV an ...
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