Guy Wolff Pots & An Old Geranium

I love old terracotta pots, and the more rugged and aged they are, the better. I try to pick up old ones when I see them. I was at a yard sale a few years ago and picked up a Guy Wolff terracotta pot, and recognized it from seeing them in catalogues and maybe at the old Smith & Hawken.

So when I was at Trade Secrets last week, I was delighted to have the chance to meet Guy and see the whole range of his pots.

Guy or one of his apprentices throw each pot by hand at his studio in rural Connecticut. And each pot is slightly different because of that, and they are all signed and dated.

This past weekend, Reggie and I got to talking about flowers, paintings, portraits, and of course, much, much more. I was talking about the portraits at my office and how we had a few Rembrandt Peale portraits of some of our early presidents. He reminded me of the Rembrandt Peale painting of Rubens Peale, one of his 16 siblings (each named after an artist), and a pot of geraniums. Of course, Reggie is familiar with this painting, having written about three years ago. Here.

Guy Wolff makes a pot called the Peale Pot, named after the pot in the painting. The Peale pot has some roping around the top edge and nicely tapered sides. Of course most appropriate thing for this pot is a geranium. And that’s what I got. But not just some road-side nursery geranium, but a cutting that is a descendant of a plant that was originally propagated by the master himself. Thomas Jefferson. {Genuflects}

According to Reggie, the Wolffs received a cutting from a plant that Peale had given Jefferson, and that Monticello’s staff managed to keep alive for two centuries. The Wolffs gave Reggie a cutting, and now Reggie and Boy have given me a cutting. Boy carefully wrapped the cutting in wet paper towels, put it in a zip-lock bag with a wee bit of water, tied it with some twine, and I hand-carried it the 300+ miles back down to Baltimore. It’s now resting in an old milk bottle, waiting to begin rooting. Once some roots have been established, I will repot it in the Peale pot which was a gift from Reggie and Boy, and hold my breath that it starts growing. It’s times like this, and especially days like this, that I miss my father, who was a great gardener. He could make anything grow, and I remember him having grow lights in the cellar, prepping for spring and planting season. Today is the anniversary of my father’s death, and you can read about what an interesting person he was here.