I'll Give Myself a C+

Did you ever find something in a long-forgotten box that zaps you back in time? My trigger was an old landscape plan I ran across last week, from my early school days. Like the goat herder at the Qumran Caves, I knew I held a piece of history in my hands. Gingerly, and with reverence, I liberated the scroll from a crusty, desiccated rubber band, carefully unfurling it.

The title block said 1975, so imagine my relief as I scanned this barely familiar drawing and did not wince.

In the early 70s, I wasn't sure what I would do with an ornamental horticulture education, but the music industry's flake factor had claimed another victim, and I realized I'd better find something new to do. I thought about my hobbies and passions.

I had become enchanted by the exquisite art of bonsai (gateway drug to Japanese gardens and culture), fascinated by the way nature's forces and raw beauty could be captured and stylized at a human scale. My crush on chlorophyll didn't stop there. Like a Days of Our Lives junkie, I found myself deeply and emotionally invested in the turbulent lives of my 50 houseplants.

Off to school I skipped, and after two years of study, earned my associate's degree from Pierce College in LA, memorizing hundreds of multisyllabic botanical names and deciphering the mysterious sand-silt-clay triangle. I learned how to flocculate, which has nothing to do with bodily functions or puberty.

Click over to Edhat.com for the rest of the story... http://www.edhat.com/site/tidbit.cfm?nid=60594

Lessons From Legendary Flora Grubb Gardens

Apologies for being a year late with this post. Good intentions and all that, but I'm here to redeem myself.

Last year, while attending the San Francisco Flower and Garden Show, a Bay Area friend lured me to Flora Grubb Gardens. "You HAVE to go. You'll go nuts!" she'd breathlessly implored me for years.

On my 2010 trip, Mara and I hooked up at Flora's. The place just knocked me out (which might explain why I spaced for a year and didn't blog a word about my visit).

It's about time I paid homage to The Divine Ms. Grubb and her matchless approach to horticulture, gardens, and the educational value of inspiring displays.



More luscious pictures and useful design lessons at my Fine Gardening blog...

Sunset Magazine Likes My Clients' Parkway!

I was curious when I checked my e-mail in-box last month and saw a message from Sharon Cohoon, senior garden writer for Sunset Magazine and their Fresh Dirt blog.

Hi, Billy. I’m coming up to Santa Barbara the weekend of March 11-12. Mostly to evaluate a hotel for a travel story. Tough assignment, huh? But I was wondering if you had a favorite garden or two you’d want to show off either day? If so, give me a call.

Guess how long it took me to pick up the phone and call Sharon back? A few weeks later I was picking Sharon up at her posh downtown hotel and ferrying her around to some of my favorite designs. When we got to the home of Nicole and Bill, Sharon was nearly breathless upon seeing this parkway erupting with brilliant, twisty, pink flowers floating over dark green foliage -- Grevillea lanigera 'Coastal Gem'.

"This is definitely blogworthy," she said as we drove away. She wasn't kidding. Read her blog post at Fresh Dirt.

Really Fine On-Line Garden Design

I'm not sure I should be sharing this with you. Besides writing, I earn some my income designing residential gardens. And here I am, about to hand you a great, free tool for doing it yourself. But I'm also a teacher and a generous kinda guy, so what the hell?

The local water agencies have shelled out some pretty serious coin to fund a goodie-filled website with lots of water conservation ideas. Follow their advice and you'll save money while helping preserve the planet's most essential natural resource - clean drinking water. You've read my rants ripping folks who let water run down the gutter, or squander it washing sidewalks. (If you want your concrete clean enough to eat off of, toss it in the dishwasher.)

Smart water use in the garden has two key components: Wise water management is important, but putting the right plant in the right placeis where sustainable landscaping begins. Growing conditions can vary widely on a small residential lot: The same plant that thrives in cool morning sun on the east side of your place turns into oven-roasted ‘tater skins when subjected to the summer scorch of afternoon sun. A mounded bed in one part of your yard might provide ideal drainage for natives, while clay deposits in the parkway usually mean the same plant's kiss of death.

With thousands of plants to choose from, how do you decide what to plant? I've got nothing against everyone's go-to garden encyclopedia, the Sunset Western Garden Book (actually, I do… check the link at the end of this article), but what if you could take an on-line tour of LOCAL gardens, click on plants that turn you on, then read everything you'd ever want to know about how to use each one flawlessly, and print out a shopping list?

Then step right up, ladies and gents, for the rip-roaringest, easy-peasy, life-changing garden design website in the whole world. (I'm holding off on giving you the link, cowgirls and stud-muffins, so hold your horses and don't scroll down just yet.)

Get the rest of the scoop at Edhat.com

Foliage Foundations and Gnasty Gnomes (the Gs are silent)

[Author's note: I'm making this first part up.]

Imagine this late night scene: You've finished flossing, folded down the quilt, fluffed the pillows, flipped open F is for Fugitive, felt it fall flat on your face, and flipped off the fluorescent.

That's their signal. I'm not condoning their behavior, mind you, but as you sail off to The Land of Nod, your garden gnomes begin their nightly escapades. Imagine a job like theirs -- standing immobile while the summer sun bakes off your paint, or winter winds whip you with sleet. And what's with the sprinkler bidet?

So when late night falls and their shift ends, the gnomes need to blow off some steam. Off to the all-night pub, they belly up to the brass foot rail and get down to serious business.

The night isn't over yet. Stumbling home, their little concrete eyes gleaming, the merry pranksters repeat their pre-dawn ritual: Picking off all the flower buds waiting to open, so the garden never blooms.

The moral of this story: Design your garden as though these mischievous, misanthropic (or is that mis-flor-opic?), buggers live in your garden. Don't use flowers as the sole visual interest in your garden. Instead, concentrate on creating year-round interest by exploiting your plants' shapes, density, leaf patterns, and foliage colors, so your garden looks great, flowers or not.

Allow me to share one of the most elegantly sophisticated little corners of landscaping I've ever seen. What knocks me out so much is the use of two key visual design principles - harmony (elements with similarities) and contrast (elements with differences). This vignette sits a few blocks from my house, adorning the Sansum Diabetes Research Center in Santa Barbara.

More photos and astute analysis at Fine Gardening

I Love Susan Harris at Garden Rant

One good turn deserves another and that one deserves another one. Susan Harris, that super-nova ball of energy, knowledge and dry wit, was kind enough to invite my wife, Lin, and me to her home just north of D.C. last September, where I was delighted to offer some fresh design ideas for Susan's sloping, narrow, forest-surrounded backyard garden.

I guess I could have been polite and said, "It's nice," but, hell, why lie to a friend?

So I paced out and pantomimed plant massings that I thought would better serve her. A few weeks later, she e-mailed me a rough sketch of the yard I'd seen. Out came my trusty colored pens, and here's what came of it. I don't know the specific plants that will thrive in Takoma, Maryland, but I do know where she needed big background shrubs, where the border between her alternative lawn and ground covers should be, and the best place to pop things with a strong focal point.


Today at GardenRant.com, Susan does a little show and tell.

Read on...

Planting Design Lessons from Raleigh NC - Fine Gardening

Blessing or curse, I find it difficult to look at a garden without immediately activating the design teacher in my brain. I imagine it's no different for a film critic trying to watch their brother-in-law's home videos.

Tune in and see me apologize to a cactus on my hands and knees. Really!

Planting Design Lesson from Raleigh, North Carolina

Win a copy of Designer Plant Combinations! - Fine Gardening

What a fun read this was! Scott Calhoun's book is now the first thing I reach for when I need a bit of inspiration on a planted design job. You gotta have this book!

You can win your own copy by visiting my blog at Fine Gardening Magazine and leaving a comment. Do it NOW!

Win a copy of Scott's book. Click over to my Cool Green Gardens blog.



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Five Plants I Hate...

For a quick, silly read, check my bi-weekly on-line column at Santa Barbara's very own news and events website...Edhat.com.

What are YOUR bottom five?

It's the Genetics, Stupid!

I’m not a geneticist. I don’t even play one on TV. I did pass my high school biology class (C-minus counts) and retained a pretty impressive archive of knowledge on the subject. As I recall, years before the dinosaurs arrived, ferocious Nucleotides stalked the primeval forests, warred with and eventually wiped out the friendly, but passive Peptides and became the dominant life form on the planet. One thing led to another and pretty soon, humans started buying plants at nurseries, paying no attention to the label in the container. That’s when the inexorable slip into stupid gardens started.

Sorry, didn’t mean to flaunt my expertise, but there’s a lesson lurking somewhere in this muck. Let me don my hip waders and see if I can pull out something worthwhile. Back to genetics…

Giving credit where credit is due, my TV partner, Owen Dell, reminds us that every plant has its “genetic destiny” (hereinafter abbreviated at GD) . Think about it…contained in the seed of a spreading chestnut tree are instructions to grow a certain way – height, width, branch structure, leaf shape, (ask the kids to leave the room – ready?) reproductive structures, you get the idea. So if we ignore the GD of the loverly Castanea dentata, plant it in a window box and try to talk it into behaving like a Petunia… Well, you get the point.

Thesis statement – “Ignore a plant’s genetic destiny and you will be a sorely disappointed, hard working gardener.”

I’m a label reader. I was an avid reader of cereal box labels when I was a kid. Mayhap it was because the sight of my dad eating soft-boiled eggs made me want to wretch, so I’d build a wall adorned with the Trix rabbit, or Cocoa-Puffs toucan. Anyway, when I go to a nursery and pick up a plant I’m not familiar with, I read the label. Of course the skeptic in me cross-checks with other references, but hey, it’s a start. I want to know how tall and wide the plants gets, what kind of cultural conditions it needs, whether it snores. I want to be an informed consumer.

So how do you explain the following images without assuming that either a) the label was written in Arabic; b) the person read the label but thought they could sweet talk the plants into growing contrary to its GD; C) they looked forward to endless weekends of pruning, resulting in a hideous green box flanked with dead brown branches; or D) they ignored the label?














These delightful specimens are both in the genus Juniper – hearty evergreens (conifers) that will grow just about anywhere. The lower, mounding one is genetically programmed to achieve a height of 18 inches and a spread of about 8 feet across. “Cool, I think I’ll plant it a foot from my driveway and three feet from the next juniper! I’m sure if I talk to it nicely, it will behave as I instruct it. Maybe enroll it in plant obedience school.”














Dude – the bed is three freakin feet wide! Do you think there might be, oh, I don’t know, a few hundred attractive plants out there that will thrive in your climate with little or no care, look drop-dead-gorgeous, and grow to be a couple of feet tall and three feet wide?
















Better yet, here’s its big cousin, Juniperus chinensis ‘Torulosa’ (Hollywood Twisted Juniper).














My book says, “15 feet tall by at least 8 feet wide. Attractive, twisted form; give plenty of room.”

“Sounds like a great plant. I have a two-foot wide bed under the eaves, next to a narrow walkway. Let’s take it home!”

Continuing my rant: Just as we have societal rules about what constitutes public decency, can’t we make some effort to end horticultural blight? Can I be deputized to arrest the perpetrators and initiate the gardening equivalent of the Darwin Awards? Can't these people be put out of my misery? It's ugly, it's wasteful, it hurts the plants.

So do us all a favor. Read the label, ask a knowledgeable nursery employee (yes, there are many) for more information about the plant. Realize that short of taking night school classes in genetic engineering and messing with the DNA, the plant’s gonna do what the plant’s gonna do. Life would be SOOOOOOOOOOO much better for all of us if you’d pay attention to the genetic forces that are completely in command.

Gotta take some Tylenol. Later, skaters.

Passion in the Beds - Unleash the Red!

Need another dose of color theory as planting season progresses? How about playing around with RED! Hot, energetic, bloody, angry, sinful, passionate RED! Like a piece of raw meat thrown into the garden, I watch the energy amp up.

Many of my students and clients get a little nervous when I bring up this touchy subject.

“I don’t like red. It’s too intense. I read somewhere that it could make my kids disobedient,” says the timid gardener.

“Huh? What have you been reading in the check-out line? Really, it’s good for you. It warms things up and creates a little emotionally punch,” says the daring designer.

“What if it scares my neighbors?” she asked, plaintively.

“Okay, let’s compromise. We’ll start with a splotch of red, but we’ll bring in some tints and shades to downplay it a bit.

“Tints and shades!?! Why didn’t you say so. Boogie down witcha bad ole red!,” shouts my now-emboldened client!

Red: Add white and it’s “Hello Kitty” time. Pink, like little girls’ jammies and Easter hats. How can THAT do any harm? How about we darken it with a bit of black and take the palette toward burgundy? Seems logical – Burgundy, France, is known for its wine, wine is served at garden parties, garden parties are fun, so let’s have some fun.

Now we’ve got an array of the primary hue, the tint and the shade. Let’s see how it looks when we throw ‘em together.



The maroon bougainvillea in the back is visible from a block away. Framed in the foreground by two spectacular, intertwined varieties of roses (one is variegated from maroon through light pink and white) and the combination is a study in variations on red.



Just around the block from the bougie/rose composition is a great little object lesson repeated with Pelargoniums. The fading red turns to maroon, with a gradation from red through pink.



The Chinese Saucer Magnolia takes care of itself, gently blending from maroon through pink on the same petal. Makes my job easy.



And this Lantana camara 'Christine' takes us through ranges of pink with a touch of lemon thrown in.

If, for some reason, you want to mix it up a bit more, but still want that connecting thread that makes these colors so easy to work with, how about stepping over one notch on the color wheel to orange? Add the tint to the palette and you’ve got apricot; add the shade and you have rust. Warmth and diversity without too much heat.



A red pelargonium acts as the anchor that moves the composition from red to orange, then off to lighter tints.



It doesn't take much more than a mixed seed packet of nasturtiums to bring a bed to life. Warm colors and their close relatives.



Hat's off to lantana again for taking care of the blend all in one plant. Use this shrub as the foundation of a warm color scheme and we can venture out into yellows and back to reds effortlessly.

Gotta go. Hope this fills in some gaps for readers.

[Red grid public domain image from Wikipedia]

A book for every Santa Barbara Gardener

Well, not just Santa Barbara. Let's make that California, because that's the name of the book - California Gardener's Guide (Volume II). But it's perfect for locals. I met Nan a few years ago when we were both presenting for a symposium at the L.A. Arboretum, and we've stayed in touch ever since. The following is a review of her book that I wrote and posted at Amazon.com. I was going to say "this is one you'll want to have on your bookshelf", but that's not quite right. You'll want to have it on your lap, at the breakfast table, on the patio and in the garden.

Here goes...

We all know that the Sunset Western Garden Book is "the bible" when it comes to horticulture on the Left Coast. But after reading Sterman's fabulous book, it was plain to see what was missing from the other tome. Nan takes us through the rationale for what makes a California garden such a rewarding and unique setting.

As great as her encyclopedic listing of plants is, an equally valuable part of the book is the first 27 pages that help us understand the climate, soil, resources of our diverse California setting, and the design process. This introduction is worth the price of the entire book and is a must read. Her approach to sustainable practices will resonate with readers, and creates an easy to understand framework for how we can have a beautiful garden while remaining good stewards of the environment.

Though there are only 186 plants featured (far less than Sunset presents), they represent a good cross section of the many categories of plants that play a role in any garden. And the plants are conveniently grouped by category of use.

The information offered for each plant is thorough, and unlike Sunset, gives the same essential information for each plant - Sunset tends to be inconsistent from plant to plant. By breaking each description into four mini-essays we learn: "When Where, and How to Plant" (about soil type, sun requirements, etc); "Growing Tips" that help us get the plant off to a good start; "Companion Planting and Design" helping the reader to imagine how the plant fits in with an overall composition; and "Try These" which introduces us to other cultivars and varieties of the species plants. The photograph on each page is clear, though two images (one long shot for overall character and another for flower detail) would be even more helpful. Lastly, the array of cartooned icons helps the reader quickly understand opportunities and constraints, like water and solar requirements, habitat value, adaptation to various micro-climates, etc.

I have taught landscape design to homeowners for nearly 20 years and always recommended the Sunset W. G. Book as a necessary reference. Now there's one more book my students will be needing.

Nan's website is PlantSoup. It's a fun read.

Who Needs Flowers?

I’ll admit it. I’m a freak for form and foliage (and using the letter ‘f’ many times). Flowers are great. It’s like the rush you feel from infatuation – a quickening of the pulse and flush of the cheeks, then a slow fade to normalcy. It doesn’t have the staying power of a long-term relationship based on a strong foundation. Sure, the bright colors of a Better Homes and Gardens-style perennial border stimulate they eye, but once that burst of color peaks, it’s downhill.

My highest admiration is reserved for designs that exploit the infinite range of visual combinations that come from the more permanent characteristics of plants – their overall form (or architecture), foliage color, the fineness or boldness of the leaves, their surface texture.

This is not to say that I avoid flowering plants in my designs. Far from it. The designs just don’t depend on it. I’ve realized after a few decades that when the flowers fade, the dead-heading is done, and there’s no bone structure left to provide interest, you might as well plow the whole thing under, cover the ground with mulch and wait for the next planting season. But if there’s an underlying composition that continues to contribute interest throughout the year, then you’ve really got something.

Try this comparison.


The first garden on the right has no flowers. Its composition emphasizes the contrasting elements of bright yellow-green Helichrysum ‘Limelight’ in the mid-ground, the somber Eugenia hedge and lighter Miscanthus ‘Morning Light’ grass at the back, and the dark green filaments of Juncus patens (California Rush) in the foreground. Oh yes, there’s a sandstone boulder that’s to die for! The garden looks like this pretty much every day of the year with minimal maintenance. `


This garden is what many people strive for – bright, colorful flowers (two varieties of begonia), a simple color scheme of pink and white, and a crisp edge of dwarf Agapanthus. I’ll be the first to tell you that this creates a charming entry bed that sets off the base of the statue. But what happens when the flowers subside? The foliage color and texture of both begonias are identical, and the leaf color of the Agapanthus merges with the others. The only interest comes from the textural differences between the two species.

These black and white comparisons tell it all.

Imagine we had no color vision. Which garden would hold your interest? The complexity of the first composition blows the second out of the water.

Now imagine the first garden WITH a great palette of colorful, tastefully combined flowers and you have it all. Not to take anything away from people who create stunning floral borders, but the type of design I’m endorsing takes a lot more effort and deeper knowledge of plants.

Thanks for reading. I hope this stimulates some discussion and helps you with your own garden.

A Bit of Garden Design Theory

Canna and Society Garlic
Originally uploaded by gardenwiseguy

Here's something to chew on. I was just looking over a few of my pictures and spotted this one that I use when I teach my garden design classes. It's an image from the project I designed for the Goleta Water District a few years back. I think it exemplifies a "Santa Barbara-style" composition, if there is such a thing. Perhaps it can be a starting point for a conversation about designing not only in our Mediterranean climate, but has implications anywhere. In this example, so fairly common plants are combined to create a killer combo.

One of the simplest concepts for bringing interest to a garden is the impact that can be created by working with contrast and harmony. Here's a crash course...

Starting with the pinkish canna lily (Canna eribus) in this photo, we see that its visual character is comprised of its architecture (the overall form of the plant) which in this case is as follows: a vertical "posture" and broad, upright, spearhead-shaped leaves. The stems will easily reach 5 to 6 feet high. The flowers are large and in proportion to the rest of the plant.

The colors are a greyish-green leaf and coral flowers. Coral is the "tint" of a slightly orangy red. If you were mixing paint you'd take a good amount of red, add barely a dot of yellow (moving it toward orange) then dilute the whole thing with a heapin' helpin' of white. White makes a basic "hue" become a "tint." O.K., let's keep it simple - pink is the tint of red.

Now for the Society Garlic (Tulbaghia violacea) in the back. Its architecture is fine textured and grassy, but is similar to the canna due to the predominantly vertical direction of the leaves and flower stems. The plant is small, growing only to about 12" (18" when flowering). The flowers are small and, again, in scale with the plant.

The flower color is also a tint, in this case, its as if we took a big dollop of purple and mixed in some white. The foliage is a medium green, with a little yellow.

Time to wrap up.

Contrast: The contrast is created by three features: fine texture (Tulbaghia) against coarse texture (Canna); contrasting flower color; and small plant / large plant.

Harmony: Both plants are vertical in their stance; both are within a range of green foliage (as opposed to pairing silver and purple foliage); both have flowers that are the tint of their base hue.

So what does all this mean to you?

Grab a visual concept before you begin putting a plant palette together. Look at not just the flowers, but the totality of the grouping. Better yet, when you look at a planting design you like, see if you can "reverse engineer" what's going on. It might give you a clue to what excites you and you'll have a better chance of creating something great for your own garden.

One last observation - the plants were used in distinct groups, not intermixed. That makes for a much stronger overall statement.

Later, skater...

~~~~~~~~~~
A thought after posting this article: I've been reading some early reactions to this post and readers seem to appreciate these design tips. I'd be glad to continue this as a series - just let me know some design topics you'd be interested in. GWG

Santa Barbara County Hort Society Tour

Plants! Where would we be without them? We’d be hungry, breathing toxic gases, sporting various sun-related skin conditions, and thoroughly perplexed with our irrational urge to visit the garden center on beautiful weekends.

I’m in a minor panic at the moment, sitting here at the keyboard putting together my thoughts before taking an enthusiastic group from the Santa Barbara County Horticultural Society (founded in 1869—who said we don’t have our stuff together?) through the Thayer’s garden. No offense to my other clients, but that’s still my fave rave of all the places I’ve done over the decades.

Who joins the Hort Society? Not to generalize too much, but it’s folks who just plain love plants—weird ones (the plants, not the people, although…) rare ones, drop-dead-gorgeous ones, odd ones, fat ones, skinny ones, plants that climb on rocks. Knowing from my own temperament, sometimes the possession of the plant overwhelms the necessity of fitting it into the overall design. “I just HAVE TO HAVE IT! I can always move it later” is the primal brain response from somewhere deep in the cortex.

I know I’ll be asked to “address” the folks before we turn them loose in the garden. So what gem can I impart that if they retain nothing else, will make this visit worthwhile? It’s my handy dandy system for taming potential chaos.

A couple of years ago I was asked to create design guidelines for the main meadow area at the Santa Barbara Botanic Garden. Honored? Stunned? Humbled? You bet. More on that another day.

The key idea was to tame the potential chaos of this grand palette by viewing the entire area as four or five major groupings of plants, each held together with a harmonizing theme.

Huh? Here’s an over simplification, but what if there were 100 varieties of plants to display. Do we combine them alphabetically by genus and species? Not likely. How about by the zip codes of the area in which they commonly occur? All the plants from downtown Santa Barbara’s 93101 would be in one group, the plants that naturally occur on the Mesa in another grouping…nah.

O.K. Back to the four or five major swaths, one with predominantly yellow and golden flowers, another made up of plants with a spiky form, another with gray and silver foliage. From a distance, there would be a sense of order due to the common visual characteristics, but if we move closer into the meadow, we’d see subtle and not so subtle contrasts between the various plants in each grouping.

Within each major block can be associations of plants of different species, but they’d all fit within the common theme. This allows a large variety of plants to be combined while simplifying the overall scale of the bed.

So what about trying this in your own garden, but scaled down to fit the spaces? I think the best example of this approach is the combination in the “Big Sur” garden at the Thayers (pictured above). Aeonium and Echevaria planted in blocks. Each has the same form and structure—flat succulent leaves held in a rosette. But the yellow-green of the slightly more robust Aeonium paired with the gray-green smaller Echevaria create a mass that from a distance, appears to be a single entity. But move in closer and there’s a subtle mix that provides another layer of complexity.

Too similar? I understand your concern, so we sparked things up by backing up that mass with Myer’s Asparagus, the common link in this grouping being the yellow-green foliage that complements the Aeonium, but with a radically different form—in this case, something like Rastafarian dreadlocks heading skyward.

Nuff for now. I can go on and on about how I visualize and compose with plants, but my hope is to give my readers a starting point for taming the one-of-each plantings I see in so many gardens owned by plant fanatics. Round up all the plants you’re thinking of using and see if you can categorize them by some common characteristics. Within those groupings, play with varying degrees of harmony and contrast.

Lemme know if this helps.

Sexy Sumptuous Color / Water-Wise Plants

We drool when we see those garden photos on the mags at the dentist’s office. Sensuous burgundy leaves, fragrant gray-leaf lavendar, delicate pink flowering shrubs. Looks like it belongs in front of Muffin Mouse's little cottage in merry old Newark. Ya just wanna take a bite out of it!

But much of the stuff we lust after in garden books doesn’t make sense in our semi-desert Santa Barbara / SoCal climate. We just can't shake that temperate climate aesthetic. So do we resign ourselves to a life of sensual deprivation or do we waste one of the most precious resources we have coaxing lush growth in a climate that’s supposed to be sporting sagebrush?

Have I got a deal for you! Call now and you can have the best of both worlds! Operators are standing by.

The key is understanding what makes a plant composition attractive to you, and “reverse engineering” it to its basic components. If your bippy gets all aroused from the combination of sky-rocketing yellow blooms framed by dark green weeping foliage, find something in your own neck of the woods that gives you that effect. Don't try to import something from another climate that needs a life-support system we can't afford!

The photo above gives the look of a lush English garden, but all the plants would survive with a monthly deep soak in the summer and no supplemental water for the rest of the year.

That dark burgundy foliage is a flowering plum with a deep root system that doesn’t need much pampering. The graceful pink flowers are bursting out of a tough-as-nails New Zealand Tea Tree. And Lavendar is a Mediterranean plant that needs no help from us, thank you very much!

So you can have it both ways—drop-dead-gorgeous garden and treading lightly on the planet. Pretty sexy, eh?

Where do roses fit in?

I’ve been invited to speak at the Santa Barbara Rose Society on June 14 and had to think about how my approach to sustainable landscape design connects to folk who are ga-ga over roses. I’ve never been an enthusiast but can understand the passion. But on the face of it, roses aren’t the first thing that pops into my head when I think about plants that can more or less go it alone.

So I think my approach will be to expound on the mystical art of landscape design in general, and explain how it’s in everyone’s best interest to adopt the principles of sustainability. Sustainability isn't just about giving stuff up. There’s a place for exotic plants like roses, as long as you put them where they have the greatest chance of thriving with the least input of harmful stuff.

I’ll let you know how this one turns out. Maybe there’ll be a few converts out there ready to catch religion!

What does Harry Connick Jr. have to do with gardens?

Actually, not much--at least on the surface. But I could stretch a wee bit and talk about how I live in two worlds of creativity. Though I spend more time as a landscape architect than I do as a musician, my heart is with the music first. So last night was a solid 2 hour performance by one of the most humble, sincere, sharing jazz and funk musician's I've experienced. Harry and his immensely talented crew were all about having fun, taking chances, and sincerely receiving joy from each other's efforts.

How can I morph that spirit into my designs?

The "have fun" part is a given--I always try to explore something that excites me, or there's no reason to sit down at the drafting table.

"Taking chances" is always in the cards, but depends on the sense of daring of the client. Lately I've been blessed and lucky!

"Joy from each othere's efforts" is a stretch, but I think it has to do with the collaboration between client and designer--there's no way I would force my design intent on them, and there's the part about helping them express what they want and me giving it physical reality. I try to hear and see what truly excites them, then turn it into a garden they can love.

Let's see if I keep that in mind on the next design. Meanwhile, my band has two gigs this week and I'm SOOOOO ready to play.

Walking in the 'hood...

With the long-neglected need to get out and exercise, Lin (my wife and spousal support unit, and from this point dubbed SSU for efficiency) coaxed me on a walk up to the lovely Santa Barbara Mission. Undaunted by fog and mist, we trudged on, giving me the opportunity to look at and comment--sometimes with enthusiasm, but mostly with exasperation--at the sorry state of so many front yards.

SSU commented about my dark running commentary. It gave me a chance to ponder my internal thought process that probably doesn't need to be externalized quite so much in her presence. I see how it can be a little depressing. Here are my ponderings.

Landscape design seems to be a mystical process for a lot of people, especially the scores of students who show up at my Adult Ed classes every year. And for good reason. Most of us seem to have a sense of matching articles of clothing, picking out furniture that creates a semblance of fashion statement, and hang a picture over the mantle that kinda goes with the couch (next incarnation--curator for the Met!).

But when it comes to plants, all bets are off. I think that the key missing ingredient is that most people don't have the vocabulary they need to describe why they like a particular garden. Maybe that's because there is such a range of visual features in the plant world that we can play with as design elements.

You look at gardens you like (magazines in the waiting room at the dentist spring to mind) and get that Pavlovian response when you see something that catches your eye. But if you can "reverse engineer" the design to the basic components that make it work, then you can emulate it in YOUR garden.

So for the purposes of teaching, I use four basic principles to describe any design composition: Harmony, Contrast, Balance, and Scale. I'll be brief here, with more postings to follow.

Harmony: Elements that look like they belong together and share common visual features. Maybe its the repetition of a spikey form or the cool appearance of gray foliage. It's what keeps a garden from looking like it was designed by a committee that's never seen the site or met each other. Repetition of a few basic elements holds the composition together. Let's move on.

Contrast: Well, it's like the opposite of Harmony. If it's all harmonious, nothing jumps out and yells "Hey! You lookin' at me?" So if most of the garden has a foliage theme of medium green leaves or mounding shrubby plants, throw in a burst of burgundy foliage, or something with an upright architecture. Better than No-Doz. Next...

Balance: At the most basic level, think formal, symmetrical balance. Draw an axis through the yard and create a mirror image on each side. It works, but unless you're auditioning for a gig at Versailles, let's try something a bit more naturalistic. Think of the "visual weight" of massings plants and try to distribute them within the landscape. A massing of one type of plant taking up 100 square feet on one side of the bed can balance a single big tree nearby. Also, balance is the key to a great color scheme, but that's another post.

Scale: For me, it's the relative size of the various elements in a composition and the appropriateness to the size of the space you're working in. Picture a formal stone ballustrade like you see along the terrace of a grand building, but put it in place of a white picket fence in front of a country cottage, and you'll have some idea of mismatched scale.

So, on my morning grump walk, I realized that my out-loud pondering was me reminding myself what still needs to be fixed, why I teach, and now, why I'm starting this blog. If I can verbalize the problem I might have a better idea of how to reverse the damage, teach people how to create what they are really seeking, and give my SSU a chance to hear the birds twitter instead of me.

Thanks for "listening".

Five Sacred Rules for Buying Plants

O.K. the show was less than great, so now I have some time. My hope with this blog entry is to help you make good plant selection choices that go beyond whether the plant has cool flowers or not. Read on and you'll be a better gardener and accomplish the basic tenets of sustainable planting. The benefits include not only a better LOOKING garden, but also reduced maintenance, resource conservation (water, fertilizer, fossil fuels and the like) and all-around healthier plants.

Being a landscape design teacher in the loverly paradise of Santa Barbara, I have cause to reach a lot of homeowners whose idea of plant selection falls under the methodology dubbed Saturday Morning Syndrome. You've done it, I've done it, kids who climb on rocks have done it (I think that's from the Oscar Meyer hot dog commercial). Here's how it goes...

Sat. AM, crisp sunny day, fuel up at your favorite caffeine house, maybe a bagel with a schmeer (my Brooklyn roots) and cruise over to the nursery. Like any good retail organization, guess what you encounter at the gates? Yup, whatever is looking great this week. Luscious blooms beckon "take me home; I'll make you sooooo happy." Underlying theme includes "all your friends will say nice things about you" and all those other primal stimuli that make us garden.

"Hmmm. Cool plant," you think, "but I told myself I'd wait until I had that master plan done before I buy another cell of chlorophyl." With resolve, you try to pass but the plant won't give up. Some hidden tentacle of this needy bush reaches out, finds that spot under your ribs and starts tickling. Now your left leg is spasming uncontrollably, kind of like that slightly sadistic thing you do to your dog when he's on his back, feet flailing. The pleasure center of your brain takes over, you pick up the new addition to your family and walk to the check-out clerk. Ching! New plant!

Pulling into the driveway, the excitement mounts as you drain the last of your coffee, unload the 1 gallon-size whatever (don't want to impose my taste on this tale) and head into the yard. Now comes the design process, following in the footsteps of legendary designers throughout time. You hold the plant out in front of you, like Martin Scorsesse assessing the next camera position, pan from left to right while thinking "WHERE SHOULD I PUT THIS?"

So let's stop the playback here and rewind to what should have happened back at the nursery. Yes, there was a mystical spell overtaking you and you might not have had your wits about you, so we'll give you a break. Consider these to be the 5 sacred steps to smart plant purchasing. The concept is RIGHT PLANT / RIGHT PLACE and it's the basis for creating a sustainable garden.

1) Know thy plant! Did you read the label that was stuck in the soil? Are you already familiar with this plant? Did you ask a KNOWLEDGABLE employee? Did you check a reference book at the nursery. Being familiar with the genus isn't enough. Check the genus (first name, like Acer, or Juniperus, or Hemerocallis - that's just the big category) but also the species and perhaps the cultivar or variety of the plant. A rose might be a rose, might be a rose, but not all Maples or Junipers or Daylilies are created equal. Plants of the same genus and even species can vary greatly in their mature size, cultural needs (sun, water, soil, etc.). You want to be sure that the plant you're taking home won't just grow there, but will thrive! Do some research.

2) Visualize. Before you put that plant in your car, do a mental tour of your planting areas. Using the information you now have about the plant, picture a location where you can plant your new baby and have it grow to maturity without running into its existing neighbors. Why?

This is a whole other posting, but let me summarize: We plant because we like nature and nobody goes out into nature with hedge trimmers and loppers and shape nature into balls, cubes and discs perched on brown, woody legs. That's not a garden; it's plant torture and you might save yourself some time and money by instead carving interesting shapes from styrofoam, painting them green, attaching silk flowers here and there, and scattering them hither and thither about the beds. We're trying to create a bit of natural beauty, and Momma Nature has already figured out how to program her kids to look best (hint: it doesn't include shaping them into submission). So, when you put the new plant in, give it room to grow without having to be shaped.

3) What can that plant do for you? This is called the plant's "function." Yes, we're buying it because it's drop-dead-gorgeous. However, what if the plant can also help make the yard more comfortable (provide shade), or screen a view we don't like (your neighbor's car repair hobby), or block some uncomfortable winds, or just be the punctuation mark in a highly visible bed (focal point). Doesn't it make sense to think on a few levels? Yup.

4) Are you thinking year 'round? It was the flowers that grabbed your attention, but that won't last all year. The plant's "architecture" (general form, outline, density, etc.) is more permanent that the flowers. So think about how this beauty's other characteristics will contribute to the garden scheme for the rest of the year. Create contrast with foliage colors and shapes; pair a low-growing dense plant with a wispy vertical bamboo! You get the idea.

5) Hydrozones (huh? He's making this up.) Yes, a fabricated word we use in the green industry, but it's a good one. Basically, group plants with similar watering needs together for the convenience of watering. In other words, you can water them all on the same irrigation valve, or set up a hose-end sprinkler or soaker hose, let it run for the prescribed time, and ALL the plants in that "zone" get the same and correcct amount of "hydro." Seems logical, eh?

So, if you thought about some or all of these ideas before the swiped your card at the counter and swaddled that container in the back seat, HURRAY FOR YOU! If not, you've got something to think about next time.

I hope to keep this blog moving and might have some announcements to make that could be of interest to you. Like any new blogger, I crave feedback, so be kind, be generous or challenge what I've put down here. We'll learn together.