Fresh from our tour of Bunny Williams’s luxurious gardens, we made our way down to neighboring West Cornwall to take in Michael Trapp’s inspired Italianate fantasia.

Located just a stone’s throw from the Housatonic River and a typical New England covered wooden bridge, the Trapp gardens exude the lazy elegance of a Tuscan villa, or an ancient Mediterranean isle.

From the curb, the frame house itself seems simple, almost nondescript, until you pass through a hedge and see it from the back, where whimsy and irony transform it into a stylish dreamscape.

As you walk through the carefully planned property, laid out in a slightly bemusing labyrinth, the ground gradually drops out from under your feet as you move from one captivating vista to the next.

It’s easy to get lost in the exuberant foliage surrounding you. The gardens are not overly manicured, leaving room for spontaneity and a sense of unlimited possibilities.

As you descend by terraced levels toward the pool, you feel as if you are stepping back in time, to the sultry era of Baron von Gloeden’s Taormina, or perhaps to the heyday of Capri when the glitterati hid out among its sun-washed terraces and stone-clutching pines to escape the dullness and dreariness of northern climes. The cool groves and grottoes evoke a lost world of sensuality, of clandestine affairs.

Like Bunny Williams, Michael Trapp is in the business of creating beautiful landscapes and interiors. His shop is situated in the front of the house, offering many of the artifacts and found objects he’s brought back with him on his scouting trips abroad. You can read more about his business HERE.

But one does not feel any of the customary hard sell of similar establishments. The overriding feeling is one of easy sophistication and graciousness. The property feels like a retreat — a retreat from the modern world (even if the village of West Cornwall seems frozen in time), but most of all a retreat from convention.

It reminded me of the gardens behind Tony Duquette’s house in Beverly Hills, which I visited a dozen or so years ago, although Trapp’s vision is much more grounded. Where Duquette celebrated an almost camp aesthetic, derived from cinema and the world of make-believe, Trapp tethers his visual extravagance to an archeological approach.

The space is a highly personal fantasy that evokes glimmers of a lost grandeur. One comes away from this experience the way a child might after visiting a playground for the first time — exhilarated and eager to return.

As someone who knows absolutely nothing about gardening, and who is reluctant to rid himself of such blissful ignorance, I was less than ecstatic when my neighbor and friend Cara invited me to a garden tour in Connecticut this past weekend. It isn’t that I don’t enjoy looking at pretty flowers and perfectly manicured herbaceous borders, it’s just that I feel like an outsider in an alien world. There’s a chummy insularity to those who know the score when it comes to gardening and landscape design. They have a language of their own, a vocabulary as erudite as any Latin scholar’s. For someone who doesn’t know the difference between a hydrangea and a fire hydrant, it can be a bit intimidating.

So it came as something of a surprise to me when I found myself traipsing through Bunny Williams’s beautiful gardens in the hills of northwestern Connecticut, and ended up enjoying myself immensely.

What a thrill to be able to experience someone else’s hard work (and that of her devoted staff) without having to get a blister on my anything-but-green thumb, or a crick in my back from bending over the weed patch.

For a mere $5.00 donation to the Garden Conservancy, I was able to stumble from one stunning vista to the next, stupefied by the riot of colors and textures before me, and charmed by the elegance and grace of the display. And camera-in-hand, on a gorgeous summer day, I was able to snap away with abandon.

Bunny Williams has a marvelous eye for the simplest detail, not to mention the finest materials. Her skills as a gardener and interior designer mesh neatly in the house where the doors this day were wide open, creating a feeling of enormous warmth and hospitality. Even the private bedrooms and baths were open to the public, something I doubt most house tours would allow.

I’ve met Bunny Williams before and always admired her lack of artifice and down-to-earth charm. She was there, signing her lavishly designed coffee table books, including her latest An Affair with a House.

The title of that seems to sum up what’s so special about her home. It’s clearly a romance — a passion of a woman with endless ideas and ingenuity for the world around her. You can read more about her books and design business HERE.

There may have been one or two too many cutesy garden ornaments for my taste (although I did like Bunny’s bunny, nearly hidden by the hedge surrounding her front door.) And occasionally one felt that certain vignettes were a tad over-staged (even the compost heap looked like it had been styled for maximum “wow” effect).

But the overriding feeling one comes away with is a sense of generosity of spirit, order and organization, cleanliness and clean lines, and an abundance of care. There’s also humor and whimsy that softens the somewhat expected formality.

I was particularly struck by a small gardener’s shed, where the light filtered through old glass, barely illuminating the ghostly ornaments and antique cloches being stored, repaired or cleaned up for future use.

As a collector of antique wooden finials, I was completely smitten with a beat-up old finial tucked away in the work room. It seemed like a truly unique piece. But then, as I stepped outside and turned the corner, there was its twin, out in the open, drenched by the sun, defiantly off-kilter.

From the classical, yet rustic pool house to the lush flower beds that seem to have a mind of their own, the property is alive with a palpable energy.

The prodigious and productive mood is contagious. One comes away armed with ideas and inspirations, eager to tackle one’s own thorny issues in all terrains of life with an equal amount of grit and aplomb.

Make that “Song of the Loon.”

Thanks for checking in. I’m on hiatus for a few days while I am on a writing retreat in Maine. An old college friend has kindly offered me his cabin. I need the quiet and solitude in order to make a dent in my work. And the ocean and mountain views are breathtaking. It’s the perfect combination.

I might find time to post an update or to re-post an older story that is languishing unnoticed in the archives. But until then, please enjoy the current offerings. You can always click on the categories buttons, at right, to sample some of the different selections. Or you can browse by month or year, above.

Right now, I’m sitting back and just enjoying the spectacular weather. And the freedom from earthly cares. (If you discount my having to cook for myself.)

Later…