Laurence E Fosgate Home near Mead Gardens

Mead Gardens is a real treasure in Winter Park Florida, less than a block from our house. Consisting of almost forty acres of natural gardens it borders the west side of the creek that connects the north Orlando chain of lakes (Lakes Sue, Rowena, Formosa, Estelle and Winyah ) with the Winter Park chain of lakes. Recently Mike and Stephen of the landscapesorlandoflorida.com team took a canoe from the dock of the "Bamboo House" (see previous blog entry) through the creek and ended up at Lake Minnehaha. Had they wanted to keep going they could have followed the waterways north to the St John's River all the way to Jacksonville and the Atlantic Ocean. These pictures show some of the varied terrain of Mead Gardens including Stephen capturing me making my way through an abandoned nature walk. I loved seeing the "Be Careful of Alligators" sign. I think it was designed more for its shock value for out of state visitors than any real desire to prevent people from being eaten. Can't remember the last time anyone around here got bitten. It is true, however, that a few folks have been taken by gators in Florida- but not while walking through the woods. Hard to believe all this wildness exists right in the heart of an urban area of almost three million people.

Rio Pinar Pavers and Landscape

Rio Pinar is a neighborhood about five miles east of downtown Orlando that was developed around a top-rate golf course and country club in the late 1950's. My father, Laurence E Fosgate Sr, was an architect with Stevens and Sipple who designed the clubhouse and other amenities for the developer, Welborn Phillips, whose previous subdivision, Azalea Park had been built a few years before. It was upon its inauguration, one of the most fashionable addresses in town and held the Florida Citrus Open

- a golf tournament that moved and became the Bay Hill Classic. The Landscapes Orlando Florida team just finished a major transformation of a classic "retro" ranch style home with pavers and a rock garden.

Sunday Morning in Winter Park Garden

Even though there's not much in bloom in the garden right now, I still found a few flowers and a couple neoregelias to photograph. And the gardeners at the end of the street in Mead Gardens are taking advantage of the fall planting season to work in their plots. A part of our mission at Laurence E Fosgate is to capture the ever changing world of landscapes and garde

ns as they move through our central Florida seasons. What a pleasure to share them with people all over the world. And the mere act of capturing these images for others does so much to help me see them better for myself. When I have taught art I always felt guilty that I thought I learned at least as much from showing others as rhey did from me.