Gardens of the World The Getty Villa

This week on In the Garden with UC Master Gardeners, UC Master Gardener Ann Liu traveled to and interviewed Michael Dehart, Grounds and Gardens Supervisor at the Getty Villa in Malibu, California. Together, they take listeners through a tour of the four gardens: Outer/Inner Peristyles, Herb Garden, and East Garden. You’ll note that this show was recorded before the devastating fires in 2025.  Imagine this!  J. Paul Getty’s inspiration for this site was the Villa of Papyri (Scrolls) near the ancient Vesuvius eruption site . How similar are the consequences between the eruption and the wildfire?  How rich is the Greek and Roman mythology and culture woven into garden design and plant selections.  Imagine how Roman citizens ate many of the same fruits and vegetables we enjoy today.

Transcript

SPEAKER_04 0:21

This is the In the Garden Show produced by UC Master Gardeners of Orange County. I am Anne Lou, the host for the hour. This week's topic is very special for the summer. We have with us Michael DeHart to talk about the Getty Villa. Here in Malibu in the Pacific Palisades in Los Angeles, we like to talk about public gardens every summer so that the public can visit gardens away from home and be inspired by the beauty of the green. I am very happy to introduce to you my guest, Michael DeHart. Welcome to the show, Michael.

SPEAKER_01 1:09

Thank you.

SPEAKER_04 1:10

I'm so glad you're able to join us. Michael is the grounds and gardens supervisor for the Getty Villa. Now, the Getty Villa, as I understand it, is the second of the locations for the J. Paul Getty Museum, correct?

SPEAKER_02 1:27

Yes. The villa was built in 1974 per J. Paul Getty himself. He commissioned the building to house his burgeoning art collection at that time. Later, as the art collection grew, uh the Getty Center was developed as a new home for an even larger collection. The villa remains as his original repository for ancient Roman Greek art.

SPEAKER_04 1:57

And Mr. Getty loved the antiquities period, correct? Collected art and the antiquities. And here we have the Getty Villa, which was inspired by a real villa.

SPEAKER_02 2:12

Right. The original Villa de Papiri was discovered in 1849 by a German archaeologist uh digging near Pompeii. He discovered the original villa that was uh probably the home of Julius Caesar's father-in-law, and it contained the largest private collection of papyrus scrolls ever found from antiquity. So it was called Villa dei Papyri.

SPEAKER_04 2:39

And even today they are uncovering more papyrus.

SPEAKER_02 2:44

Yes, uh, and every time they find more scrolls, they're finding more details that can enhance our understanding of the ancient world.

SPEAKER_04 2:52

That is fascinating. In understanding the ancient world, we have to understand the mythology and the culture of the people. And we will be getting into that as we talk about the gardens. The villa is right across from the beach.

SPEAKER_02 3:07

Right, we're right on the ocean, as was the original Villa de Papuri.

SPEAKER_04 3:12

And we still have the steep cliffs.

SPEAKER_02 3:14

Right.

SPEAKER_04 3:15

And the plants are affected by the marine layer.

SPEAKER_02 3:19

Somewhat, yes. Um as most gardeners understand, the marine layer increases the atmospheric humidity, which is not good if you have roses or grapes or hollyhocks.

SPEAKER_04 3:34

And that's your job, right?

SPEAKER_02 3:36

Those are our those are my challenges, yes.

SPEAKER_04 3:38

Because you have all three very prevalent here in the garden.

SPEAKER_02 3:42

Right. They were all part of the Roman garden, and we have inherited the plants and the problems on the coast.

SPEAKER_04 3:50

So maybe we should uh uh take a little bird walk here, and those three plants that you named. For the roses, you have some shrub roses, and one is historic, it's called.

SPEAKER_02 4:01

Yes, we have the Roma Damascena. Uh the common name is the Damasc rose, one of the most fragrant species roses from antiquity.

SPEAKER_04 4:09

From Damascus, maybe?

SPEAKER_02 4:10

Yes.

SPEAKER_04 4:11

Wow, a Syrian rose.

SPEAKER_01 4:13

It's very old.

SPEAKER_04 4:14

And this is, I remember seeing a map in the exhibits showing uh ancient Syria. That's huge. It would cover today's Israel, Syria, Lebanon.

SPEAKER_02 4:26

It was quite developed.

SPEAKER_04 4:27

Very, very developed. And the rose comes from there.

SPEAKER_02 4:31

Yes. What we do to control the rust and the powdery miledew, we spray with a solution of baking soda and water. And that adjusts the pH on the leaf surface just enough that the fungal spores don't like it and they just don't reproduce. If you have overhead irrigation or really heavy fog where the water is actually dripping off the leaf, you'll need to reapply that because it doesn't, it's not in the leaf, it's just a light, thin, powdery coating of po of baking soda on the surface of the leaf. Uh it's best to spray when the end of the fog or drippy period is over so that so the actual baking soda stays on the leaf.

SPEAKER_04 5:12

So when we we get into the hotter months, it's less of a problem.

SPEAKER_02 5:16

Right.

SPEAKER_04 5:16

Now you mentioned grapes. How are the grapes affected by the marine layer?

SPEAKER_02 5:20

The grapes get downy mildew, and we do the same thing. It's a food crop. We are we operate a completely green garden. There's no pesticides or herbicides used, so the baking soda is our solution for grapes also.

SPEAKER_04 5:33

And what was the third plant affected by the hollyhocks? The hollyhocks, oh, they're so pretty.

SPEAKER_02 5:39

Hollyhawks get rust here.

SPEAKER_04 5:40

Oh, I've never heard of them having rust.

SPEAKER_02 5:43

Uh here on the coast, they do. Uh in inland situations, I don't see it at all. But here on the coast, we rust is our challenge with hollyhocks, and they're so beautiful we want the plant. So we use the baking soda solution there also, and it keeps the rust at bay.

SPEAKER_04 5:56

These three plants were plants present during the time of the early Romans?

SPEAKER_02 6:00

Yes.

SPEAKER_04 6:01

It's really fun to visit a garden that is filled with plants, herbs, fruit trees, all kinds of greenery that were common in the time of the early Romans. Two thousand years ago. So that is a fun trip. If you're just uh coming on right now, we are interviewing Michael Dehart, who is the grounds and gardens supervisor for the Getty Villa. Let's go on with the interview. You mentioned that this villa was inspired by the villa of Papiri, which is the village of papyrus, uh near a place called Herculinarum.

SPEAKER_02 6:43

Herculaneum.

SPEAKER_04 6:44

Herculaneum.

SPEAKER_02 6:46

It was at an upscale suburb of the larger city of Pompeii.

SPEAKER_04 6:51

And it was covered by the volcanic eruption back in 79 AD.

SPEAKER_02 6:57

Right. There's 65 feet of pyroclastic material on top of the site. So any excavation has to go down through the existing city, down through 65 feet of that flow, which is like rock, and then you discover the ancient mosaics, roof tiles, walls, and and the actual buildings that the ancients had.

SPEAKER_04 7:20

It's really fun to see the villa because it's a wonderful combination of architecture as well as gardens. The uh together they remind you of going down into an archaeological dig. I like the benches of the what do you call that area with all the seats around the outdoor classical theater? Yes.

SPEAKER_02 7:44

The outdoor classical theater is is a modern copy of the outdoor theater in Pompeii. Uh when the architects went to Europe to redesign the villa, I was with them. I have pictures of the architects measuring the amphitheater in Pompeii so that we have the exact same.

SPEAKER_04 8:05

That is cool. I didn't realize you went we you were with them. That's really exciting. Before we get into individual gardens, because there are four gardens I want to talk about in detail, I want to just mention that when I entered the the the villa and saw the steep cliffs and the uh terrain here, I was surprised to see deer.

SPEAKER_02 8:30

Yes, we have deer on site. Uh as with so many gardens in the United States these days, deer are one of our challenges. Uh we have a perimeter fence that was originally designed to exclude the deer, but now the deer have learned that we have a spring on site, and in the driest months of the of the summer, the deer really want to be near that water. So we've learned to cohabitate with them.

SPEAKER_04 8:57

I'm glad you are because I brought my grandchildren with me to view the gardens before this tour, and it made their day to see real deer. You can imagine many children growing up in an urban setting don't have a chance to see nature. We even saw these beautiful green parrots in the trees.

SPEAKER_02 9:17

The green parrots are our local, our local favorites now. They they let themselves know be known. They are squawky.

SPEAKER_04 9:27

They are very, very noisy. Let's get into the individual gardens. The first one, the iconic one, is the main one, and that is the outer peristal.

SPEAKER_02 9:40

Yes, it's 200 feet long with a central water feature. The pool is being renovated right now, and the water will come back soon, so we'll have three fountains going down the central axis of the pool.

SPEAKER_04 9:55

Now, this pool really in the old times was really a swimming pool, wasn't it?

SPEAKER_02 10:01

Yes, it was ten feet deep, and it was used to keep fish. Because uh in ancient Rome they didn't have refrigeration, and anytime you could keep food sources live, it was fresher. So the the pools held fish just like the stables had animals that would be someday's dinner.

SPEAKER_04 10:22

And uh later on we'll talk about the herb garden. There were some fish there, but I don't think in the old days there were fish in the herb garden, were there?

SPEAKER_02 10:31

No, the original villa, an herb garden like that would have had a central water feature that would have been used for watering the garden. Uh-huh. In a well or somewhere where you could dip water like a bucket and move water out from the central feature to the beds around it.

SPEAKER_04 10:48

So it could be used for irrigation or maybe even for cooking?

SPEAKER_01 10:52

Perhaps.

SPEAKER_04 11:06

Water lilies. Let's go back to the outer peristyle. The word peristyle, what does it mean?

SPEAKER_02 11:12

Peristyle means a covered uh a garden that is surrounded by a covered walkway. Uh the walkway could be, and there's usually a walled garden. The wall keeps out the outside world so that you can have like a compound. The peristyle gives you relief from the sun or rain or any inclement weather. So you can enjoy the garden, be covered, and completely enclosed from the rest of the world.

SPEAKER_04 11:41

The pool can be used as air conditioning in a sense when it's full of water, right? Yes. Winds blowing over it.

SPEAKER_02 11:49

It will definitely affect the the climate inside that walled garden. It would be cooler and moister.

SPEAKER_04 11:54

And this peristyle is so large, it was not typical really. It would have been a very, very wealthy person who owned a villa and peristyle of this size.

SPEAKER_02 12:05

Yes, this this garden would have been the last garden the built the visitors would have seen. They would have entered from the west porch, which is where our outdoor classical theater is. That would have been the main door, and then the the visitor would have entered into the atrium, and then the inner peristyle, and then and only then would they have been able to see out into the outer peristyle. It would have been the last POW moment of a visit.

SPEAKER_04 12:33

Oh, and here I am beginning the interview with a POW. I'm going a little bit backwards. I I I thought we'd do the outer one because it helps us to understand the purpose of and the way of life of the people living here in the villa. The owner probably was very interested in philosophy. The papyrus or the papyri that they have found show a real philosophical character. And back then, uh Epicurus was very popular. He was a natural and moral philosopher who believed that man is mortal, that the cosmos is a result of accident, that there is no real providential or loving God, and the criteria of a good life are pleasure and temperance. So if you picture the people who came to visit the owner at this villa, it would be people who would be very interested to talk about this philosophy and to enjoy life because pleasure and temperance were important. And they had conversational pieces. Shall we talk about the Hermes?

SPEAKER_02 13:54

Yes, there are several statues on marble stands that are scattered throughout the garden, and the statues are uh busts of philosophical figures in history.

SPEAKER_04 14:12

Of that time.

SPEAKER_02 14:14

Yes.

SPEAKER_04 14:15

And I understand that people who are visiting might have a little conversation around one bust and talk about things like is there a god? Or how does this world come to be? How did it start? And things like that.

SPEAKER_02 14:38

Somehow that God or goddess would impart their knowledge, their thoughts on that.

SPEAKER_04 14:45

Like a muse? There is a muse exhibit there uh that that is really very, very pretty. And also to think in terms of viewpoints of that person represented in the bus, what would they think? How would they answer that question? And sit among the beautiful plants. Now let's talk about the plants in the large peristyle.

SPEAKER_02 15:13

I think the the dominant species that you see first out is the one mile of boxwood hedge. We have one of the things that the Romans developed was man's control over nature and the ability to make topiary shapes to form a natural plant into an unnatural form to prove that man has dominion over the natural world.

SPEAKER_04 15:37

That concept carried on to the French and the English.

SPEAKER_02 15:42

They took it to a new level.

SPEAKER_04 15:44

They brought it to a new level. Versailles and some of the gardens in England. I didn't realize that the root was the Romans.

SPEAKER_02 15:53

Uh Pollarding trees into s small versions of what they originally were, topiary boxwood and privet hedges, um animal shapes, and actual grafting trees together. We're all part of the Roman horticulture style.

SPEAKER_04 16:15

Control, control, control, right?

SPEAKER_02 16:18

Yes.

SPEAKER_04 16:20

Now, right next to the large parasol, we go to our second garden, the herb garden.

SPEAKER_02 16:26

The herb garden is my favorite.

SPEAKER_04 16:28

Oh, we can spend another half hour on this, uh, the herb garden, but let's begin and then we'll have our station break. The herb garden is filled with vegetables, fruit trees that um that people used two thousand years ago. Let's just talk about the fruit trees to start. You have the citron.

SPEAKER_02 16:50

Yes, the citron tree is the only citrus native to European continent. The other citrus that we have today, lemons, oranges, and grapefruits, they were imported from India in the fourth century AD. So the Romans didn't have those modern citruses that we enjoy. What they had was the citron, and they used the the zest from the skin as a flavoring.

SPEAKER_04 17:15

Oh, for flavoring? It has a very strong citrus fragrance, right?

SPEAKER_02 17:20

It does.

SPEAKER_04 17:21

And medicine? Was it used for medicine?

SPEAKER_02 17:24

I don't know of any medical applications. There may have been.

SPEAKER_04 17:27

But you have lots of herbs in the garden that was used for medicine. Let's talk about some.

SPEAKER_02 17:35

Yes, one of the prime examples is yarrow. Yarrow was found in the Near East during Alexander the Great's campaigns through the Ottoman Empire. He found most of the stone fruit that we have today, and he brought back yarrow as a blood clotting agent. They learned that when you apply yarrow to a cut, it will stop the blood of uh flow of blood.

SPEAKER_01 18:04

Interesting.

SPEAKER_02 18:05

They took this with them all over the battlefields wherever the Roman wherever the Greeks were conquering, and then subsequently the Romans. They were finding yarrow on battlefields all over Europe and they used it as a blood clotting agent.

SPEAKER_04 18:20

It grows easily. I have it in my yard.

SPEAKER_02 18:22

It's a meadow plant all over.

SPEAKER_04 18:24

Yeah, it grows very, very easily. Would you call it invasive?

SPEAKER_02 18:28

It could be. It could be.

SPEAKER_04 18:31

You have several plants that I would consider invasive, but you have them enclosed with the cement and so mint. Yeah, the mint and the thyme.

SPEAKER_02 18:42

Yes, they're all they're all in concrete planners.

SPEAKER_04 18:46

And the chamomile?

SPEAKER_02 18:48

Yes. It's not as invasive as the other ones. We have that one kind of open. The sun will limit where that will spread. You know.

SPEAKER_04 18:57

You know what my favorite was? The bee bomb.

SPEAKER_02 19:00

The bee bomb, that's nice.

SPEAKER_04 19:02

I think if if uh the if anyone is walking through the herb garden, you miss the herb garden if you not do not bend down and touch them and smell them on your hand.

SPEAKER_02 19:15

There are 159 beds in the herb garden, and each bed has an edging, a main planting, and a specimen plant. So there's lots of interpretive material here to learn about the Roman lifestyle.

SPEAKER_04 19:29

And my grandchildren loved the lamb's ear.

SPEAKER_02 19:33

That's always a favorite, yes. So furry. The Romans used them like a bandage.

SPEAKER_04 19:39

Tell me about it. They boiled the leaves.

SPEAKER_02 19:42

No, you could use the leaf like a band-aid.

SPEAKER_04 19:45

Oh, the leaf itself.

SPEAKER_02 19:46

The leaf itself was furry and kind of strong, so it doesn't split or crack. If you had a poultice or uh a salve of some kind made from another plant, you could hold the the active ingredient on the wound or the bruise with a bandage of lambsear.

SPEAKER_04 20:07

I didn't realize that. It it works like an antiseptic.

SPEAKER_02 20:12

The lambsear works like a band-aid, just holds the material on this wound. The other material that you're using, which might be chamomile or yarrow or something like that, that's the actual active ingredient. And the lambsear was just kind of a held it in place.

SPEAKER_04 20:30

That's really fun about the rosemary growing along the wall.

SPEAKER_02 20:35

We have lots of rosemary. The Romans used it like we do today for culinary uses. It was also used in wedding rituals. If the bridegroom did not arrive at the wedding with a sprig of rosemary to present to the bride, he would never establish dominion over the household.

SPEAKER_04 20:55

Do you know why?

SPEAKER_02 20:56

No, tell me.

SPEAKER_04 20:59

I was told during the docent tour, so when you visit, it's really worthwhile to have a docent tour. She said that schoolboys back then would take rosemary and put a bundle of it into their into a pouch and hang it around their neck and wear it the day they had exams because it helped memory. And so if the bridegroom forgot, I can see why they hadn't bring rosemary to the wedding.

SPEAKER_02 21:30

It all makes sense.

SPEAKER_04 21:31

Now it makes sense, right? Now uh borage, the blue flower of the borage.

SPEAKER_02 21:41

Borage is always in the garden. We reseed that bed whenever it's finished. It takes about six months to do a whole cycle of that plant. The borage was planted for bees. They attracted bees because they didn't have sugar. Honey was their sweetener. So any plant that they knew that the bees would visit. They included in the garden to enhance their honey production.

SPEAKER_04 22:03

Mmm. And borage can also be eaten. You can put the blue flowers in tea. Makes it very pretty.

SPEAKER_02 22:11

Yes, the Romans didn't have that one yet. We learned that one later.

SPEAKER_04 22:14

Oh, we got a little bit smarter, huh? But the Romans knew about plants that were valuable to trade. You want to talk about the olives and the grains?

SPEAKER_02 22:26

The olives were probably their most commercial of all the plants. They traded the wood, they traded the fruit, they've traded the oil. The oil was probably the most valuable commodity they had from the olive olive tree. It was used for cooking, it was used medicinally, it was used for lighting in lamps. They used olive oil for all kinds of things. It was a very valuable commodity.

SPEAKER_04 22:52

Hmm. And grapes, do they make wine?

SPEAKER_02 22:55

They did. If you've ever heard of Bacchus, he made the story of wine.

SPEAKER_04 23:00

Let's talk about Bacchus because he's one of the mythological figures in the villa that is most represented.

SPEAKER_02 23:07

Yes, you'll see him, a little miniature Bacchus on the fountain in the herb garden. He is riding a wineskin. He's central to the herb garden experience.

SPEAKER_04 23:21

And he symbolizes Merriman. Ah, merriment, a good time. Yes.

SPEAKER_02 23:27

So wherever you have a wedding plan, be sure you have a picture or a mask of our our rose, our grapes in the herb garden are Rogers Red, a variety that was developed for coastal climates so that it doesn't need the cold winter chill. We get a full crop of grapes here in Malibu. Because we have that variety.

SPEAKER_04 23:50

Which brings me to one of my questions I had planned. From this herb garden, do they use herbs and such in the kitchen?

SPEAKER_02 24:00

Not in our kitchen. The quantity that the kitchen needs is much more than we can produce in the garden. The garden is mainly for interpretive value. We leave the crops on the plants as long as possible so that people can enjoy the story of the plants and the story of the crop. And then once the once it's not aesthetically valuable, we'll harvest them and use them.

SPEAKER_04 24:24

How about uh how about the plum tree? Do you use the plums from the plum tree?

SPEAKER_02 24:31

The plums we have to be faster than the birds. The birds know the plums are there. However, if we can get them, they are the sweetest plums you'll ever have. They're the green species plum. It's not the Santa Rosa, the bright red one that we normally see in the grocery store. It's a plain green plum. It's wonderful.

SPEAKER_04 24:50

It's very distinctive. I see a lot of people stopping by the plum trees you have to take pictures because of the trunk.

SPEAKER_02 24:58

The trunks look twisted. Yes. And for years I heard that the Getty Grounds department went out and twisted them every morning. Ridiculous. That wouldn't be true. That's what it looks like. They grew that way naturally, and I've seen other trees like that in other areas that didn't twist. I've heard all kinds of theories of why they did that, but I'm not sure if any of them were true. I'm not sure. They're just really distinctive looking trunks.

SPEAKER_04 25:29

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 25:29

They look like corkscrews.

SPEAKER_04 25:31

I thought the first one I saw was an accident until I saw the second one, and I said, Oh, there's a reason for this. It's their species. Yes, we can't leave the herb garden without talking about the palm.

SPEAKER_02 25:46

Our date palms, yes. Phoenix dactylifera. They were planted in 1974, and they represent the palms that the Romans would have had for the dates, the way we use today. They ate the fruit, they also made wine from the fruit. So the date palm had lots of different uses. They also made rope from the fibers.

SPEAKER_04 26:05

Mm. Date wine?

SPEAKER_02 26:07

Yes, date. Yes.

SPEAKER_04 26:09

It must have been sweet.

SPEAKER_02 26:10

Probably.

SPEAKER_04 26:11

Very nice though. Especially for a time when they didn't have sugar cane. True. The palms from the palm tree um provided the Romans with needles.

SPEAKER_02 26:25

The the very The Phoenix palm has very star very sharp needles on the palm frond.

SPEAKER_04 26:31

And you have the phoenix palm?

SPEAKER_02 26:33

That's yes. Uh uh the date palm and we have date palm, phoenix dactylifer.

SPEAKER_04 26:39

Oh, it's the same.

SPEAKER_02 26:40

Yes, the phoenix.

SPEAKER_04 26:41

Oh, I'm sorry. And I I heard that uh the palm leaves are woven to make mats.

SPEAKER_02 26:48

Yes, the fibers can be split, you split the fibers open, and then it's it's very, very fibrous. They can be woven or threaded or uh plaited to make rope.

SPEAKER_04 27:04

That must have been very, very desirable for the Romans because uh laying on those stones that they had uh must have been quite hard and uh bed sores must have been common, huh?

SPEAKER_02 27:17

Well, there was plenty of palms to make plenty of mat.

SPEAKER_04 27:21

And of course we have the sage.

SPEAKER_02 27:24

Yes, our culinary cooking sage, salvia thicinalis. It was also used as a hair dye. It could make the hair black. In modern day Italy, they take the sage leaf, saute it in olive oil, and then garnish your dish with a crispy sage leaf.

SPEAKER_04 27:43

I use sage on my meats, it's very good.

SPEAKER_02 27:46

Same thing, just crisp it, make it crispy.

SPEAKER_04 27:50

This is Anne Lou, UC Master Gardener. I am hosting Michael DeHart, grounds and gardens supervisor for the Getty Villa. As part of our In the Garden show, let's get back to our interview. We were talking about two of the gardens in the Getty Villa. We covered the large peristyle and the herb garden, which is right next to it. Now we're kind of going backwards as Michael noted, because usually uh uh uh a tourist might see the large one last. But you know, I don't think it matters, does it, Michael?

SPEAKER_02 28:33

Not really. Uh you go with the flow of the crowd if from the entry path from the parking lot, you do see the main peristyle and the herb garden first.

SPEAKER_04 28:43

And as you actually go through the villa, the building itself, when you're up on the second level and you look out, it's kind of neat to see the the large peristyle of the pool and the garden uh uh how how it grows, you get a better picture of how it was designed.

SPEAKER_02 29:02

Yes, any first-time visitor that comes to the villa should not miss the upper terraces. They're beautiful.

SPEAKER_04 29:09

Yes. Now let's go to the other two gardens in the Getty Villa. Let's go to the inner peristyle. Tell me where it is and tell me what is so special about it because it is very special.

SPEAKER_02 29:26

The inner peristyle is the kind of the heart of the building. Most of the gallery spaces that would have been living spaces in the original villa are all kind of centered around the inner peristyle garden. The covered peristyle walk around the garden provides indoor-outdoor living space for bedrooms, kitchens, any kind of family activities that would have been in the rooms, they could be in the peristyle also. So the peristyle garden itself was the hub of any activity in the house.

SPEAKER_04 30:00

And this one is really majestic. The columns around are marble, right?

SPEAKER_02 30:06

Yes.

SPEAKER_04 30:07

And it gives a sense of luxury.

SPEAKER_02 30:10

It does. Uh the Romans valued symmetry and balance in anything they designed. The inner peristyle is the quintessential Roman garden. You can split the garden down any axis or corner to corner, and each side will mirror the other. It's a perfectly balanced garden. There's two axes that's that cross the inner peristyle garden. The one main axis on the building comes from the front door through the atrium into the inner peristyle and out into the east garden. The other axis is this, the whole axis of the main peristyle, the largest garden, it crosses the other axis right in the center.

SPEAKER_04 30:54

And you have these statues that are lining uh lining the axis, and these statues, were they actually excavated?

SPEAKER_02 31:02

Yes, they're all the statuary in the garden are modern copies of originals that were found in the Villa de Papiri.

SPEAKER_04 31:09

And uh who are these the statues are of whom?

SPEAKER_02 31:14

There the statues around the pool are five maidens. Uh there's one missing. Uh there's a niche for it, but the sixth maiden was never found in antiquity, so they didn't make a statue that wasn't there.

SPEAKER_04 31:34

And they're all different. They're each a little different.

SPEAKER_02 31:36

Yes, they have a different stance, a different look. Some of them are smiling. They're all unique.

SPEAKER_04 31:42

And what's kind of bizarre are their eyes.

SPEAKER_02 31:46

All the eyes have an inlay of either ivory or bone.

SPEAKER_04 31:50

They were once painted, and you can see traces of paint around their their facial features.

SPEAKER_01 31:57

It would have been very different with pigment.

SPEAKER_04 32:01

Yeah, I think so. Each one of these quadrants has a fountain.

SPEAKER_02 32:08

Yes, there's a water feature in each corner that make them lively. The sound of water is always nice in a garden and it provides kind of a moist area.

SPEAKER_04 32:20

They're very pretty. The sound of the the sound of the water and and such. And um as I'm walking along the edge of the peristyle where the columns are, I look up and I see designs up on top that are that look like leaves.

SPEAKER_02 32:38

The antifixes on the roof on the roof edge. They were designed to keep birds and rodents from nesting in the roof, but they were designed to be decorative as well. So they're part of the roof system. But they're actually quite pretty.

SPEAKER_04 32:54

Are they uh representative of a certain kind of leaf?

SPEAKER_02 32:57

Uh they're a composite of m of multiple antiquity antifixes.

SPEAKER_04 33:02

Oh, this reminds me, I missed mentioning that when I was in the first peristyle, the large one, walking along that corridor, I looked up and I saw it looked like little frescoes of leaves. Some had a canthus, which is a leaf that represents um everlasting life. Everlasting life for the Romans. And then uh sometimes you would have lotus. And the lotus came from Egypt, to my surprise. I always thought of lotus as something of an Asian, Asian leaf, but here we have an Asian plant, and here we have a uh lotus there, and it came from Egypt, and it represented prophecy. The Romans were very, very into looking into the future and having what I would call good karma, right?

SPEAKER_02 33:55

They also incorporated native cultures into their own. When they conquered an area, they didn't overlay their superstitions and their own culture on that land as much as they incorporate those native cultures into their own.

SPEAKER_04 34:12

So it would have been quite possible that as they uh went eastward into what we might call the Far East, they could have been very influenced by um some of the plants that they discovered and brought back.

SPEAKER_01 34:28

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_04 34:30

Is there anything you want to add more about the the inner parasink?

SPEAKER_02 34:35

The inner peristyle represents a gardening challenge that we probably all have.

SPEAKER_04 34:40

And what is that challenge?

SPEAKER_02 34:42

The challenge of balance and symmetry in a garden that has shade on part of it. Because of the the building itself has a second floor, and because the sun doesn't shine from directly above, half of the garden is always in the shade. So horticulturally, it's a challenge to have all four quadrants match and be Romanly balanced. That's still have the shade element.

SPEAKER_04 35:12

Yes, that is very important for all of us gardeners. When you landscape or plan on having uh sections of your garden looking the same, you've got to look at the way the sun travels.

SPEAKER_02 35:28

It makes a big difference.

SPEAKER_04 35:29

Because it affects the shade.

SPEAKER_02 35:31

What we've done is we've selected plants that look the same. Foxgloves have white flowers that bloom in the shade, and there are several verbascums that have white flowers that bloom in the sun. The flower type are both spikes. They're both tall spikes of flowers, both blooming the same colors, but one of them is happier in the shade, so we use them on opposing sides of the garden and kind of look the same.

SPEAKER_04 36:00

Clever. Clever.

SPEAKER_02 36:02

They're both Roman, they both have a Roman use. And so we get to talk about them both.

SPEAKER_04 36:08

What is the use?

SPEAKER_02 36:09

The Romans used foxglove to regulate the heart rate. Something I would not suggest. However, the Romans knew that if you took a small amount of digitalis, you could reduce a fluttering heart. Scary. You could also turn it off.

SPEAKER_04 36:30

Oh would that be like put into a tea?

SPEAKER_02 36:35

Yes. Verbascom was used as a torch. You could dip the the stalk. Once the stalk is dried, they would dip the whole stalk in tallow and make a torch for going into caves or lighting lighting after dark.

SPEAKER_04 36:50

We take all these things for granted. Oil, uh plants we can get oil from for lighting or using as torches. Uh we usually don't think of those things. And going into a garden like this and hearing a docent or listening to Michael on this podcast, we have a greater appreciation for our plants, the whole botanical world.

SPEAKER_02 37:21

One of the things I really enjoy doing is finding a plant in the garden and then seeing it in the collection, in a wreath, in a painting, in a mural, in a statue, and then learn about the statue and what significance did that plant or flower.

SPEAKER_04 37:39

Okay, let's talk about wreath. You led me into it. Talk talk about the laurel.

SPEAKER_02 37:44

The laurel wreath, got it. The bay laurel wreath was used uh for a victorious youth, a victorious politician, an athlete, uh a warrior. Um when there was a parade or a procession to celebrate that victory, a laurel wreath was worn.

SPEAKER_04 38:05

And we would see that in the early pictures of the Olympics.

SPEAKER_01 38:10

Exactly.

SPEAKER_04 38:11

And they don't wear that anymore, but I think there might be a laurel leaf on our dollar bill. I'm not sure, but I think I have seen it on our paper and our paper money. We've got to check that out.

SPEAKER_01 38:24

That's a good idea.

SPEAKER_04 38:27

Now we've covered the outer peristyle, the inner peristyle, and we have saved one of the one of the nicest, shadiest private gardens is the East Garden. It's kind of tucked away on the east side of the villa. Let's talk about the East Garden.

SPEAKER_02 38:48

The East Garden is probably the smallest of the gardens. It was it's a walled garden separated from the rest of the building, and it was designed for private family contemplative time. The original owner of the villa de Pipiri would have escaped the politics of the house, the heat of the s of the sun, the business from the atrium and anything, and would have escaped to the uh the East Garden to be quiet and private.

SPEAKER_04 39:19

In the East Garden, that's where maybe the children would have their lessons.

SPEAKER_02 39:26

Yes, that's a a perfect place to get away from all the activity that would have been in a house this size. The East Garden would have been a quiet place to get away from the distractions.

SPEAKER_04 39:37

And that's where you have this wonderful fountain built of lava rock.

SPEAKER_02 39:42

Yes, the two water features in the East Garden are exact copies from fountains found in Pompeii. The two fountains in Pompeii were found in two different villas, and they were combined here on Axis, so they work together.

SPEAKER_04 39:58

And side by side, well, on each side we have these theater masks. You want to tell about it?

SPEAKER_02 40:04

Yes, the Greek Greek drama and Greek tragedy are represented in two masks on either side of the fountain.

SPEAKER_04 40:10

The comedy of life.

SPEAKER_02 40:11

The the mouths of both mass you can see are well worn from people putting their hands in the mouth of the fountain of the mask.

SPEAKER_04 40:21

Yes. Now one is uh Hercules. Is that right? And one is Bacchus, I believe. And uh they just show the the comedy of life I mentioned, how uh uh life has this tragedy and happy and sad and beginning and end. There is just so much to learn about the gardens that I want to let the public know there are tons of tours. Which one is your favorite tour, Michael?

SPEAKER_02 40:54

Well, of course the garden tour. I asked the wrong person. Okay. The garden tour is fun. Uh the architectures tour talks about the building itself and the ancient the ancient site.

SPEAKER_04 41:07

And I've got to come back for that. This is a place worth returning to. You cannot see it all at one time. In fact, the garden tour is given every day, but there's another garden tour, which is the culinary garden tour, which talks about the plants and herbs and fruits of uh of that uh early Roman time. You learn so much from each tour, you learn so much from each different docent. One docent may present a viewpoint that's a little bit uh different from another, and so it's worth coming back again and again. This place is so rich with archaeology. I love the theater. We mentioned the theater, how it's layered, right?

SPEAKER_02 41:57

Yes. The theater holds 400, 400, 450?

SPEAKER_04 42:05

A lot of people, and the viewing is good because the steepness of the seats allow for people to view without any blockage. And you look down on a center just in front of the main entry. In fact, this summer, I don't know if it will be true of every summer, but this summer there are troubadour shows given two times a day. And you can hear music and oh, I even saw something about some shows coming in September. So the best way to find out about what's happening at the Getty Villa is to go online, and I believe they have a what's it called, a 360 event calendar?

SPEAKER_02 42:52

They do, yes. Uh Getty.edu.

SPEAKER_04 42:55

And it's ever changing. Uh I was surprised when I came on Saturday. There were some activities that were not even announced in that event calendar. Uh they were doing perfume making from plants in the garden.

SPEAKER_02 43:12

That's become a real favorite for the public. You want to talk about perfumes. Uh I I haven't done it yet, but I've seen the setup. Uh there are stronger fragrances, there are highlight fragrances, there are things that set the set the fragrance in in like a stabilizer? Right. And they're and everyone gets to create their own combinations of what they like.

SPEAKER_04 43:36

The line was maybe 30 people long because it was very, very popular. There was another uh sensory activity, touching the marble.

SPEAKER_02 43:49

Yes, there's one statue that's a modern copy of an ancient marble statue. So that one we allow the public to interact with. Touch it, feel it, so you can understand what the marble is like without touching the ancient ones.

SPEAKER_04 44:06

And there was a room, it's a small room with the different colors of marble.

SPEAKER_02 44:11

That's a beautiful room.

SPEAKER_04 44:12

That is gorgeous.

SPEAKER_02 44:13

There's a plaque on the wall in that room describing where all the marbles are from.

SPEAKER_04 44:18

Mmm.

SPEAKER_02 44:19

Yes. All over all over the eastern wor Eastern Mediterranean.

SPEAKER_04 44:23

Yes. And uh it's uh it's nice to end a day or maybe take a break. Your visit at the Getty Villa to go to the Tea by the Sea.

SPEAKER_02 44:36

Tea by the Sea is a really nice, nice ticket to have. I believe it's Thursdays and Saturdays.

SPEAKER_04 44:42

Oh, it's not every day.

SPEAKER_02 44:43

Not every day.

SPEAKER_04 44:44

I didn't know that.

SPEAKER_02 44:45

It's it's an exclusive experience in the founders' room, which is above the restaurant. You get an ocean view, you look out over the outdoor classical theater and the herb garden, and you're served high tea.

SPEAKER_03 44:58

Oh, how special.

SPEAKER_02 45:00

It's lovely.

SPEAKER_03 45:00

That would be lovely.

SPEAKER_02 45:02

The Getty has their own blend of tea that they offer. There's several different varieties. One of them is their own villa blend.

SPEAKER_04 45:10

Now we are coming to the close of the show. We have about five minutes. And when I interview uh my guests, I am always afraid that I might be missing something that they would like to be asked about. And I'm gonna just give you an open question. Michael, tell me anything you want about the gardens that I have not yet asked.

SPEAKER_02 45:40

The fruit trees in the herb garden represent fruits that would have been available to the Romans that we have today. And I always enjoy sharing them.

SPEAKER_01 45:54

Pomegranates, olive, dates, peaches, pears, apples, quince, figs, apricots, grapes.

SPEAKER_04 46:10

It's so exciting. It's amazing to think that these are fruits that early Romans also ate. And the citron, they they even had that in their fruitcakes.

SPEAKER_02 46:24

They did. It's amazing to realize what we have today. They were part of their natural world already.

SPEAKER_04 46:32

Oh, that is so much fun. Uh I have a personal question to ask you. How did you train for this wonderful job? I think if I were young and I had to grow up and choose a job, I would say, I would like to be a grounds and gardens supervisor just like Michael DeHart.

SPEAKER_02 46:51

Well, I had the same inspiration when I was young. I went to public gardens. I saw what it was like to work in public horticulture, and I thought, I want to do that someday. I studied uh at Cow Poly San Luis Obispo and got a Bachelor's of Science in Ornamental Horticulture. I did an internship at Disney World in Florida and I interviewed at the Getty.

SPEAKER_04 47:18

Wow. This is uh it's interesting. I talked to Scott LaFleur, who it you know Scott? Yes, from the um Sherman Library and Gardens, how similar your your past life.

SPEAKER_02 47:34

Um being inspired at a young age.

SPEAKER_04 47:37

Yes, I think that's very important. And that brings us to the close of our interview with a message to parents out there how important it is to visit the garden with the family, how important it is to influence our young children, to value our our our living our living world that is not just about human life, but it's also the life of of the plant life, right?

SPEAKER_01 48:17

Definitely.

SPEAKER_04 48:18

Definitely. Michael, I am very, very grateful that you agreed to take time out of your busy day to sit with me here in the ranch house. Oh, I didn't talk about the ranch house. I feel so lucky to be in the ranch house when uh the senior communications specialist led me here, Desiree Zenovich led me in here. I said, we get to go to the ranch house. We have to mention what the ranch house is, and maybe end with a little bit about who Getty was.

unknown 48:53

J.

SPEAKER_02 48:53

Paul Getty was an oil oil professional from the 30s and 40s. He discovered oil in several states, did a lot of drilling here in Los Angeles and in Texas.

SPEAKER_04 49:06

And Oklahoma.

SPEAKER_02 49:07

All throughout the Midwest. He amassed the largest, largest, he was the richest man in the world in the 60s, and he started collecting art as one of his passions.

SPEAKER_04 49:18

He studied in Oxford and loved and loved the ancient world.

SPEAKER_02 49:23

The ranch house he bought in 1954 to house his art collection at that time, and then added a second floor, galleries, and laboratory spaces here for conservation. His art collection kept growing, and the ranch house here didn't have enough space to house the entire collection, so that's when he commissioned the villa to be built in front. The ranch house now houses a reading room where we're sitting now, conference rooms, the curatorial staff, and the labs are still here to support the antiquities in the galleries.

SPEAKER_04 50:00

And it's so special to be in the ranch house where Getty once lived. Now Getty never lived in the villa, correct?

SPEAKER_02 50:09

Correct. It was always built as a museum.

SPEAKER_04 50:12

And I think he died.

SPEAKER_02 50:14

Two years after it was built.

SPEAKER_04 50:16

Ah, that was sad. But uh he really envisioned a luxurious villa similar to the uh Villa de Papiri.

SPEAKER_02 50:26

That's what he wanted, and we're so grateful that he did.

SPEAKER_04 50:30

And that he has endowed it to the Getty Trust.

SPEAKER_01 50:34

Yes.

SPEAKER_04 50:34

Which allows anyone to come and visit the Getty Villa for free. All you have to do is pay for parking, which is quite nominal. We have covered so many things about the Getty Villa and what makes it special. We talked about how knowing the mythology and culture of the Romans come to life when we visit the gardens and see the buildings and understand the reason why everything is designed in the way it is. When you come, be sure you visit the four gardens. There is the outer and the inner peristyles, there is the East Garden and the Herb Garden, and there are many, many different exhibitions in the villa itself. It's a place to visit a full day. Wouldn't you say?

SPEAKER_02 51:30

It will, yes. There's a lovely lunch or a coffee cart to take a break. There are quiet little areas to take a respite, bench to sit on, places to take a break from the galleries, and then go back and see some more.

SPEAKER_04 51:46

And lots of places to take pictures.

SPEAKER_02 51:48

Oh yes.

SPEAKER_04 51:49

Yes, and so don't forget your camera when you come. Thank you very much, Michael, for being my guest.

SPEAKER_01 51:55

Thank you for having me.