Welcome to Villa Emilia (My Woodland Garden), a photography blog with a slant towards gardening and nature. An amateur gardener and photographer, I hope to share beautiful moments with you through pictures. 🤎 From autumn 2026 onwards, Villa Emilia will be even more Christmassy than before!

Thank you for your visit.

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18.3.2017

I left my heart at...






...Parco Burcina, a landscape garden in Piedmont region (Italy), founded in the mid-19th century by Giovanni Piacenza, a wool industrialist, and situated in the Municipalities of Biella and Pollone.

I must go back sometimes... to visit my heart and to take more and better photos. Oh, I wish I had had a digital camera when I was living in Italy!






We visited the park in May many years ago; that day it had been raining before we arrived and the air was fresh and fragrant with scents from the grand conifers of the park. The valley of rhododendrons is stunning. On the internet, you can find many photos (much, much better than these!) depicting the valley from above, but imagine yourself rambling among the shrubs, surrounded by all those colours...






By myself, I followed a path leading to the top of the hill. Noisy schoolchildren and other visitors were left far behind, and I found serene small meadows and young birches with leaves of the most delicate green.  

The colours and light  are particularly bad in the photo below, but it shows the position of the park on a hill.






We saw pleasant views also on our way back home. Oasi Zegna is a freely accessible nature park in the Biella Alps. It was created by the entrepreneur Ermenegildo Zegna, founder of the homonymous factory that makes men's clothing and accessories.









Some old photos taken in our garden (in Italy):












Awful colours, but dear memories:






One of my favourites, Azalea japonica 'Palestrina':






♥


3.1.2017

From start to success :)






The topic of the first MakroTex challenge of this year is BEGINNING. I decided to choose a gardening theme.

In the beginning, there's a dream, fed by emotions, history and memories... and by books, magazines and catalogues... :)






















Then there's much work.



Source: Internet


Knowledge, skills and good luck would be useful as well - and yet success is not guaranteed. :)






















MakroTex-haasteen aiheena on tällä viikolla ALKU. Koetin keksiä, miten teemaan voisi yhdistää puutarhakuvia. 

Alussa on ideoita ja haaveita, joita sitten yritetään toteuttaa... 

Tämän postauksen kuvat eivät ole uusia. Mukana on jopa kaksi paperikuvasta skannattua kuvaa ja allaolevista "unelmakuvista" osa on Italiasta.



Wisteria floribunda 'Longissima Alba'




Robinia pseudoacacia




Laburnum anagyroides







"If the plan doesn't work,
change the plan, not the goal."







Happy New Year!

Onnellista uutta vuotta!


10.5.2015

Old photos, old hues


Happy new week to everyone!






Browsing through my photo files, I came across this group of old, scanned photos. The colours are a little bit strange, but I decided not to worry - on the contrary, I enhanced the tones to create a slightly old-fashioned effect.










♥










Participating in Mosaic Monday # 40

at Lavender Cottage Gardening.

Thank you, Judith, for hosting!






Tomorrow I will post lots of photos taken in these days. Spring seems to have come rather early in Southern and Western Finland, but here in Eastern Finland it's late... It'll probably be short. So let's make the most of it! Today the weather is chilly and it's raining again, but my day hasn't been useless: I have planted a tree...



♥