Attract Attention with Two Strong Shapes
Visitors are always surprised when they see my perennial border. The colors are lovely-mostly pastels, silvers, grays, and greens-but it's not the colors that most people respond to. Rising like punctuation marks, spires and globes create a flow ... [... more]
Fine Gardening |
Think Outside the Window Box
There comes a time when a garden needs a jolt of novelty or a finishing touch to bring it together. One way to do this is to add window boxes to your home. These details fuse indoors and out and make the house and garden whole. I have them ... [... more]
Fine Gardening |
A Room with a View
The large window in my home office looks out onto a deep backyard, where weeping willows and majestic sequoias in adjacent properties extend the view so that my back garden looks much bigger than its actual size. This panorama, unfortunately, is ... [... more]
Fine Gardening |
Design a Border with Strong Plant Shapes
Nineteen eighty-six was a wonderful gardening year for me in Connecticut. By mid-July, every inch of my perennial border was in bloom, and I was thrilled. It was just what I had been working toward for 20 years-a summer garden absolutely filled ... [... more]
Fine Gardening |
Composing with Conifers
When my husband and I built a new house filled with large windows, I wanted beautiful views all year-round. Perennial borders were my first choice, until I remembered that they require intensive maintenance and that they often fall far short of ... [... more]
Fine Gardening |
Three Ways to Design with Containers
Planting in containers is a lighthearted way to garden. It has everything going for it-and anyone can do it. Container gardening requires less time, space, and energy than inground planting and is just as much fun. In terms of plant material, the ... [... more]
Fine Gardening |
Using Containers as Elements of a Design
Looking out the window at my garden, I find it hard to imagine it without containers. Sixty of them, strategically placed throughout my garden, provide design solutions for difficult places. I use containers as major structural elements to help ... [... more]
Fine Gardening |
Inspired Design: Living Lightly on the Land
Maybe it's the optimist in me, but I feel as though we've reached a tipping point with regard to the public's awareness and acceptance of our responsibility to do something about global warming. Former Vice President Al Gore's documentary, One ... [... more]
Fine Gardening |
Creating a Scene
Lucky for me, I have a vivid imagination. The original landscape surrounding my 1950s-era suburban ranch house was about as interesting as milk toast after a 24-hour soak on the kitchen table. The 4-foot-tall junipers planted under the front ... [... more]
Fine Gardening |
Designing on the Fly
I love making plans for my garden-but not on paper. My most rewarding design efforts take place as I'm daydreaming. I gaze about the garden and imagine what I'd like to see. I think about the lines of its paths and beds, the interplay of plants, ... [... more]
Fine Gardening |
Making Opposites Attractive
I've been designing gardens for a decade or so, and I've been studying them for at least another decade. In addition to traveling to see many gardens, my ongoing teacher has been my own in Los Angeles. I originally asked landscape architect ... [... more]
Fine Gardening |
A Garden Story in Three Parts
It's a woodland story-you know that right away-but the rest is a mystery. Do you hear water? Music? Mozart perhaps? Some laughing far away? You are beginning chapter one of the story of a garden, on a lake, in Alabama. I consider my garden just ... [... more]
Fine Gardening |
