Announcing my new book...

Nothing warms the heart of a speaker more than to pull into the venue and see a sign like this! Thank you Diane Threlkeld, chair of the Yard & Garden Lecture Series - how thoughtful!

Last Saturday, I traveled to Port Townsend, Washington, to speak at the Yard and Garden Series 2011, an educational program produced by the WSU Jefferson County Master Gardeners. Such a great audience of enthusiastic kindred spirits.

After my talk and floral design demonstration on Sustainable Flower Growing and Design, I promised to post some of the resources for seasonal, local, and sustainable flowers. Here they are:

California Organic Flowers (www.californiaorganicflowers.com); Here’s a link to our post about visiting this cool farm in Chico, California

Jello Mold Farm (www.jellomoldfarm.com); Our friends Diane and Dennis grow sustainable cut flowers in Mt. Vernon, Washington. Read their list of “where to buy” (including Farmer’s Market, CSA orders and Seattle area retail shops)

Peterkort Roses (www.peterkortroses.com), a fabulous, family-owned rose farm in Hillsboro, Oregon. Their roses are grown sustainably in hoop houses year ’round. The colors are pure, the scents are not cloying, and the flowers are totally fresh. While Peterkort sells wholesale only, you can ask your local florist to order from them directly. Demand for locally-grown ingredients will help give flower consumers more choices and eventually replace those steroidal mega-rose imports. ReadSandra Peterkort Laubenthal’s blog for news and updates on the rose-growing world.

Wild Ridge Organics (www.wildridgeorganics.com); Specializing in Australian and South African cut flowers, based in Salinas, California. These are the awesome exotics used in my arrangement that one lucky audience member took home with her.

Upcoming: My collaborator, photographer David Perry, and I are hitting the lecture circuit in 2011 – spreading the word about their passion for locally-grown flower crops and the designers who use these ingredients. 

If you are in the Seattle area, come hear from and meet us at the Northwest Flower & Garden Show, February 23-27, 2011. Our appearance details (click on the links below for lengthier course descriptions):

Thursday, February 24th

• 12:15 p.m. Hood Room: “Conquering Your Digital Camera: Making Beautiful & Memorable Garden Photos,” with David Perry
• 2:30 p.m. DIY Stage: “Floral Design with Spring Bulbs: Bring Spring Indoors with Beautiful Blooming Bouquets,” with Debra Prinzing

Friday, February 25th

• 12:15 p.m. Hood Room: “A Year in Flowers: Seasonal, Local & Sustainable Floral Ingredients,” with David Perry
• 2:00 p.m. DIY Stage: “The Winter Bouquet: Sustainable Floral Designs From Winter’s Bounty,” with Debra Prinzing

By borrowing this lovely cream urn from my friend Lorene, and by clipping ingredients from her garden and that of Jean Zaputil's, I created a dramatic winter bouquet.

Earlier this week, my collaborator David Perry and I were the “program” for Woodinville Garden Club’s first meeting of 2011. It was an auspicious beginning for what we anticipate to be a great year gathering stories both visually and with words for our book project, A Fresh Bouquet.

Frequently, the feedback to our “seasonal, local and sustainable” mantra has to do with the argument that one can only follow this practice in the peak growing seasons when annuals and perennials are in their glory (you know what we mean – roses, peonies, dahlias, even sunflowers….they don’t usually sing in January!)

That’s true, but living in the seasons means that of course you don’t want a vase filled with August bloomers in the dead of winter. That’s like eating a mealy hothouse tomato out of season. Yes, it’s red in color, but that’s about as much in common the January grocery store tomato has with the off-the-vine, warm, juicy, flavorful heirloom you grow in the garden and add to your late summer salads.

So after our illustrated lecture on “A Year in Flowers,” featuring some pretty incredible images that Dave has captured on our joint and his solo excursions, we set out to design and demonstrate some great ideas for winter bouquets. Suffice it to say, David created an uniquely “David” arrangement. Yes, it involved power tools and an unexpected combination of leaves and blooms. When he blogs about it, I’ll add the link here.

This detail shot shows how the oakleaf hydrangea adds wine to the bouquet, showcased against the hellebore foliage; a glimpse of the yellow-and-green acuba foliage is in the upper right corner.

For me, I wanted to fill a vase with winter beauty. Some of you may know that our family is in a bit of transition. We finally sold our house in Southern California, but we are still living in a rental house in Seattle, while house- and garden-hunting for a permanent residence.

I yearn for my previous Seattle garden where I could gather more than enough ingredients for any impromptu bouquet (does this come close to admitting that I’m an over-planter? YES! But I don’t own that garden anymore, sadly). I’m a bit limited with the offerings at our rental house and I don’t want to denude all the plants my landlords consider theirs!

So, on Tuesday, I went “flower shopping,” which means I visited the amazing gardens of two friends, clippers in hand. It was sunny out, and very cold. Some of the shrubs showed signs of frost damage. After all, It was January 4th! But I was not disappointed and my garden designer friend Jean Zaputil walked me around her backyard and entry garden, encouraging me to take a little of this and a little of that.

Her bounty included Fatsia, which has huge, palm-like foliage. Green and glossy, this is good stuff – perfect for adding drama to a vase. We clippped branches of green Boxwood, another hardworking shrub that is just as hardworking in an arrangement. Oh, and the Sarcococca, or sweet box – divine. If you have never grown this evergreen shrub, which has little pointed leaves and hard-to-see, super fragrant white winter flowers, think about planting it now. It’s hardy in the Pacific NW….not in the midwest, unfortunately, according to my friend Danielle.

I also left with a few stems from Jean’s Acuba shrub, which is another one of those plants you sometimes ignore in the summertime when everything else looks so swell. But even the famed Christopher Lloyd admired this plant – its bright yellow foliage is splashed with green flecks. And there’s nothing like something golden to offset all that greenery. It ended up as one of the magical ingredients that perked up my bouquet. I also talked Jean into letting me clip two branches from her about-to-bloom Helleborus argutifolia – with its leathery, serrated, olive-green foliage and the pale green flower in bud.

Here's how the honeysuckle vine looks, wrapping around the base of the urn.

After leaving Jean’s, I headed to Lorene Edwards Forkner, plantswoman, designer, blogger and fellow writer – another incredibly talented friend (I am blessed with many of them!). Lorene’s garden is very close to Puget Sound, which is often a bit milder than the rest of Seattle. That’s the only reason I can come up with to explain why her Oakleaf Hydrangea shrub was still hanging onto several deep burgundy leaves in pretty sets.

Like the golden Acuba, the wine-colored Hydrangea foliage added great contrast to the bouquet. Oh- and the ‘Jelena’ witch hazel – yes, this glorious, fragrant shrub is just beginning to flower in Lorene’s front yard, so she allowed me to clip a few branches. The blooms of the witch hazel are little puffs of burgundy-copper – and it doesn’t take many of them to perfume a room. I made this bouquet on Tuesday and four days later, the dining area where I set the urn was still heady with the scent.

You can look closely to see most of these ingredients in the photos here. One more thing I want to share about this abundant bouquet. Notice the draping vine? That’s a cascading and twining length of a rugged honeysuckle, also from Lorene’s property. I wanted it to spill elegantly from the mouth of the cream-colored urn, but it was a little too stiff to give me the look I envisioned. So I started wrapping it around the base of the urn and – well, that looked better. I employed a trick I learned from a Portland floral designer we recently interviewed, Jennie Greene. She uses tiny lengths of twine-wrapped wire to secure branches and stems in place. Easy t0 find at craft stores, I pulled out a roll of the wire, cut off a couple inches and secured the honeysuckle in place.

Now who says there’s nothing to put in a vase in January? This creation illustrates just one way to gather from the winter garden. Go see what you can create!

A Gardener's Holiday Welcome at Old Goat Farm

If you’re like many of my gardening friends who can’t resist the charming character of old farm implements or tools, you probably have a few elderly hand-trowels in your collection. I know I’m not the only one who actually begs, buys and forages for old nozzles, flower frogs, watering cans and metal implements for digging soil! 

Whether displayed on a shelf or hanging from a wall inside the potting shed, that slightly rusted, weathered and distressed garden trowel, cultivator, hoe or rake appeals to many of us because the paint is chipping and the handle is probably made from real wood and screws rather than plastic and staples. 

You might call them our holiday elves! In the kitchen with Greg Graves and Gary Waller

My pals Greg Graves and Gary Waller, owners of Old Goat Farm in Graham, Wash., are two such hunter-gatherers. 

It helps that the men acquired a Victorian farm house and a similarly pedigreed landscape (and a barn and several outbuildings) several years ago. Greg and Gary moved from the city to the country where they have created an appealing lifestyle-business that includes raising poultry, peacocks and goats (yes, there are a few goats here, even an “old” goat), propagating and selling unusual plants, and hosting legions of visitors to their Open Garden days in summertime and to their Holiday Teas in December. 

The farm house's irresistable covered porch overlooks the garden.

Gary, an award-winning floral designer, has amassed an impressive collection of holiday decorations (that’s what the barn is for – to store everything from santas and snowmen to ribbons, ornaments and lights). 

He and Greg decorate each room of the farmhouse with a specific Christmas theme and then invite their customers, friends, local senior groups and word-of-mouth partakers to attend their Holiday Teas.

People walk from room to room (bath included!), enjoy the highly-detailed decorations, sip a warm drink and sample the mouthwatering desserts. Greg tells me that Old Goat Farm will serve tea to 450 persons this month.

Two of the teas are fund-raisers for causes they support, but basically the entire endeavor is a gesture of community outreach. “We keep the price low because we don’t want to make it too costly for the senior groups to come,” Greg says. 

Here's Lorene, studying the tiny kitchen tree that's an ode to poultry on the farm (Gary hollowed-out all sorts of the eggs and decoupaged them with hen images).

One of Gary's hand-made egg ornaments.

Greg invited fellow garden writer Lorene Edwards Forkner and me to join last Friday’s tea when a last-minute cancellation opened up two slots at the table.

We donned our festive attire and drove to Graham/Orting. If you know about the city of Tacoma, the Graham/Orting area is due east of it. The Garden Conservancy-supported Chase Garden is a nearby horticultural destination. 

Let me set the scene up on our arrival: 

Festooned in garlands, plaid ribbons and old garden implements (!) the soft yellow farmhouse greets its guests. The entry wreath hangs from the front gate with a trowel and worn wood dibble (a planting device for enlarging seed or bulb holes). 

The front gate's wreath begins the decor theme with a trowel and dibble

Who wouldn’t love a huge covered porch that wraps around three sides of the 100-year-old Victorian residence? Each post is dressed in holiday finery, a pair of rusty old tools gathered up with an enormous lodge pole pinecone and the red-and-green plaid ribbon. 

The cheerful door decor has at its center a set of vintage child’s set of play tools – a rake and a shovel. Criss-crossed with more ribbon and cones, they welcomed our arrival (see photo at top). 

Front porch decor: love it!

A galvanized watering can becomes an impromptu vase, filled with greenery gathered from the wooded landscape. And we feel transported to a century ago (almost) while touring the garden and the home. 

One of our favorite destinations at Old Goat Farm is “Linda’s Garden,” designed by Greg to memorialize the late, dear friend to us all, Linda Plato.

We lost Linda five years ago this month, a premature death brought on by breast cancer. Linda and Greg met in horticulture school as they both began their second careers. They worked together at the Elizabeth C. Miller Botanical Garden (where Greg is still on the staff as head gardener). They traveled the world to see gardens. Lorene and I were just happy to be small stars in Linda’s orbit. And we miss her. 

In Linda's garden, the double boxwood topiaries line the path that leads to the garden shed.

Linda’s garden is an homage to topiary. For you see, Greg and Gary would never have moved here to Old Goat Farm if it was not for Linda dragging Greg out there six years ago to buy topiary from the former owner who was liquidating her stock.  As Greg tells the story on his web site: 

Story of Old Goat Farm
In December of 2004, quite by accident, we found this beautiful little place while plant shopping with our good friend Linda. It is located just outside of Orting, WA, tucked below Mt. Rainier. We fell in love with this place, and by March of 2005, we were the owners of Old Goat Farm.

It is kind of a throwback to a simpler time with its 100-year-old farmhouse and cute barn and nursery. The garden is dotted with topiaries which give it a magical quality. 

“Linda once said: ‘What’s better than a row of topiaries? A double-row of topiaries!,’” Greg explains.  And that’s why you will see double-boxwood balls, pyramids, ovoid shapes and cubes lining both sides of the pathway that loops through the shaded, secluded and peaceful Linda’s Garden. Hurrah! It never fails to put a smile on my face. Please enjoy the photos of our visit to Old Goat. May we all be so lucky to have people like Greg and Gary, Lorene, and our dear Linda pass through our lives!

A small Christmas scene adorns the front porch.

A cedar garland wraps around the porch columns and each is topped with a huge pinecone and more vintage tools.

The full view of the farmhouse front door. Naturally, it's RED!

The perky old goat welcomes visitors to the garden and nursery.

Here is the "old goat," carved from wood and sipping a mug of coffee in the garden.

One of the wonderful barn strutures.

The ancient, moss-covered apple trees, backlit by the dim December sun.

A topiary bunny of variegated box, a work in progress by Greg (and an homage to Linda).

A moss-covered "bench" resting on two piles of stones. Note the mahonia that has seeded itself in the rockery.

Yes, you can grow moss lawns here in the Pacific Northwest and this is one terrific example!

For amazing drama in the winter landscape, place an evergreen fern in an urn on top of a pedestal. Wow.

A circular stone "rug" that Greg recently added at the entry to Linda's garden - the ideal place to sit and be quiet.

Stone gabion pillars guard the entry path to Linda's garden.

Merry Christmas from Old Goat Farm. This is a miniature version, complete with sign, created by Gary Waller.

Preserve the Harvest with Burgon & Ball's charming jam, marmalade, pickles and chutney jars.

Trend-spotters are reading the horticultural tea leaves these days.

It’s an annual practice that I remember so well from my newsroom career when, without fail, we reporters were asked to compile the obligatory “forecast” story. I covered retail, and you could imagine how loathe Seattle’s major retail CEOs were to tell me anything about the coming year when it was just days after Christmas and they hadn’t tallied up the current year’s performance.

But, alas, we all want a glimpse into the future. And that’s what going to industry trade shows can help reveal. A peek into the products, plants, tools and design items you may be seeing in 2011′s backyards.

This post continues with even more interesting offerings. Or the ones that caught my interest anyway. I welcome your reaction. Are these items you can see yourself purchasing for your garden? Do you even NEED more products? (That’s a long conversation, isn’t it?).

Here is the "sun" bracket from M Brace - simply brilliant!

I really enjoyed meeting Jill Plumb, a school teacher who came up with a brilliantly simple method of building raised beds.

Her product is called M Brace. It is a decorative steel corner bracket that holds lumber at a 45-degree angle WITHOUT HARDWARE (note: this is a big selling point for anyone who has dragged the electric drill and 100-foot-long orange extension cord out to the backyard to try and wrestle together a box for the tomatoes).

Here's Jill demonstrating the nifty packaging for a pair of brackets.

Jill told me that she got this “big idea” one day while re-loading paper napkins into a “slot” style napkin holder.

Something clicked and she saw in her mind’s eye how easy it would be to have a bracket that emulated that napkin holder. Just larger, more durable and also pretty. Several prototypes later, including the support of her students who she involved in the design process, packaging development and marketing, Jill’s M Brace is looking very professional and has already hit garden center shelves in some markets.

Made from recycled steel (natural or powder-coated), with decorative cut-outs including a squiggle, sun, carrot or bamboo fronds, the set of 4 brackets has a $165/set recommended retail price. Jill continues to offer new product ideas such as “edging” made from the leftover swirl pieces or plant stakes from the leftover carrot cutouts. Brilliant!

The Feeney 3-in-1 trellis, shown in a fan pattern

I spotted another clever system to corral plants – especially in this case, vines – in the Feeney Architectural Products booth.

A detail of the Somerset II Trellis

We see so much over-designed crap in the marketplace, which is one reason why I appreciated Feeney’s simple use of stainless steel cables to create a trellis for climbing plants. Feeney’s 3-in-1 Trellisis an easy-to-assemble wall-mount trellis kit with 1/8-inch diameter rods and special mounting components that can be configured into a Fan, Grid or Diamond design. This is a lightweight solution that does require measuring and drilling skills to install, but can turn a blah wall or fence into something quite beautiful. Just add a vine of your choice and voila! Something quite pretty. Suggested retail: $199.

Feeney also uses stainless steel cables in its inexpensive “It’s a Cinch” plant hanger and in a freestanding trellis panel kit. The Greenway Trellis has a frame of aluminum tubing and a square-grid pattern for the vines. The frame legs can be set in compacted gravel or concrete footings, or they can be base-mounted on a deck or patio. That square-grid pattern also shows up in the Somerset II Trellis, which has top and bottom powder-coated aluminum brackets. It is also a wall-mount system but a little larger than the 3-in-1. (more…)

Seatons Toffee, a 'quill' form with deep bronze petals.

I have great memories of the giant yellow chrysanthemum corsage my dad bought me for a college homecoming when I was a little girl. That curly ball of petals was so unwieldy it was hard to keep from crushing it with my chin. To me, that mum didn’t even feel real – it was like something from a fantasy world of my dreams.

My relationship with mums hasn’t really changed much since then. I’ve always kept them at arm’s length, both in garden design and in floral arranging.

The only time mums registered on my radar in the past decade was the celebrated arrival of ‘Kermit’, a lime green mum with a button-like flower that gained a huge following for its zesty color and knack for looking good in a vase for up to two weeks. But what about other mums?

Lots to learn

'Yoko Ono' is a top pompom-style mum with that awesome green hue.

Any ambivalence I’ve had about mums changed for the positive after I met two leading mum experts at the Association of Specialty Cut Flower Growers annual symposium in Tulsa, Oklahoma earlier this month.

On one of the long bus rides, I sat with Ray Gray of King’s Mums, an Oregon City, Ore.-based grower of “exhibition, specialty and vintage chrysanthemum rooted cuttings.”

Ray shared a bit of the story behind how he and his wife Kim purchased King’s Mums in 2008. The Grays are longtime wholesale nursery owners who were looking for ways to diversify their crops. They learned from Janet Foss, another grower, that King’s Mums was for sale.

'Yodogimi' is a semi-double mum with dark red petals tipped in gold.

For more than 40 years, the King family operated a huge Chrysanthemum-growing operation in Central California. The business served the amateur gardener and professional grower with more than 200 cultivars of exhibition and spray mums, one of the largest sources in the U.S.

After buying the business, Ray and Kim in January 2009 moved this amazing collection to their small family farm in Oregon City. They are carrying on the tradition begun by the Kings while also implementing new technologies and growing methods.

'Two Tone Pink' has petite pink-purple petals with white tips.

Ray gave me a copy of the King’s Mum catalog and right away I started drooling over the cultivars between the covers. As a cut flower choice, the mum is superb. The palette leans toward the warm end of the color spectrum, which is very en voguewith today’s floral designers: bronze, gold, terra cotta, salmon, champagne, orange, crimson, pink-red, lime green, apricot, burgundy, and all sorts of luscious bi-colored petal combinations. And of course, there are also pastel, cream and white flowers.

'Senkyo Kenshin' is a dark bronze 'spider' form - magical!

I know this is probably all old news to people in the National Chrysanthemum Society, and to specialty cut flower growers and their floral design clients. But I found it thrilling to meet Ray and learn how he and Kim are keeping alive this important cut flower category. Yes, I started to fantasize about growing some of these blooms in my own garden.

Note to self: King’s Mums is open to the public each October. Located about 20 minutes south of Portland (Oregon City is the end of the historic Oregon Trail), you can visit during business hours and see these yummy flowers up close and personal.

A beautiful punch of color comes from mums filling the hoop house at Bear Creek Farm.

There is another reason why mums stayed on my mind at the ASCFG conference. After meeting Ray and flipping through the beautiful flowers in his catalog, I was stunned to walk into one of Vicki Stamback’s hoop houses at Bear Creek Farms to discover rows of these very mums I’d just seen in that catalog.

I have to confess, I was a bit antisocial while skipping out of the demonstration of releasing beneficial insects in the greenhouse. But I wasn’t the only one climbing between the shoulder-high rows of mums, taking photos of these really superb blooms and making sure to jot down the name of each. These flowers were impossible to ignore as you can see here.

The following day, I sat in on “The Comeback of the Mum,” a presentation by Chehalis, Wash., grower Janet Foss. I learned enough to become a confirmed mum fanatic. You can read a summary of her presentation at A Fresh Bouquet.

I’ve got to share the rest of these incredible specimens:

Read on to learn what I'm going to do with these amazing shutters!

I recently spent the morning at a cool local flea market in Seattle. I was up early and out the door by 7:15 a.m., ready to get my creative juices going.

My mission: to discover as many castoffs from others that could make their way home with me.

The destination: 2nd Saturdayz, a popular flea market where vendors, dealers and designers come together to do business with salvage-savvy shoppers.

The apt motto: A Saturday Market of Fine Tastes and Curious Treasures.

Once inside the doors of a huge hangar (yes, the flea market is held at a decommissioned Naval base), I met up with Jean and Gillian. But not too much socializing is encouraged at these events. That is, IF you want to get the best deals. First-come, first-serve is the motto. Or: Every woman for herself.

I shouldn’t limit this endeavor to the female salvager because there were many men in attendance at 2nd Saturdayz. But still, you know what I mean. It’s a gal’s paradise.

Galvanized chicken feeder. 30 sizeable oval openings. A succulent planter or a flower holder? Or both?

Lately, I’ve been collecting vintage flower frogs, which makes sense since I’m living and breathing floral design. But this time, instead of finding glass and metal frogs, cages and stem-holders to displace the dreaded florist’s Oasis, I picked up a galvanized metal chicken feeder.

Think of a loooong ice-cube tray with oval cutouts. In metal. Very cool. Now that I’m looking at it again, I may just use this nifty piece as a planter for hardy succulents. It’s probably leaky so that’s going to give the drainage I’ll need.

A nearly-pristine child's typewriter complements my grown-up Underwood.

I also picked up a vintage child’s typewriter. It can play nicely with my retro black Underwood typewriter that we bought back in 1985 at the Rotary Club Auction on Bainbridge Island. I think I paid $5 back in the day.

Those old typewriters, truly relics, are now priced at $50 on up. And to think so many of them have been dismantled to make jewelry from the letter keys. I’m guilty of buying one of those alphabet bracelets, too.

When I walked into one small “booth” with my friend Jean, an awesome Seattle landscape designer, I found myself absent-mindedly stroking the frame and spindles of a cast iron baby crib. The vendor had taken off one of the crib’s side-rails and piled pillows and cushions on the springs and against the three remaining railings.

Here's the end of the baby crib. Next time you see this, I'll be lounging against some cushy pillows, perhaps under a shade tree. This crib will become my garden bench.

What did it recall? Yes, a very fashionable garden daybed or bench. And for $100, I totally lucked out. My friend Gillian, who is a pro at this sort of buying-and-selling of antiques and vintage items at Ravenna Gardens, pulled me aside to share the secret that she’s seen other dealers selling cast iron baby cribs for $600. I don’t have a “garden” in which to place this bench right now, since I’m in a rental house and I’m not yet ready to invest energy on land I don’t own. But . . . I did decide to bring this crib home and store the pieces in the garage until the next garden comes along. Luck-ee me!!!

I couldn’t ignore the central element inside the warehouse – a little hamlet of potting sheds. Their perky corrugated metal roofs, topped with finials created from shiny bits and pieces, stood high above the flea market’s landscape.

While gazing at the rustic but stylish potting sheds, I met designer/builder Bob Bowling. Owner of Bob Bowling Rustics of Whidbey Island, this engaging shed artist greeted me and generously shared his story.

Turns out, like some of the talented folks we featured in Stylish Sheds and Elegant Hideaways, Bob makes unique structures using reclaimed and recycled materials. Whimsical and playful, and finished off with salvaged windows, doors and other artifacts, the Rustics sheds are each a delight to see.

Bob's cool garden shed was hard to miss.

The "stripes" come from variously-stained boards.

The prices are reasonable, too. I should know. For $3200, you can get this “Rasta” shed. It measures about 7-by-7 feet in diameter (plus or minus) and features cool details, like the exterior of alternating stripes of differently-stained boards and the window boxes, door hardware and towering finial.

You could easily spend this much for a pre-fab storage or tool shed on the lot of your local big-box store. Which would add more art and style to your life, while also being quite functional?

All this thrifty flea-market shopping had energized me and made me feel quite artistic.

And then I met that shutter duo that called my name. Loudly. They appear to be half-circle crowns or eyebrow tops from a set of plantation shutters.

Wooden, with 2-inch deep slats, these pieces were displayed separately. Once I noticed both of them, I was not going to leave with just one! I don’t think I got a huge bargain, since I paid $28 apiece (but the seller insisted she had just cut the price in half). Whatever. When you spy something so uncommon, you have to act.

Other than changing the depressing buff-colored paint job to something more lively, what on earth do you suppose I will do with these crescent-shaped pieces?

Hello! You two are pretty darned cute. That Baylor Chapman is uber-talented!

Here's another small shutter-turned-wall garden, compliments of Baylor Chapman.

For inspiration, I hearkened swiftly to my visit to Baylor Chapman, a talented San Francisco floral and garden designer I recently profiled for A Fresh Bouquet. After my friends Susan and Rebecca took me to meet Baylor at her floral studio, the three of us accompanied her to her loft apartment in SF’s Mission District.

And there on the outside roof deck, were some pretty amazing succulent gardens – PLANTED IN SHUTTERS!!!

Naturally, I am going to draw from this incredibly clever idea and put those twin shutters to very good use with a vertical planting of hardy succulents. It may take until next spring, but stay tuned. And if you have any suggestions on what color I should use to upgrade the crappy paint color, please chime in.

The trick, according to Baylor, is to secure a layer of landscaping cloth like a little pocket or envelope behind each shutter opening. Then you can add potting soil and plant your sedums, succulents or whatever else seems fitting. You know, I really do love that chocolate brown finish on the shutters. Doesn’t it nicely offset the silver, gray, blue and green foliage of the succulents?

Well, all in day’s work. More to come as I execute these big plans.

Dahlia 'Duo'

Last Sunday morning, while staying a few extra days in San Francisco after my Garden Conservancy talk, I took two Muni buses (47 & 5) to Golden Gate Park where all things artistic, botanical and cultural seem to reside.

My objective was to see the amazing living roof at the California Academy of Sciences, but once I realized I only had 90 minutes, my plans took a slight detour. Art and flowers beckoned.

The Conservatory of Flowers, with Dahlia Dell in the foreground

First stop was the Conservatory of Flowers, circa 1879. It is one of the last remaining Victorian-era conservatories on the West coast (the other resides in Seattle’s Volunteer Park). Before I could even approach the conservatory, my attention was diverted by a late autumn display of dahlias.

Called “Dahlia Dell” and dating to 1924, two demonstration flower beds thrive here, located to the east of the conservatory. They are maintained by volunteers from the San Francisco Dahlia Society for the simple purpose of educating local gardeners and flower lovers about the diversity of dahlia color, form, size and culture. I have a feeling that Paula Jaffe, a dahlia expert and educator who I profiled in “Dazzling Dahlias,” a 2008 Perennials magazine article, is one of the passionate individuals responsible for this joy-inducing floral display.

It was fun to play around with the “tulip” Macro button on the back of my Canon G10 camera and take pics of the fading beauties. These dahlias have withstood the combination of late-season rain, fog and sunshine and they’re still producing pretty blooms. I can’t wait to grow dahlias again, especially because they play well with flower vases. Really well. Enjoy this diverse display. Most (but not all) of the plants were labeled, thankfully.

Dahlia 'Western Spanish Dancer'

Dahlia 'The Phantom'

Dahlia 'Sir Richard'

Dahlia 'Shipley Spot'

Dahlia 'Shea's Rainbow'

Aptly named: Dahlia 'Pooh'

Dahlia 'Pink Paradise'

Dahlia 'Horse Feathers'

Dahlia 'Green D'Or' orange sport

Dahlia 'George C'

Dahlia 'Elvira' (a miniature)

Dahlia 'Delta Red'

Dahlia 'Creamy Beige'

Dahlia 'Bo De O'

Dahlia 'Belle Fiore'

Dahlia 'Badger Twinkle'

Dahlia 'Arulen Princess'

MORE TO SEE

The de Young's tower - against a blue autumn sky.

After spending an hour with the dahlias, I moseyed over to the California Academy of Sciences, but discovered that – from ground level – it is nearly impossible to see, let alone get a sense of its scale and magnificence, Renzo Piano’s green living roof.

So I compromised and spent my museum admission budget to enterthe de Young art museum where “Van Gogh, Gauguin, Cezanne and Beyond: Post-Impressionist Masterpieces from the Musee d’Orsay” was in full swing. It was exciting to see the many amazing and exciting canvasses on display. I’ve been to the Musee d’Orsay twice before when in Paris and so I enjoyed revisiting some of the paintings and drawings again. Twelve galleries of paintings were incredible to take in. You can never have too much of this artwork. The show continues through January 18, 2011.

Here's a closer look at the pointillistic-style perforated copper exterior.

After I left the galleries, I took the elevator to the viewing tower.

Actually, this was the first time I’ve been to the de Young since it was renovated and reopened in October 2005. The “new” building is clad in a perforated copper sheath, which may sound rigid but has a sensual fluidity that reacts to the light and dark.

Depending on how the sun moves through the sky, the building’s surface has dot-like patterns and a shimmery quality. The 144-foot tower is one of the most alluring aspects of the new design, by Swiss architecture firm Herzog & de Meuron and Fong & Chan Architects in San Francisco. From way up high, you can see the best of San Francisco – a 360-degree, mind-blowing perspective.

This roof is incredible - a horticultural masterpiece on top of the California Academy of Sciences in SF

A closer look of one of the roof's mounded forms

From here, I got some photographs of that green, living roof.

 I’ve already decided that on my next visit to San Francisco, I will have to see that installation up close and personal. Because while peering down on it and photographing it (through the glass-walled viewing gallery), I noticed that people were up on the roof doing just that.

Not a bad lineup for a few hours at Golden Gate Park, huh?

Ornamental cabbages and kales are all it takes to make some pretty cool fall window boxes.

Understanding “scale” is one of the most challenging of all design principles. So is finding just the right plant combo to fill a series of ginormous window boxes.

Jayson Home & Garden - a Chicago discovery for all the things I love

So imagine my delight at seeing a great example of both while visiting my college-freshman son in Chicago last month. While waiting for him to get out of class, I filled my free time touring the city’s uber-hip Lincoln Park neighborhood. That’s when I drove by Jayson Home & Garden.

A savvy retailer-friend in Seattle had told me about this must-visit shop that specializes in European-inspired home furnishings, antiques, accessories, tabletop and plants. . . so I slammed on the brakes of the rental car and took a tour – inside and out.

Jayson Home & Garden occupies a large, vintage warehouse on Clybourn Avenue. Since the building is located on a corner, there are many huge  windows that wrap both sides of it. Each window is about 4-feet wide and is adorned with an accompanying window box. You can see why any other autumn flowering favorite, such as a mum or pansy, could disappear in these deep, super-sized planter boxes.

I took this photo from across the street - see how dramatic the window boxes look with the large green-purple heads of cabbage and kale?

So here’s where the scale equation works brilliantly.

These boxes are planted with two forms of ornamental cabbage and kale. That’s it.

Packed tightly with alternating ruffled and rounded plant shapes, the design is simple and makes a big impact while filling no fewer than six of the massive boxes. I also love the way the designs anchor the tall windows and elevate something living halfway up the sides of the store’s exterior.

Check it out!

The next time you’re at the grocery store or garden center, pick up a few pots of these decorative plants.

You can experiment to see how well they add volume, scale and seasonal interest to window boxes, planters or containers.

Even the Monarchs were willing to be photographed at the flower farm.

In a glorious Iowa field, I gathered flowers for my bouquets.

One knows she’s in relationship trouble when her own mother and dear friend Susan, who was her maid-of-honor in 1984, call to say, “I haven’t heard from you for a while, so I checked your blog to see what you have been up to.”

Umm. I’ve been on the road a lot lately. Way too much on the road for my liking. Being away from home and traveling for 15 of the 30 days in the month of September was ridiculous, but (I guess) necessary. Anyway, for the first time in three years, I went for a full month without posting an entry on this blog. Yikes!

There were many blog posts composed in my mind as an idea or notion would occur to me. “I should write that down,” I thought. But then, the droning lull of the airplane engine would convince me a quick “up in the air” nap was in order. Or I didn’t have access to the Internet. Or something like a deadline for a volunteer project or even – wow – a paying project . .  or someone else’s needs that were way more pressing came along.

So here we are in October - how apropos. The new leaf is turned. I don’t have to travel again until Oct. 12th and that is a single overnight jaunt for a photo shoot in Bellingham, 100 miles to the north.

Seriously, I should be able to squeeze in some news, insights, ideas, GARDENS, cool FLOWERS, and more between now and then.

The story I want to share here is from September 14-16. After six full and intense days for the annual Garden Writers Association Symposium in Dallas, I jumped on a tiny airplane and flew to Des Moines. I met up with the team I collaborate with at Better Homes & Gardens magazine. Eric Liskey (deputy garden editor), Jane McKeon (associate garden editor) and Scott Johnson (deputy art director) and I were up to our knees in flowers.

A view across the flower fields at Howell's Farm in Iowa. Isn't this just the most perfect cloud-filled sky you've ever seen?

Globe amaranth (Gomphrena sp.)

The flowers – ingredients for a how-to story on creating bouquets from field-grown arrangements – were in all their glory at Howell’s Farm.

Based in Cumming, Iowa (in Madison County – yes, where the bridges are!), Howell’s is a sixth-generation family farm. After decades of raising corn and other agricultural crops, current owners Fred Howell and family began in 1985 to grow everlasting flowers.

Today, the farm is an 800-acre destination for people in search of the best varieties of decorative and seasonal crops. In the spring, summer and fall that means people come for the huge variety of annual and perennial flowers, herbs and grasses for cutting and drying. In the fall, they enjoy the amazing pumpkin patch and a cool corn maze. By the end of the year, in the winter, it’s the Christmas trees as main attraction.

After I landed in Des Moines, Eric and I drove out to Howell’s, about 25 miles outside of Des Moines, on a breezy, but gorgeous afternoon. Scott met us there and the three of us followed Erin Howell, Fred’s daughter, on a walk through the five-acre flower fields. As is my typical reaction whenever I visit a flower-growing operation, I was practically hyperventilating with excitement.

Celosia, plume type - what a great color!

This shows how windy it was as Eric (left) and Scott (right) held the oversized "silk" to cast a shadow for one of the bouquet vignettes.

The variety of flower form, color and vigor in Howell’s crops was dazzling. The setting itself was breathtaking. We talked through our options of ingredients, including what “design lessons” we wanted to illustrate in the story, what sizes and shapes of vases we needed to use, and how to CHOOSE among all the great flowers that seemed to say “pick me, pick me!”

Back at the editorial offices, the three of us huddled with Jane to talk about the floral design projects we wanted to assemble and photograph the following day. This was no small task. Everything has to be mapped out so we could envision how things will look on the pages of Better Homes & Gardens.

The sheets on Scott’s clip-board featured his sketches of mini-magazine pages, complete with thumbnails of vases, blooms and notes to show how a four-page flower arranging story might look. We had to think about a color palette for the vases, taking into consideration the textures and hues of each flower lesson. Then Scott raced out to pick up props from all his secret sources (including tables, stands, vases, pitchers, etc.) and Eric and I took a drive over to his personal garden. We needed a few extra plant ingredients to enhance the designs we had in mind, so Eric obligingly let me cut some lambs’ ears and goldenrod from his borders. What else? Oh! a visit to the mall to pick up a denim shirt for me to wear in the photo shoot.

BH&G staff photographer Blaine Moats wanted the perfect Monarch shot. He actually got dozens of perfect shots because the butterflies were amazingly cooperative.

Yes, there it is: Francesca's House

The next morning arrived bright and early and we met out at Howell’s around 7 a.m. Since Jane and I had designed the first two looks the afternoon before, we had a jump start for the photography. But then, the light seemed pretty good for a portrait, so Scott sent me out to cut flowers while our photographer Blaine Moats shot away.  As I walked between the rows of marigolds, zinnias, sunflowers and milkweed, filling my galvanized French flower buckets with stems, I thought: How lucky can a gal get? It was a joyous experience to just be there, to know that I was getting to create bouquets and arrangements that will be featured in the magazine sometime next summer, and to work with such talented, artistic colleagues.

We were soon distracted by a sight so compelling and awe-inspiring that we simply had to stop working. Well, except for Blaine, who just turned his lens on the scene and began to document it. A harmonic convergence of Monarch butterflies was waking up as the day began to warm. They seemed to want to pose for photos, since even I was able to capture some really sweet butterfly portraits as the winged creatures breakfasted on the nectar of hot pink ”Kiss-me-over-the-garden-gate” flowers (aka Polygonum orientale).

Milkweed with Monarchs (Asclepias sp.)

Me again - can't stay away from those blooms!

If that wasn’t thrilling enough, by the time Jane McKeon arrived in the afternoon, I had another amazing sight.

“Look over there,” Jane said, gesturing to a distant and lonely farmhouse. “Do you know that it’s Francesca’s house?” Yes, this was the actual Iowa farmhouse used by Meryl Streep’s character Francesca Johnson in the famous film “Bridges of Madison County.”

Another reason to visit Howell’s Farm is to gaze across rows of flowers and see that setting. I may have to rent the film just to see that house on the screen, and to appreciate Meryl’s Oscar-nominated performance from 1995.

There’s lots more to share but my bouquet designs are embargoed until they show up in the magazine. I can’t wait to show them off to you.

The September issue of Better Homes & Gardens features my “Debra’s Garden” column encouraging readers to add ornamental grasses to their seasonal flower arrangements.  

"Meadow in a vase" is the theme of my September column for BH&G

The photo that accompanies the piece depicts a gorgeous autumn bouquet bursting with asters, fall foliage and miscanthus blades.  

Its sultry palette includes dark purple, russet-red, gold and green elements in a clear, glass vase. As a footnote, I promised to show off my favorite grasses for cutting and flower arranging here on this blog.  

As it turns out, I’ve been seeing a lot of wonderful ornamental grasses and grass-like design ingredients lately. These days, I have dreamy plumes of fountain, feather, and silver grasses on my mind.  

There’s something both completely romantic and purely modern about grasses in floral arrangements (or in the landscape, for that matter). Here’s a peek at what’s caught my eye this year, including my favorite grasses for cutting:  

FROM THE FLOWER FARM  

Owned by Diane Szukovathy and Dennis Westphall, Jello Mold Farm is one of my favorite local flower sources here in the Pacific Northwest. Diane and Dennis use sustainable practices and recently they’ve delighted floral design customers with gorgeous late-summer grasses. You can find Jello Mold Farm at the Queen Anne Farmers’ Market every Thursday - be sure to check out the incredible selection of downy and fluid grasses.  

Here are a few show-stoppers included on Diane’s “fresh list” that she emails to customers every Monday. The four images you see here were taken by Diane: 

Jello Mold's RED JEWEL MILLET, with large, elegant, arching, red-toned seed-heads approximately 5 inches long

Jello Mold's GREEN MILLET, with 3-inch-long, fuzzy green seedheads and a wonderful texture

These awesome examples are ornamental millets, not edible ones. 

While actually cultivars of Pennisetum glaucum, you can almost convince yourself that they are relatives of the corn family if you squint. 

When cut for bouquets, the plants yield both the sweet, furry seed-heads, as well as the strapping, wide leaf blades. Both plant elements are useful in an arrangement as beautiful counterpoints to blooms. 

Like many good things, “more is better.” For example,  I like to gather several seed-heads together in a clump and inset them into the arrangement. 

It’s a pretty picture to have three to five seed-heads cascading out of a bountiful grouping of seasonal flowers and foliage.  (more…)