Announcing my new book...

A few weeks ago I had a phone date with Stephen Orr, the guy who has held all the jobs I’d love to have: Garden Editor for House & Garden magazine; Garden Editor for Domino magazine . . . and now, garden editorial director for Martha Stewart Living magazine.

He is one of the friendliest and most genuine individuals I’ve ever had the pleasure to meet in the magazine world. It was a treat for me to interview Stephen about the publication of Tomorrow’s Garden, his first book. I’ve met Stephen in person a few times, both in Los Angeles at a Garden Conservancy symposium, and in San Francisco when I spoke at Flora Grubb Nursery after Stylish Sheds and Elegant Hideaways, my own book, was published. We garden writers really do live in a small world!

Thanks to Craig Nakano, my editor at the Los Angeles Times HOME section, for agreeing to feature my Q&A with Stephen.

You can click here for the full story. And click here for a web gallery of Stephen’s photography that accompanies his book. Here is an excerpt of my interview with Stephen:

“People don’t think much about where gravel comes from as a resource,” Orr said, yet gravel gardens are becoming increasingly popular. His book features gravel landscapes from Venice and Ojai to Austin, Texas, to Nantucket, Mass. We asked him to discuss gravel as a sustainable design material:

What appeals to you about the use of gravel?

It is such a great base for many styles, from traditional to modern. There are plenty of people in Los Angeles and San Francisco who have jumped on the bandwagon wanting to make low-water gardens, but I’m happy to see it catching on in other parts of the country. The California lifestyle is so amazing, with outdoor rooms, and they can be “floored” differently. One room could be floored with grass, another with stone pavers or gravel.

Designers praise gravel gardens as permeable and an alternative to lawns. How has your view of the material changed?

I was visiting nursery owner Flora Grubb in San Francisco, and she told me she often recommends gravel to customers. And then the question “Where does it come from?” came up. Our conversation opened my eyes to begin viewing gravel as a finite resource.

Where does it come from?

As with so many environmental choices, the decisions we make trying to do the right thing are complex and often somewhat overwhelming. In many cases, gravel does indeed come from local quarries. The Austin gardens in my book used local gravel. Those gardeners like how it matches the colors of the natural geology around them. But in other areas, its origin is a big question mark. Even after a lot of research, I found I still have a lot of questions about how responsibly gravel is mined. The EPA monitors gravel production, which is a huge industry mainly for construction and highway building. In comparison, gravel for gardening use is minor, but it’s still something to be conscious of.

What questions should homeowners be asking about the gravel they buy?

I suggest you approach it like having a local consciousness of food. Don’t buy bags of gravel if you don’t know where it comes from. It may be shipped longer distances than is environmentally responsible. Try instead to source the material close to home.

What type of gravel do you recommend?

There is a difference between “crushed stone,” which has sharper edges, and “pea gravel,” which is rounded. Some people prefer walking on the rounded pea gravel, but consider the environmental impact it takes to extract it from ancient stream-beds formed by alluvial processes over millennia. Pea gravel isn’t a manufactured product. It’s not even a renewable resource. Many forward-thinking designers are switching to more jagged, crushed limestone or granite instead.

Any tips on how gravel should be installed?

One major thing I learned is that the depth of gravel is important. If it’s laid too deep, it’s like trudging through deep snow. Most of the designers I interviewed recommend you first put down a layer of “road base,” bigger pieces of crushed stone — an inch or two in length. Lay it very flat with a compactor and then place just a few inches of crushed gravel or pea gravel on top. This approach makes a very stable surface.

What are some of the interesting ways people use gravel?

I love the modern look of some of the gardens in my book. But I also really love gravel gardens with a more traditional influence where plants are encouraged to self-sow. I’m a plant nut. I come at gardening because I love plants. So to me, the space that contains the plant — the garden — is a frame to show them off. I love seeing volunteers like verbena or a spire of silver verbascum in the gravel. Or, I like to see gravel as the flooring for a spare space containing just a water feature.

Do you see gravel as the anti-lawn?

I like to see gravel and lawn used in combination. Just as a lot of us live without wall-to-wall carpet and instead have rugs with wood floors, I encourage people to think of their lawn as an area rug. Think about using it with an element of crushed rock, such as a flat area under a tree or where you need better drainage.

A spring bouquet in a Mason Jar inspires . . .

The other day, while talking with my friend Lorene (one of the most creative people I have known since we were college classmates together), I described some of the cool design ideas I’ve spotted in the past few weeks. My own enthusiasm for all this visual stimulation made me realize my “list” could be a blog post here.

After seeing these ideas in Seattle, Los Angeles and New York, my own idea-bank has been rekindled. Witnessing the talent of others doesn’t ever make me envious. No, it makes me want to up my own game and push myself further to do something wonderfully better as a writer, a gardener, a designer.

The type of inspiration I’ve seen lately has been truly exquisite. Great design is great design, whether in the garden, the home, or the restaurant. When you see it, you know it!

There may be no other response than to gaze in awe and say – WOW. But if your muse can be stirred or awakened by these ideas, by all means, use them as a starting point for your own artistic expression. I hope you enjoy where all this beauty takes you!

A TEENAGER WINS

17-year-old garden designer Courtney Goetz won a Gold Medal at the Northwest Flower & Garden Show. Her mom, designer and writer Sue Goetz, is one of her influences.

At last month’s Northwest Flower & Garden Show, one of my most favorite annual events, I was invited by Julie Chai of Sunset Magazine to help “judge” the Sunset Outdoor Living Award.

We were smitten by a small but extremely innovative garden called “Paradise (to be) Regained . . . borrowing Thoreau,” which we honored with the Sunset award.

The critera recognizes a garden that exemplifies “fresh, useful and achievable ideas.” In this instance, the designer was 17-year-old Courtney Goetz.

Courtney, the daughter of garden designer and writer Sue Goetz, grew up in the garden-making business. In 2005, when she was 11, Courtney helped mom Sue design a display garden named “A Child of the Garden Grows .  .  .  .” for this same show. Now, she has made a garden herself – and guess what? In addition to the Sunset Award, the show judges honored Courtney with a Gold Medal.

This half-circle garden floor treatment by Courtney Goetz shows how to pair salvaged metal grates with colorful groundcovers to create a "welcome mat" at the entry to a garden shelter.

As her Senior Thesis Project for Gig Harbor High School, Courtney wanted her design to be all about ”recycling, re-purposing, and ‘re-characterizing’ used materials for use in the garden,” she says. “My goal and intent for this garden is to have green ideas for everyone to instill in their lives. I want the message to get out that not everyone can buy solar panels or hybrid cars, but anyone can and will make a difference by using a little bit less and utilizing what we already have.”

One of the many wonderful – and really clever — details of Courtney’s display garden was the checkerboard ”floor” treatment, combining recycled metal grates with ground covers and rocks.

We loved this idea as a modern twist on a “welcome mat.” Courtney selected varieties of sedum and sempervivums in gold and dark green, as well as smooth rocks and the metal grates. It all adds up to a really gorgeous detail in the garden.

Look for exciting things to come from this young talent. We can’t wait to see more!

ROUGH AND SMOOTH TEXTURES

Openings between each paver makes room for a permeable detail of smoth stones.

Design detail

Another wonderful “floor” treatment appeared in a garden called “Wrinkle in Time,” designed by Karen Stefonick of Karen Stefonick Design. Her garden won the Best in Show Award, also called the “Founder’s Cup.”

Since I was able to tour it up close during the judging, I realized how truly creative Karen is when it comes to working with landscaping materials. She devised a patio using two simple ingredients: Concrete Pavers and Tumbled Stone.

Look closely at this pattern created by the slightly offset 1-by-2 foot concrete pavers. By staggering their placement and filling a 2-inch gap at either end of each paver with small rocks, Karen has accomplished two things.

First, she uses the texture of stone to contrast with the smooth concrete, which results in an attractive pattern. Second, this treatment turns a patio into a permeable surface for collecting rainwater into the ground rather than allowing it to stream down to the curb and disappear. Very cool!

BIRTHDAY BOUQUET

What a gorgeous grouping of flowers and vases!

During all the Flower Show activity, including giving three talks in two days, I almost forgot to celebrate my birthday. But thankfully, my friends and family didn’t forget.

Flower detail

One of the best surprises was the delivery of flowers from a local West Seattle shop called Fleurt Studio.

The gift-giver was my sister-in-law Sandra B. Henriquez. Her touching gesture of sending flowers was made more amazing because instead of resorting to the generic, 1-800 route, Sandi did her homework to find a local flower shop that offers unique, one-of-a-kind gift bouquets. She called (long-distance from Washington, DC) and spoke with Samantha, the owner, and discussed exactly what would be included in the delivery.

And here’s what arrived: A “floralscape,” an eclectic grouping of five differently-sized vases holding mostly purple and plum ingredients. I loved the whimsical inclusion of two canning jars, a bud vase, a vintage bottle and a miniature glass cup. Together, they created a floral display that no single bunch could equal. Magical, huh?

LOS ANGELES VIBE

Stunning!

After February’s Flower Show madness, March welcomed a trip to Los Angeles, my former home town. Living there for the past four years was an amazing adventure, especially when it comes to learning about design with new eyes. The city, and in fact all of Southern California, was for me a big design graduate school – with lessons in architecture, industrial design, sculpture and history.

While living in LA, I spent a lot of time scouting homes and gardens for the Los Angeles Times HOME section, as well as visiting retail sources for plants, furniture, gardening accents and more.

Rolling Greens Nursery in Hollywood is one of my favorite haunts. It was the site of our Garden Design magazine Hollywood Issue party last April – one of those exciting moments when I said to myself: I can’t believe I’m living here and doing this type of work I love!

Teabags, thousands of them!

When I returned to LA last week to work on a photo shoot for Better Homes & Gardens, I took our art director Scott Johnson to visit Rolling Greens. I wanted him to see several of the area’s cool nurseries. We stocked up on some plants for the next day’s shoot, and poked around buying ourselves tiny agaves to bring home to our colder climes (Seattle for me; Des Moines, Iowa, for Scott – yes, I know. It’s really futile, but we try).

But the wow-factor occurred when I walked into the large space where cookbooks and culinary/gourmet products are typically sold. There along the far wall hung a new installation that I can only describe as a Tea Bag Curtain. One of the staffers told me that the artful treatment had just been hung by Rolling Greens creative director Angela Hicks and her crew.

Hundreds (maybe thousands!) of hand-dyed tea bags, attached to long strings create a beautiful semitransparent cascade, suspended from rods attached at the ceiling. I can only imagine how much time and care was taken to create this rosy-melon masterpiece.

Organic and delicate, this “curtain” is so charming. I am eager to figure out how to replicate it somehow. Simple ingredients paired with masterful execution . . . it adds up to something truly remarkable. This Tea Bag Curtain isn’t “selling product,” but who cares? It goes miles at saying to Rolling Greens customers: we care about design and we’re a place where you can be inspired.

ON TO NEW YORK CITY

Anthropologie's lavish zipper gown - look close and see how it was made with straight pins!

Here's how the crushed paper skirt emerges from the tight, pastel-colored bodice....

Only days after spending 48 hours in Los Angeles, I flew to New York City. I’ve previously written about visiting the awesome High Line Park, but here’s another visual treat, shown purely for its beauty and innovation.

I turned the corner on my way to the Chelsea Market, a huge warehouse-turned-hipster food mall, and there on the corner was a gorgeous Anthropologie window display.

Some super-creative designer turned a dressmaker’s form, yards of zippers, straight pins and crushed butcher paper into a fanciful ball gown. The way the separated zippers form the bodice so the gold and silver metallic zipper teeth sparkle in the light . . . dazzling. But at the top of each zipper, the “end” has been spiraled into a little rosette.

Just take a look and feast your eyes on the charming way a few simple ingredients become Cinderella’s new gown!

Now, go out and do something uninhibited and artistic today. I dare you! I’m going to try it myself.

A galvanized flower bucket is paired with plum-purple tulips and shimmery pink glass as a soil topper

A year ago this month, I met my photographer friend Jack Coyier and his assistant Stuart Gow at a great location perched above the ocean in Malibu. My car was filled with flats of flowering bulbs – tulips, hyacinths, daffodils, grape muscari blooms – and an assortment of perennials and annuals as their companions. Oh, and lots of pots.

Color-coded pots, selected to match or coordinate with the blooms of spring bulbs purchased in 4-inch pots and nursery flats. It was a bulb garden in a Volvo station wagon!

March 2011 Better Homes & Gardens

We photographed a feature that I created for Better Homes & Gardens, which you can find in this month’s issue.

Called “Matched Sets,” the story gives hope and design inspiration to anyone who forgot to plant bulbs last fall.

It’s not too late to buy beautiful flowering bulbs, just peeking out of their buds. In Seattle at least, we have a variety of narcissus and daffodils, grape hyacinth, a gazillion tulip choices and at least three colors (pink, white and dark purple) hyacinth.

For a few bucks, you can plant these in a container, plunk it on your front porch or patio, and look like a genius who really did think about bulb-planting last October.

When you match the pot color to the bloom color, the design packs a punch. In some examples you see here, I tweaked the rules; in others, I didn’t deviate from the palette’s theme. It was fun working with Stuart and Jack, and seeing this story in print brings back some great memories of our day together on location in Malibu.

Two of the designs we shot didn’t make it to the pages of BH&G, so I’ve included them here. The first is above right. Below is a detail shot of how perfectly the glass marbles look as a color-matched soil topper, followed by a close-up of the not-used hyacinth design:

An affordable and reusable way to add color to any pot design.

The hyacinths didn't behave well that day, but I do love the checkerboard accent of white alyssum with dark purple ajuga at the base of each container.

My absolutely favorite design: Oval-shaped blue-glazed pot, with blue=green echeverias and sweet blue grape hyacinth (muscari) bulbs.

Simple tips to get started:

1. Select bulbs with blooms that match your container’s color
2. Add cool-season annuals, grasses, succulents, or perennials that match or complement the palette
3. Plant bulbs first, then pack other plants around them so the bulbs seem to be emerging through the plants at the base.
4. Remember the basics: Use potting mix and a container that has proper drainage.
5. Water regularly.

Sources: Blue pot (Sperling Nursery & Gift Shop, Woodland Hills, CA), square wood containers (Rolling Greens Nursery, Los Angeles), galvanized flower pot (Michael’s Craft Stores).

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

This just in: the tally of the Los Angeles Times’ HOME section’s most highly viewed stories and galleries of the year. And – wow – 4 of the top 12 are stories that I was fortunate to discover and write for the newspaper.

Here they are – enjoy the inspiration:

Lara and David's Hollywood Regency Living Room - a delicious palette with a retro art, lamps and furnishings.

1. In Beverly Hills, a Hollywood Regency re-do created by TV personality Lara Spencer and her husband David Haffenreffer.

The Daily House in Glendale - an iconic Midcentury house.

2. The historic midcentury Daily House in Glendale, lovingly revived by attorney Chris Burusco.

The exterior of Paul and Cicek Bricault's master suite is planted with succulents - a "green" addition in Venice.

3. The growing green Venice house owned by Paul and Cicek Bricault, complete with succulent walls on the exterior of their master bedroom addition. PS, this story also logged in as one of the paper’s most-read Home & Garden pieces of 2010.

The Chartreuse House - in Venice - a bungalow-turned-modern home.

4. The charming, modern Chartreuse House, also in Venice, designed by Lisa Little of LayerLA and Victoria Yust/Ian McIlvaine of Tierra Sol y Mar. Gardens by Stephanie Bartron of SB Garden Design.

Even though I have relocated to Seattle, I continue to report on home design, interiors and architecture for the Los Angeles Times. I’m looking forward to 2011 – can’t wait to discover the great design the New Year brings.

Meet Mark (aka "Marco") Henry ~ in his garden

On Friday, I enjoyed a rare luxury – a return to a favorite garden I’ve written about twice in the past decade: 

I hopped in the car and drove to Snohomish, Wash., where I lunched with two long-time friends from my days working for The Herald, the daily newspaper in Everett, Wash. (it’s a mid-sized city located about 30 miles north of Seattle). 

Here is a beautiful planter; once dreary gray concrete, it has been warmed up with a coating of terra cotta-colored Latex paint.

In the process, I learned something new about how to save drab, lifeless cast-stone (concrete) containers and garden ornamentation.

Read on for the simple steps: 

Marco Henry, a gifted artist, garden and interior designer and Venetian expert, hosted a little luncheon at his amazing home. We were joined by our mutual friend Darlene Huntington, one of my very first “sources” when I joined The Herald’s Home & Garden section in 2000.

Over the years, I have had the privilege of writing about both of these incredibly talented gardeners and their verdant, plant-filled environments. The two introduced me to other Snohomish County plant fanatics, owners of vintage homes, collectors of antiques and garden-makers. I have been so enriched as a writer and gardener from that 4-1/2-year episode of my life. 

After lunch we, of course, ventured out to Marco’s garden. Yes, it’s winter here in the Pacific Northwest, but when you have structural plants (such as Italian cypresses and ball-shaped boxwood shrubs), there’s lots to appreciate. When you see these elements, you understand what people mean when they say to design the “bones” of the garden for year-round interest.

A simple coat of Terra Cotta pigment, from a can of Latex paint, transformed an old concrete pedestal and finial into a work of art.

I first wrote about Marco and his garden when it was included on the Northwest Perennial Alliance’s “Open Garden” tour  in 2000. Darlene marched me over to Mark’s home for an introduction. When I entered the Gothic-inspired wood gate, mounted into a niche in the beautifully-groomed hedgerow, I gasped and gazed in awe at what I saw inside: plant collections, art collections, vintage furniture, water features, sculpture and more – all surrounding a circa 1912 farmhouse and yard, complete with chicken coop and green house. 

This garden has the power to transport its viewer to a horticultural world we all yearn to possess. Is it a formal Italian garden? Or a cottage-style English estate? Maybe it’s a a landscape in the South of France. Each of these influences has a voice in Marco’s garden.

A teacher early in his career, Marco can be credited with giving a generation of fortunate kindergardeners an appreciation for art, color and beauty. Now, the grown-ups in his world can learn from his garden design techniques and his unique aesthetic.

My June 2000 article was called “Secret Garden.” I just unearthed that article and re-read it, savoring some of Marco’s choice quotes: 

“I’m a plant collector, a collector period. Some people put all of their collection together in one place. I don’t. I like to make something artistic out of it. 

“If I buy one of something I like, it’s the beginning of a collection. I could be Chinese porcelain or it could be coleus.” 

My eyes were drawn to the Green Man plaque, all the more noticeable now that he's been coated in Terra Cotta paint

Looks like original Terra Cotta, doesn't he?

In 2006, I was asked by Cottage Living magazine to again write about Marco’s garden. We had fun with that story, which was photographed by Richard Warren. I loved sharing Marco’s gardening style with a national readership, especially his tips on growing and designing with hydrangeas. 

Marco is passionate about Venice, a city he first visited in 1968 as a young man.  In a post-card written to his parents that year, he said he could imagine living in Venice. Now that dream is practically true, since Marco travels to Venice at least twice annually. He has guided many tours there for fans of Venetian architecture, art and gardens, and he lectures on the lessons we can learn from the gardens of Venice. 

Today’s lesson was all about Terra Cotta and the way it can warm up a garden, especially ones here in the Pacific Northwest that exist under a grayish cloud cover all winter long. Marco showed me several ornamental pieces that began their lives as uninteresting blobs of concrete. Concrete, he says, often recedes and is visually obscured by the greenery around it. Now he’s infused these pieces with the sun-drenched character of Italy. It’s a simple process and one I’m eager to try myself:

The little Terra Cotta "shelf" was transformed from gray cast-stone concrete to rich Terra Cotta - with Latex paint!

1. Find a piece of broken Terra Cotta pottery or a flowerpot with the perfect red-pink shade you love.

2. Take it to the paint store and ask the guys to mix up a can of paint that matches your sample. Be sure to order exterior Latex (water base) paint.

3. Fill a plastic bucket with some of the paint and drizzle in a bit of water to dilute it to a consistency that’s easy to work with. It can be more like a glaze or a stain in thickness.

4. Start painting any old piece of ordinary garden concrete. You may wish to coat the concrete with one, two, or three coats. The water-base pigment will “take” to the concrete differently, depending on how porous it is. Marco says the Terra Cotta-colored paint definitely “soaks” into the pores of the concrete.

5. Finally, you will enjoy what looks like perfectly-cast Terra Cotta. It weathers nicely and may soon take on a patina of age, moss, or lichen.

You’ll be pleased with the resulting appearance of your efforts. Old concrete gets a Mediterranean-style upgrade – to classic Terra Cotta. How easy is that? Thank you, Marco - great tip!

POST-Script: Thanks to Jim Bishop of San Diego-based Bishop Garden Design, who originally saw this post on my Facebook page, I want to share his cool ideas for painting concrete:

If you want to give (terra cotta) an immediate aged look, get a second can of (paint) in a darker version of the first color.

Water this down too or add a glazing agent and paint lightly over the object especially in the recesses. Rub off the excess until you get the aged look you want. Oil based gel stains work well too for creating an aged look and give you a longer working time.

Get out that paint, people! Have some fun!

Okay, I know that there is still one more week left in the month of November, but we had a big Seattle snowstorm today and so visions of sugarplums are dancing in my head.

One other reason I’m dreaming about my holiday decor is the just-arrived December issue of Better Homes & Gardens. It hit newsstands with a really gorgeous wreath on the cover and all sorts of design, entertaining and gift-giving ideas filling 275 beautiful pages.

A medium-sized glass "world" to gaze upon in wonder.

I was asked to pick my favorite garden gift for the holidays and you can read about it on page 153. Or you can see it here: An alluring “Forest Floor” ornament created by San Francisco designer Flora Grubb. It is a winner! Thanks to Flora for suggesting we feature one of her custom ornaments and for sharing the photograph you see here.

Living Ornaments:

It’s fun to use living elements and wild-gathered souvenirs from nature in your holiday decorating. I love this “Forest Floor” glass ornament created by San Francisco designer Flora Grubb. Lichens, moss, feathers and seeds cushion a living Tillandsia air plant inside a tiny glass ball – an enchanting, diminutive naturescape to hang from branch or bough.

An occasional spritz of water is all this tiny terrarium needs to continue looking beautiful – even after you take down the tree. Available from www.floragrubb.com; 3-inch, $19.95; 4-inch, $24.95; set of three 2-inch balls, $19.95.

Cool, huh?

Some good news for the print world:

For those of you who subscribe to the New York Times, you can’t have missed a full-page advertisement on the back of today’s Business section. It’s so huge that I couldn’t scan the entire contents of the colorful spread on my tiny printer. But here’s the gist of it:

Better Homes & Gardens, along with Meredith Corp. sister title Family Circle, are the magazine world’s #1 and #2 top books for women consumers, in terms of total advertising pages sold.

Under the leadership of editor-in-chief Gayle Goodson Butler and SVP, Group Publisher James T. Carr, Better Homes & Gardens has earned the support of 1,739 advertising pages this year. 

Just when everyone thinks magazines are a dying breed, here’s a report that “these magazines have held the top two positions in the women’s lifestyle category for 2010 and 2009.”

Just sayin’.

You can't miss the Chartreuse House, seen through the similarly-colored plant palette.

Today’s Los Angeles Times’ HOME section features my architecture/interiors story about Lisa Little and Phil Brennan’s makeover of a pair of tiny cottages in Venice, Calif.

The Venice-based architect and her special effects wizard husband painted the exterior an acid-chartreuse color and trimmed the house in charcoal gray.

Click on over to the story and you’ll see a fabulous web gallery of images shot by photographer Katie Falkenberg.

I also included a sidebar on Stephanie Bartron’s amazing work in the postage stamp-sized front yard, which faces a Venice walk street, which appears in LA at Home, the Home section’s daily design blog.

But you really can’t see much of the garden in the Times’ web gallery.

I promise you – it’s something to behold, featuring a dazzling palette of plants that enliven the small entry garden and play beautifully with the rugged materials Stephanie selected.

So I will share those photos here, along with the sidebar text:

A Chartreuse garden

As a color-packed accent to the renovated 1905 Craftsman bungalow, the Chartreuse House’s front yard is a example of how much great design can occur in a tiny patch of soil.

Yet before choosing a zesty palette of drought- and salt-tolerant plantings, designer Stephanie Bartron, of SB Garden Design, had to address some of the less visible challenges of the property’s postage stamp-sized entry. Prior owners had piled layers of topsoil over the sandy native soil, which created a drainage mess.

A wave-like pattern gives lots more interest to the raised bed.

“I needed to lower the grade of the front yard in order to move water away from the house,” Bartron says. “We calculated the volume of soil to excavate and used that amount to fill two raised planters. That way we didn’t have to haul away any material.”

Divided by a permeable walkway of concrete tile, the raised planters are formed by boxes of thick steel plate that have been roughly finished to encourage rusting. Now weathered, the boxed-beds replicate the Cor-Ten steel used to make the vertical planter in Little and Brennan’s courtyard.

The same weathered steel forms a slender raised planter at the base of the charcoal fence facing the walk-street. It is filled with a ribbon of golden oregano and Sedum rupestre ‘Angelina’ — which dazzle against the darker fencing.

The chartreuse scheme continues outside the gray composite fence.

Bartron asked the metal fabricator cut a “wave” detail along the top of the larger planting box and in it she installed a sedge meadow, a nod to the nearby beach.  Privacy screening comes from a “hedge” of weeping Mexican bamboo and alternating chartreuse and yellow-flowering kangaroo paws.

“The plants create a punch of color in  such a small space,” Bartron says. The lacy bamboo fronds, the tall kangaroo paw stalks and the undulating drifts of sedge are constantly moving, thanks to the ocean breezes. Little added a eucalyptus tree to the front area, situated so that it will eventually grow high enough to screen the house’s topmost windows.

Such a simple yet sophisticated combination of plants in the smaller of two raised beds.

For the smaller of the two planter boxes, Barton paired dramatic clumps of smooth agave (Agave attenuata), known for growing well near the ocean, with Mexican feather grasses, dark purple Aeonium arboreum ‘Zwartkop’ and yellow-and-green variegated New Zealand flaxes. The entire bed is under-planted with the chartreuse Sedum rupestre ‘Angelina’. Filled with detail, it is a diminutive landscape that causes visitors to slow down and experience while approaching the front door.

The garden has many sustainable features, including low-maintenance plantings and permeable surfaces. Yet, says Bartron, its main design motivation is a response to the architecture. “This is such an artsy, whimsical place and I see the garden as a colorful jewel box for Lisa and Paul to enjoy.”

–Debra Prinzing

I’ll close with just a few more photos:

The larger of the two raised beds is planted mostly with Carex, to emulate the waves of the nearby Pacific Ocean.

This view shows how the Mexican bamboo and the kangaroo paws provide ample screening from the walk street traffic.

Playful and suitable for the setting, the lemon yellow kangaroo paw sways in the breezes.

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.

October is well underway, and here is my little “Know-How” piece from the October 2010 issue of Better Homes & Gardens.

It was inspired, in part, by my past visits to my friend Kathy’s garden. She uses outdoor candles incredibly well.

I have always loved the look of luminarias, the traditional candle-lit lanterns that illuminate walkways and paths for Southwest-style holiday celebrations. Modern re-interpretations use paper bags or Mason jars weighted down with a layer of sand in the base holding votive candles inside.

For a fresh twist that takes the luminaria idea and improves upon it, look for 7-Day Candles, also called altar candles. I first saw the brilliant display of these Mexican chapel candles in Kathy’s Southern California garden. Of course, it’s easy to dine and entertain out-of-doors here all year long. But even if you reside in cooler parts of the country, you can still borrow her idea!

White, red, blue or green wax is poured into an 8-inch-tall cylindrical glass container. “You can burn them 15 hours a day for a week,” Kathy says. “Imagine, 110 hours of candlelight for about one dollar!”

You can often find them at Mexican grocery stores or 99-cent/Dollar Stores. I found several styles on the shelf of my local Safeway grocery store – in the Mexican food aisle. And yes, they cost 99-cents!

A cluster of 7-Day candles looks brilliant inside a traditional hurricaine lantern.

Here are some of the tall, slender, long-burning candles nestled in a base of dried lentil beans. Perfect for autumn decor!

Kathy began decorating with these clean-and-simple altar candles after too many dinner parties where one-inch votives burned out before the evening was over. She lined her outdoor fireplace mantle with a row of the 7-Day candles, which glowed and sparkled during her al fresco dinners.

Kathy also groups three or four candles inside a large, glass vase for impact. A few inches of dry black beans or orange lentils in the base serve as a stabilizer. Try a variation of your own and you’ll enjoy hours of romantic flickering candlelight.

As for displaying 7-Day candles outdoors, such as on a porch, patio or front walkway, don’t worry that they’ll blow out.

Kathy calls the glass cylinders “little hurricane lamps.”

Here are some additional “illuminating” ideas for your after-dark garden enjoyment:

• Burn a flame:  also adds warmth after dusk. At the Independent Garden Center Show in August, I was amazed at the number of vendors who are introducing these ceramic bowls, lanterns or pots that contain a small metal insert that burns a “gel fuel.” In one catalog, from Napa Home & Garden (see lantern here), the liquid fuel is described as being manufactured from recycled, post-consumer waste – a recycled and sustainable product. The decorative ceramic container burns a long-lasting flame. In the garden, you can illuminate the edges of a pathway or group several lanterns together on a tabletop for after-dark enjoyment.
• String up lights: Create a twinkling overhead canopy with strings of carnival lighting, holiday strands or small lantern lights. When suspended from an arbor or tree branches, the tiny lights lend a flickering, romantic accent – and just enough light for sitting outdoors with a hot drink.

ILLUMINATION UPDATE: My friend Kathy Purdy, at Cold Climate Gardening, just suggested that I check out solar fireflies: ”Personally, I can’t see using these if you have the real McCoy, but I’ve learned that not all areas of the country do,” she writes. Kathy, you’re right. West coast gardeners are not as fortunate as you East coast gardeners. I haven’t seen a real firefly since July 2000, when my family visited friends in Washington, D.C. and we lay on our backs (on their front lawn) late at night – watching the magic!