Current Obsessions: Real Estate Envy

We’re taking up a collection to buy Reneé Zellweger’s Connecticut farmhouse (comes with party barn), and we only need $1.6 million. Everybody send in a dollar.

Here are more things we’re obsessed with lately:

• Move over, cork. The latest eco-friendly material is the humble loofah.
• A must visit: London’s Royal Botanical Garden in Autumn.
• Next week we’re painting with autumn colors (perhaps you heard that orange is the new black?). Starting with this Kobocha Squash and Ginger soup.
• A beginner’s guide to at-home canning and preserving.
• Add these 10 tips to your October gardening calendar.
• In a suburb of north Philadelphia, a lush rain garden–with more than 50 species of plants–has us envious here in drought-afflicted California.
• Weekend read: Places Journal, the magazine for the thinking landscaper, has unveiled a gorgeous new redesign.
• San Francisco, get your flower crowns ready in time for the Treasure Island Music Festival.
• Aspiring floral designers, take note.
• The perfect fall flower and its six varietals.
• Learn the art of sauce making at Brooklyn Brainery, October 19  from 11 am to 12:30 pm.

Instagram and Pinterest Pick of the Week:

• We’re ogling Botany Shope’s Instagram feed (@botanyshope5) and Green Board on Pinterest. 
• Have you heard? The Remodelista & Gardenista Markets are coming to London (November 15), Los Angeles (December 6), and San Francisco (December 13). Meet us there?

For more from this week on Gardenista, take a look at our DIY Mudroom issue and head over to Remodelista to peek a week of DIY Bathrooms.