Edwina von Gal on Gardening as an Antidote
06/26/24 • 69 min
To the landscape designer Edwina von Gal, gardening is much more than just seeding, planting, weeding, and watering; it’s her life calling. Since starting her namesake firm in 1984 in East Hampton, on New York’s Long Island, she has worked with, for, and/or alongside the likes of Calvin Klein, Larry Gagosian, Frank Gehry, Maya Lin, Annabelle Selldorf, Richard Serra, and Cindy Sherman, creating gardens that center on native species and engage in other nature-based land-care solutions. In 2008, von Gal founded the Azuero Earth Project in Panama to promote chemical-free reforestation with native trees on the Azuero Peninsula. Stemming out of this initiative, in 2013, she then founded the Perfect Earth Project to promote chemical-free, non-agricultural land management in the U.S. Her most recent effort, Two Thirds for the Birds, is a call-to-action to plant more native plants and eliminate pesticides, thus creating a greater food supply for birds.
On the episode, she discusses the meditative qualities of gardening; reframing landscaping as “land care”; and why she sees herself not as a steward of land, but rather as a collaborator with it.
Special thanks to our Season 9 presenting sponsor, L’École, School of Jewelry Arts.
Show notes:
[15:32] William Cronon
[15:32] Changes in the Land
[15:32] Tiokasin Ghosthorse
[24:04] Carl Sagan
[24:04] The Demon-Haunted World
[26:07] Perfect Earth Project
[40:37] Two Thirds for the Birds
[42:41] John Fitzpatrick
[42:41] Cornell Lab of Ornithology
[42:41] Merlin Bird ID
[47:01] Garden Club of America
[50:21] Diana Vreeland
[51:09] Peter Sharp
[51:09] Channel Gardens at Rockefeller Center
[54:46] Frank Gehry
[54:46] Biomuseo
[54:46] Bruce Mau
[56:32] Azuero Earth Project
[1:00:37] Doug Tallamy
[1:02:01] Nature’s Best Hope
[1:05:12] The High Line
[1:05:12] Brooklyn Bridge Park
[1:05:12] The Battery Conservancy
[1:05:12] Brooklyn Museum
To the landscape designer Edwina von Gal, gardening is much more than just seeding, planting, weeding, and watering; it’s her life calling. Since starting her namesake firm in 1984 in East Hampton, on New York’s Long Island, she has worked with, for, and/or alongside the likes of Calvin Klein, Larry Gagosian, Frank Gehry, Maya Lin, Annabelle Selldorf, Richard Serra, and Cindy Sherman, creating gardens that center on native species and engage in other nature-based land-care solutions. In 2008, von Gal founded the Azuero Earth Project in Panama to promote chemical-free reforestation with native trees on the Azuero Peninsula. Stemming out of this initiative, in 2013, she then founded the Perfect Earth Project to promote chemical-free, non-agricultural land management in the U.S. Her most recent effort, Two Thirds for the Birds, is a call-to-action to plant more native plants and eliminate pesticides, thus creating a greater food supply for birds.
On the episode, she discusses the meditative qualities of gardening; reframing landscaping as “land care”; and why she sees herself not as a steward of land, but rather as a collaborator with it.
Special thanks to our Season 9 presenting sponsor, L’École, School of Jewelry Arts.
Show notes:
[15:32] William Cronon
[15:32] Changes in the Land
[15:32] Tiokasin Ghosthorse
[24:04] Carl Sagan
[24:04] The Demon-Haunted World
[26:07] Perfect Earth Project
[40:37] Two Thirds for the Birds
[42:41] John Fitzpatrick
[42:41] Cornell Lab of Ornithology
[42:41] Merlin Bird ID
[47:01] Garden Club of America
[50:21] Diana Vreeland
[51:09] Peter Sharp
[51:09] Channel Gardens at Rockefeller Center
[54:46] Frank Gehry
[54:46] Biomuseo
[54:46] Bruce Mau
[56:32] Azuero Earth Project
[1:00:37] Doug Tallamy
[1:02:01] Nature’s Best Hope
[1:05:12] The High Line
[1:05:12] Brooklyn Bridge Park
[1:05:12] The Battery Conservancy
[1:05:12] Brooklyn Museum
Previous Episode
Hiroshi Sugimoto on Photography as a Form of Timekeeping
While he may technically practice as a photographer, artist, and architect, Hiroshi Sugimoto could also be considered, from a wider-lens perspective, a chronicler of time. With a body of work now spanning nearly five decades, Sugimoto began making pictures in earnest in 1976 with his ongoing “Diorama” series. In 1980, he started what may be his most widely recognized series, “Seascapes,” composed of Rothko-esque abstractions of the ocean that he has taken at roughly 250 locations around the world. In more recent years, Sugimoto has also built a flourishing architectural practice, designing everything from a café in Tokyo to the currently-under-construction Hirshhorn Sculpture Garden in Washington, D.C. As with his subtly profound work, Sugimoto bears tremendous wisdom and is regarded by many as one of the most deeply perceptive minds and practitioners at the intersection of time and art-making.
On the episode, he discusses his pictures as fossilizations of time; seascapes as the least spoiled places on Earth; and why, for him, the “target of completion” for a building is 5,000 years from now.
Special thanks to our Season 9 presenting sponsor, L’École, School of Jewelry Arts.
Show notes:
[5:10] Pre-Photography Time-Recording Devices
[39:05] “Theaters”
[15:06] “Seascapes”
[32:31] “Diorama”
[17:16] Caspar David Friedrich
[25:14] Odawara
[28:52] “Aujourd’hui le monde est mort [Lost Human Genetic Archive]”
[44:19] “Abandoned Theaters”
[44:19] “Opera Houses”
[44:19] “Drive-In Theaters”
[49:52] “Architecture”
[51:12] Le Corbusier
[51:12] Mies van der Rohe
[55:30] New Material Research Laboratory
[55:30] Tomoyuki Sakakida
[59:23] Enoura Observatory
[59:23] Hirshhorn Sculpture Garden
[1:00:48] Katsura Imperial Villa
[1:01:05] Bruno Taut
[1:02:14] Donald Judd
[1:02:14] “Hiroshi Sugimoto: Five Elements in Optical Glass”
[1:06:47] Mingei
[1:06:47] Isamu Noguchi
[1:06:47] Dan Flavin
[1:09:15] Sugimoto Bunraku Sonezaki Shinju: The Love Suicides at Sonezaki
[1:09:15] At the Hawk's Well
[1:09:15] W.B. Yeats
Next Episode
Rita Sodi on Food as a Reflection of Home
For Rita Sodi, cooking isn’t so much an art or a science, but rather an intuitive way for her to channel her Tuscan roots and provide a profound sense of home. Following a 15-year career in the world of fashion as a self-described “denim guru” for Calvin Klein Jeans, Sodi transitioned into the realm of restaurants in 2008, when she moved to New York City from Bagno a Ripoli, Italy, and opened the West Village establishment I Sodi. Soon after, Sodi serendipitously met her life and work partner, Jody Williams—the chef-owner of the French bistro Buvette—and the two went on to found the restaurant group Officina 1397. Now, in addition to I Sodi and Buvette, they also operate Via Carota, The Commerce Inn, and Bar Pisellino. Across all of Sodi’s undertakings, her motive is clear: to create dishes she loves with great care and rigor, and, at least in the cases of I Sodi and Via Carota, to share an abiding passion for Tuscan cooking.
On the episode, Sodi discusses learning to cook from her mother, her atypical journey from fashion to food, and some of the stringent rules she follows in the kitchen and in life.
Special thanks to our Season 10 presenting sponsor, L’École, School of Jewelry Arts.
Show notes:
[25:50] Tuscany
[4:50] West Village
[5:58] I Sodi
[6:47] Calvin Klein Jeans
[8:31] Jody Williams
[8:31] Via Carota
[8:31] Officina 1397
[8:31] Bar Pisellino
[8:31] The Commerce Inn
[8:31] Buvette
[20:29] Pete Wells
[23:22] “An Ode to I Sodi”
[23:22] “The 100 Best Restaurants in New York City 2024”
[23:22] “When I Want to Be Alone, I Eat Dinner at the Bar at I Sodi”
[25:50] Bagno a Ripoli
[29:35] “The Laws of Tuscan Eating at I Sodi in the West Village”
[48:26] Emilia-Romagna
[53:53] Jeff Gordinier
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