Tastes and Trends

What's Hot?

The High's Artful Garden Tour: Atlanta homeowners will open their gardens to visitors for the fourth annual Artful Garden Tour on Saturday, May 17, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. (rain or shine) to benefit the High Museum of Art. Featuring homes in the Druid Hills, Inman Park, Loring Heights and Virginia-Highland neighborhoods, the tour encompasses seven gardens. The Artful Garden Tour is one of four annual fundraisers held by the High's Art Partners members.

"Conservation is a prominent theme in this year's tour," says member and Art Partners event chair Tina A. Cox. "Our European- and Asian-style gardens exemplify how one can take drought-tolerant Southern plants and shrubs and still create an artistic and relaxing environment in which to live." She adds, "The best thing about this year's tour is that the visitors can learn from homeowners and designers about how to create their own drought-tolerant garden retreats."

Prominent local landscapers David Ellis and Brendan Butler designed and coordinated a selection of the gardens on the tour, while others were envisioned and completed by the homeowners themselves. Glenn Dair, master clay artist and pottery director at Callanwolde Fine Arts Center, worked with Butler to design site-specific works at the Copenhill Lofts, stop No. 7 on this year's tour. Several other local artists, including Doug Dannels and Matt Janke, will exhibit clay sculpture, blown glass, metalwork and painting en plein air during the garden tour, welcoming patrons to observe their work throughout the day.

Tickets are $20 in advance, $25 at the door or $18 for groups of 10 or more and can be purchased at www.high.org/gardentour or at the following retailers: Boxwoods Gardens & Gifts Inc., Buckhead, (404) 233- 3400; Hastings Garden Center, Brookhaven, (404) 869- 7447; Intown Ace Hardware, Decatur, (404) 378-6006; Intown Ace Hardware, Virginia-Highland, (404) 874- 5619; and Lush Life Garden & Flowers, Buckhead, (404) 841-9661.

Home TheaterWorks: Father-and-son team David and Seth Harold are getting ready to celebrate the grand opening of their upscale home entertainment store May 3 and 4. Their company custom-designs and installs home theaters, media rooms, sound systems, home automation systems and outdoor speaker systems, just to name a few things. The Dunwoody family is heavily involved in the Jewish community here, with both David and wife Ellen being past presidents of Temple Beth Tikvah.

"We felt that Atlanta could use a high-end showroom — most home entertainment companies are run out of people's cars and warehouses," David said. "But here homeowners, builders and remodelers can touch, feel and listen to what they are buying. Anybody can compete on the price, the technology is available to everyone, but no one can compete with the service. We want to be known for supporting our customers after the sale." Home TheaterWorks is at 8460 Holcomb Bridge Road in Roswell. (770) 643-7777. www.htwatlanta.com.

To submit or suggest items for What's Hot, e-mail Ann Marie Quill at amquill@JULEPonline.us or call (404) 564-4560.