A Yearning for Urns

I remember when the attraction began....when my husband's job moved us from California to the South. It was there that I was exposed to the beauty and character of older, Southern architecture and garden decor...and the classic urn stole my heart.

Urns like this beautiful 5 foot tall one in Jackson Square in New Orleans,

Or this graceful one that is a tranquil fountain in historic St. Francisville, Louisiana.

The historic grandeur of these and many other beauties

were the inspiration for my garden urns below,

at our home in Baton Rouge.

During a school field trip to the east coast--once again,

beautiful urns flank the entrances to the hostoric larger mansions--like this one at

the governor's palace at Colonial Williamsburg, Virginia.

And so my obsession began. For Mother's Day about 5 years ago,

I splurged for my own set of iron urns from one of my favorite

stores in Baton Rouge called the Royal Standard.

They are the classic urn shape and painted black.

Today they are just beginning to show an aging patina of

rust and dirt and make my hydrangeas feel grand.

My mother-in-law gave me her gorgeous cement acanthus leaf urns.

These have more than three decades of age to their gorgeous patina.

This one has a glass top and is a side table on our patio right now.

I cannot resist the classic urn shape, and when I saw an iron pair in a smaller size at an antique store in Baton Rouge, they called to me. These are about a foot tall. Perfect table size. For some reason, I had these separated, one inside and one out for a few years...and the outside one has developed a wonderful rust pattern.