Could it be time to add your mobile device to your set of gardening tools? There really is an app for everything. Bring out your inner designer to create the dream landscape you always imagined with the Home Outside Palette app. Move, resize, and even undo with over 280 available elements (trees, paths, enclosures, and more) to…
Plants
Elements of Style: The Classic Mediterranean Garden
Elements of Style: The Classic Mediterranean Garden A classic Mediterranean style garden is typically low-maintenance, drought tolerant and perfect for a climate dry and hot in Summer and warm and moist in Winter. For those of us living in California, this seems a perfect fit. Traveling throughout the Mediterranean region, focused on the landscape and…
Right Plant, Right Place: The What and Where of Drought Tolerant Planting
My client was happy; she’d just completed installation of major landscape improvements designed by an award-winning designer. I was not so happy. Some of the plants the designer had chosen were simply not suited for the area where they’d been planted and it was my job to make them look good. Landscape architects, designers, and…
The Importance of Sustainable Gardening
The word of the day is sustainability. The United Nations World Commission for the Environment defines sustainability as “meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” The other word that makes headlines is “green.” What that means for gardeners and landscape designers: We must pay attention…
Book Worm: A Review of Fine Foliage
I like to think of Karen Chapman and Christina Salwitz’s new book as the stylist’s guide to plant combinations. That’s not a leap, as a combination of plants devised by Salwitz—who is known for couture plants—graced the cover of this year’s March issue of Better Homes and Gardens. Serving Seattle clientele through her company Le…
And Now…To Our Mothers
Anna Jarvis is credited with originating Mothers Day in 1907. Her mother died on May 9, 1905, and missing her greatly, Anna started a letter writing campaign to ask ministers, businessmen and congressmen to make Mothers Day a holiday to recognize all mothers. With each letter, she would send a white carnation. In May of…
