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The Prep

As busy as we have been with landscape installation projects, we have a full roster of clients for whom we do fall container installations. We are happy to oblige. I understand wanting to change the pots out for the season to come. A summer planting that has declined, or not done well, or which has not measured up to expectation – it can be a relief to put that planting to rest, and move on. I have other clients who would prefer to move on to the fall when the summer planting is at its super nova best. Watching a container that has been a pleasure to experience the entire season go in to decline is a painful acknowledgement that the garden season has begun its long slide towards dormancy. Yet other clients like the fall season the best, and are ready for a new look as soon as the night temperatures drop. Not matter the reason, we are available to plant containers for fall. We try to treat the fall season with fresh eyes, and we like to represent the fall season in the most robust way possible. The summer season provides no end of plant material that is tall and vining, of medium height, of short stature, and of trailing habit.  I could make lists. But the fall season challenges anyone who plants a container to create a variety of levels, contrast, and volume. We look first at the construction of a centerpiece that might organize the entire arrangement. Our fall container pots sometimes feature centerpieces of a variety of materials that celebrate the end of summer, and the harvest. Constructing those centerpieces is in preparation for a fall container planting.

We rely in great measure on the height, volume, and color provided by cut stems of broom corn. The seed heads and drying leaves can provide a dramatic centerpiece to a fall pot. The broom corn we purchase is hung upside down from the moment we get it. That drying process up side down will challenge the effect of gravity – somewhat. This fall maturing crop was and still is grown for the production of corn brooms, but we value its bold good looks. Marzela has a gift for handling and arranging these heavy stems in a graceful way. Her centerpieces, no matter the materials, anchor the plantings we are about to do.  All of her materials are arranged around a stout bamboo pole, the length of which will be driven in to the soil in the pot. She has been creating centerpieces our installation scheduled for tomorrow, for the past 2 days.

Some summer pots have centerpieces that still look great.  I am thinking about the figs, the lemon cypress, the rosemary, the boxwood topiaries, and a whole host of dwarf evergreens. But other central players in summer pots will go down in concert with falling night temperatures. There are few fall plants that provide stature, and represent the color or the spirit of the season. So what other materials might be available? This is the long way of saying that not every centerpiece we do for a fall pot involves live material. In the interest of celebrating the fall season, we may assemble lots of materials that are not especially living, but are very lively visually. These centerpieces are a mix of all of the above. The bleached kuwa branches are a natural curly stem available to us in dried bunches. The preserved eucalyptus is a natural material that has been treated to last for months, no matter the weather. The white berry picks are as fake as fake can be. But they reference the natural world in a graphic way.

These centerpieces are slated for a specific pair of pots on a terrace that features a number of pots. The primary view is from a distance, so the creamy white centerpiece will read.

This centerpiece will be viewed from up close, so the darker colors and more subtle variations in color will be appreciated. A centerpiece of distinction, no matter the origin of the materials, can endow a fall container planting with with fall appropriate style and verve. I like the idea of endowing the garden with seasonal plantings that are vervacious. If you are a gardener like me, you understand that a garden and landscape is about a certain kind of earthy and unforgettable romance. I am a fan of bringing on the romance every season. The fall season coming up asks for a representation of the end of summer harvest.

fall centerpieces

preserved eucalyptus in butterscotch

fall picks

Of course every fall pot we plant involves living plants. All of our custom grown cabbages and kale are incredibly well grown. See for your self. They benefit from regular water and food, as they are growing fast this time of year. Our September weather has been unseasonably warm,. Once the temperatures cool, the leaves will color up dramatically, in shades of purple, pink, cerise, and white. Tuscan kale is a tall, all green variety that I hear is delicious to eat after a few frosts. Having superior quality plant material available to plant makes the process and outcome a pleasure all around.

The outer leaves of this cabbage variety, Osaka Red, will darken, and the center will turn a brilliant deep cerise pink, given some chilly weather. The look of the pots will evolve as the plants take on their fall color. If the early winter season is mild, these glorious and showy ornamental vegetables will look great in to December.

Each centerpiece has a photo tucked into it that shows which pot it belongs to, and what will be planted with it. That kind of planning helps to make a large planting job go smoothly and efficiently. But no matter the planning, seeing the work come together is always a pleasure. Pictured above is a trio of pots planted for fall last October. This year’s pots will feel just as fallish, but will feature whatever interesting materials Rob has purchased for the shop.

The Ruby Queen cabbage, the kale “Pinstripe”,  and broom corn are all looking good.

Posted on: September 27, 2018 19 Comments
Filed Under: Deborah Silver and Co Inc, Color, container planting Tagged With: , , ,

Bedding Out

Bedding out annual plants was a seasonal planting practice very popular from the late 1860’s until the turn of the century. Victorian gardeners, particularly of an English persuasion, reveled in planting seasonal and tropical plants in intricate patterns in ground resembling rugs. Or clocks. Or other objects and events. Or giant shapes all of one color and cultivar of plant. It seems so difficult to understand this concept of annual in ground gardening now, as modern gardeners are used to having thousands of cultivars of annual plants available to buy or grow from seed. What probably drove the fad as much as anything was the recent availability of tropical and annual plants that would bloom all summer long. The Victorian gardens took their plant choice liberation seriously.  They planted everything they could find.

The Victorians-they embellished everything they had a mind to.  Architecture, fashion-and gardening. I will confess to have bedded out many thousands of annual plants over a period of 10 years during my tenure as the garden designer for the Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island. Of course a resort hotel dating back to the Victorian era would ask for gardens reminiscent of the same period. One season I designed and Rob drew a scale plan for a for a long curving bed with the Stars and Stripes. Every bedding out garden I designed for them included decorative dirt. Those dirt spaces enabled discreet maintenance paths, but they also enabled a clear and crisp definition of the pattern.

Even the simplest pattern relied on planting a large area for the pattern to read properly. Bedding out large areas took lots of plants. Annual plants are a fairly inexpensive source of gardening pleasure, but planting lots of them is expensive.

Although few residential gardeners plant annuals in ground on this scale, some commercial properties still do a big job of bedding out annuals. The expansive shapes and bright colors are cheery and inviting. Detroit Garden Works does have a moderately sized annual garden out front, which is planted in a different way every year. It is part of what makes a visit to the shop enjoyable and interesting. We plant tulips in the spring, and hope the summer annuals persist until late fall.  Though the Victorians embellished everything they touched, more modern gardeners are looking for a more simple splash of color. I do not bed out in the classical definition of the term any more. But I do plant seasonal plants in the ground. Any request for annual plantings in ground that come to me suggest a mix of plants.

My primary attraction to a mix of plants has to do with spreading out the risk. If the salvia in this bed has a bad year, the petunias might be able to carry the day.  It is just good planning to plant any large in ground area I need to plant with a collection of plants.  I like to hedge my bets. The plant mix first and foremost asks for plants that like similar growing conditions.

So I mix the plants before I mix the colors. Nature has a way of turning the tide when you least expect it, so I always design with the possibility of trouble in mind. Designing a mix is easy. You need three colors for a mix to be even. In this bed, I planted white petunias between each of the other colors. White lightens and brightens the overall scheme. White provides a very strong contract to every other color nearby – even pastel colors. Adding a 4th and 5th plant to a planting scheme can be very busy. Noisy, even. This bed with 3 types of plants- tall florist’s ageratum, petunias, and sky blue Cathedral salvia – and 5 colors will be visually fairly quiet, as all of the colors are closely related.

Viewed on the diagonal, this bed will have distinct stripes, given the placement of the white petunias between each of the other two petunia colors.  I will be interested to see how the look shifts from different points of view once this bed has grown in. I rarely plant at the shop until all of my clients have their flowers, so this was planted but 2 weeks ago.  Given that the soil is warm, they will grow fast. To follow are pictures of a few of the in ground plantings we did this year.

This is a relatively small planting area, but a small planting area does not have to be uninteresting. The biggest challenge will be keeping water intended for the lawn out of this area. All of these plants thrive in fairly dry conditions once they are established.

The other small planting areas on either side of the walk feature a purple mix of petunias and scaevola, punctuated with a dash of lime licorice.

White petunias, cirrus dusty miller, and lime licorice make for an unusual color scheme, which is exactly what my clients like.

The cirrus dusty miller will provide a little height, and the licorice and petunias will weave in and out of one another.

The mix in the pots is pink, red and red violet, leavened with variegated licorice.

in ground, a mix of 3 colors of petunias.

This small garden area features 2 colors of dwarf cleome, verbena bonariensis, petunias in several colors, white angelonia and white phlox.

A little 4th of July style visual fireworks will energize this small space at the side door all summer long.

Posted on: July 4, 2018 15 Comments
Filed Under: Color, seasonal plants, Summer

Bold Or Bashful?

Designing great container plantings asks for thoughtful decisions about lots of visual issues. A container is a landscape in miniature. Every design issue that manages to get addressed in such a confined space means that container will satisfy the viewer on multiple levels. Superb container plantings are layered, organized, and deliberate. I greatly admire container plantings that are visually interesting, whether they be formally or informally imagined.  I especially like the organization phase. How do I plant for my clients? I like to know to location of the pots, the size and style of the pots, the architecture of the house, the sun and shade exposure, and the style of planting that most closely represents the point of view of the client. But truth be told, I ask about color first. Color is an incredibly important design element, if for no other reason that everyone reacts individually and strongly to color. The pale yellow and vaguely violet upright verbena named “Limonella” pictured above has a subtle coloration that I find fascinating. My grower, on the other hand, could not decide if it was good or blah. Consequently he only grew a few flats.

There are plenty of seasonal plants that have equally reserved coloration.  This bench is home to showy oregano, silver dichondra, variegated licorice and euphorbia “Diamond Frost”. Though they all have subtly different textures, shapes, and habits of growth, the color is uniformly subdued. The color green reads as a neutral color in the landscape for obvious reasons. A pot of white geraniums surrounded by a frothy mix of the aforementioned plants would be quietly satisfying in coloration. The contrast between the unflappable form of the geraniums and the airy and flowing form of the supporting cast provides visual interest on a different level. The fact that each of these plants requires similar light and water means there will be opportunity for each individual plant to thrive.

Some seasonal plants are bashful in coloration for other reasons. The Cathedral series of annual salvias are avilable in a range of colors, from white, pale blue, lavender and dark purple.  What makes their effect in a container reserved is the fact that they will always sport more foliage than flowers. The individual florets are small. Breeders have worked hard to create a flowering salvia with more visual punch, but I find the quieter bloom habit charming. Scaevola, commonly known as fan flower, features diminuitive lowers all along fleshy green trailing stems.  It provides as much volume as color to a container arrangement.

Yellow and pale lilac petunias are subdued in color, and similar in value – meaning the colors do not contrast much. Mixing them with the Limonella trailing verbena is an idea I would like to try. Adding vanilla marigolds to the mix would introduce a like color element with a contrasting height.

These yellow with a blue eye streptocarpus would be a great fit with the yellow and pale lilac petunias, but the science would be all wrong.  This plant requires a fairly shady location to prosper. It is always good to keep in mind that good horticulture comes before any other design element.

Some tropical plants are anything but bashful.  Persian Shield is a plant prized for the brilliant red violet color of its foliage. I have never seen it bloom. That color is the most vibrant given a partial shade location. It may fade in full sun. Red violet is a shade of purple that leans to the red side. Some call this color magenta, or carmine. As I favor harmony in color, and contrast achieved by light and dark, I would plant lilac and or red New Guinea impatiens with it. The red geraniums in the background of this picture accentuates the red highlights in these purple leaves.

Persian Queen geraniums pack a powerful punch of color.  The intense hot pink flowers sit on top of intensely lime green foliage. If bold color is to your liking, this plant delivers the goods. You can calm the color with dark purple petunias, heliotrope, or the softer colored lime licorice – or add flames to the fire with red annual phlox or red seed geraniums. This plant is great for pots that are viewed from afar. There would be no problem spotting even a small container of these in the landscape.  The dahlias are the show stopper darlings of the container world.  The colors are intense and jewel like.  The sheer size of the flowers is as powerful as the color. Given lots of sun, regular moisture and food, they will bloom profusely. The best flowering actually comes near the end of the season.  They are beautiful in September and October.

There are plenty of plants for partially shaded locations that have strong color.  Begonias are hard to beat. A mix of all the colors available is as effective as a mass of all one color.  The less well known lime selaginella, or club moss, can effectively lighten up the shadiest spot. With a regular source of moisture, it will cascade over the edge of a pot.

But if you love all and every color equally, and are pleased by representing as many of them as you can in a container, you are not alone.  There is something so lavish and exuberant about a mass of mixed color plants. Nature’s colors all go together. If mixed colors are pleasing, then the next most important design element is the overall shape. Plants that grown tall and linear can be balanced by plants that grow low and wide. Airy growing plants can be countered by plants with a prominent structure. All of the contrasting shapes, tectures and colors of green will certainly knit the arrangement together.

See what I mean?

 

Posted on: June 1, 2018 10 Comments
Filed Under: Deborah Silver and Co Inc, Color, container planting, Summer, Detroit Garden Works

Early May

Our bitterly cold and record breaking April gave way to an early May that has been too warm, too windy, too rainy and very stormy. Of course it has. Every plant that hunkered down in April was shoved into bloom and leaf by unseasonable heat. This is anything but a cool and slowly evolving spring. This isn’t springtime.  It is boom and bust time. Daffodils began to wilt with the heat at the moment they came in to bloom. The magnolia petals were falling as the flowers opened. Even the grape hyacinths looked unhappy. This is the natural course of events-nature ruling over all in a rather capricious even cruel way. That rule is not especially friendly and certainly not fair. The only thing to do is to pay attention. The Secretariat of all springs is zooming by and already heading into the home stretch. Yesterday and today the temps are hovering around 45, and are accompanied by torrential rains. Every gardener is blinking, just like me. Are we up or down?

This does not mean that the experience of the beauty of the garden and landscape waking up is lost. It is just fleeting. In a spring like this, it takes effort and concentration to capture the moment. Not a one of my hellebores bloomed until the very end of April. Snow and ice buried them until quite late. It was an event when they finally sallied forth. This green flowered hellebore is a cultivar from Pine Knot Farms, and it was well worth waiting for.

May visits every property equally. The coming of the growing happens everywhere. Even those places where there may not be a gardener on staff. The new growth on the weeds is just as beautiful as the new growth on delphiniums. Truly. A patch of daylilies fresh out of the ground is my favorite time for them. The flowers on the maples are the most exquisite shade of chartreuse. There are a few spring days when even the roadway is green. The violets may not be welcome in some lawns, but I love them. I would have them everywhere, in every color, in the spring.

Seasonal spring plants have the same vibrant aura as the spring landscape. The color is clear and brilliant. Spring rains wash all of the dust and pollen out of the air. Spring sunlight is like no other light. Everything grows for broke. What a delight to be a part of that! This window box has pansies, strawberries, annual phlox, bidens, osteospermum, parsley and alyssum.  Seasonal flowers have the ability to handle unusual cold and heat better than the ephemeral spring wildflowers, spring flowering bulbs, shrubs and trees. Anyone who has ever known the pleasure of a stand of double bloodroot understands keeping a close eye on the approaching bloom. A day away from the garden means you might miss it altogether. This window box will prosper steadily, even in the warmer weather to come.

There is nothing particularly extraordinary about creeping jenny, but a mass of it under planting white daffodils is a May moment worth savoring. Later in the summer, that chartreuse will harden, and take on an orange cast unless it has afternoon shade. Right now it looks good enough to eat.

Forsythia is an ordinary spring flowering shrub, but the late day May light makes the color glow. This gardener had the good sense to just let it grow. A shrub in full spring bloom, a wheelbarrow, and an sidewalk-this is the stuff of which great spring days are made.

My old clumps of Royal Heritage hellebores all feature downward facing flowers. This means I need to get down on the ground and look up into their faces. Any perennial that can make this 68 year old gardener do that has something going for it. Oh yes, the hellebores are a feature of the spring season, no matter the weather.

This PJM rhododendron came with the house I bought 24 years ago.  It has had its ups and downs, but I can count on those dazzling flowers in May. This year’s display began to fade in the heat, but my memory of this moment, given my experience of it for more than 2 decades, is a forever memory. I have had 48 springs as a gardener. Each one is different.  But the sum total of all of my Mays is worth my attention.

I do not travel much outside my route to and from work, this time of year. So much of my experience of May is in my own neighborhood, driving by. This Bradford pear, branched to the ground and in full bloom, is an experience of spring that delights my eye.

A single shoot of variegated lily of the valley, after 3 years in my garden, has decided to branch out. I could not be more delighted. May has a way of surprising even the most veteran gardener. I cannot really explain how this plant settling down and spreading has been such an important part of my spring. Yes, I was paying attention.

The Princeton Gold maples in my back yard are leafing out. Those giant chartreuse leaves say spring in no uncertain terms. This year’s spring green may be fleeting, but a beautiful moment is a moment to be treasured.

The tulips at the shop are not their usual size, given our freezing April.  But they are blooming. I admire their effort.

My pansies have taken the worst of the cold and the heat, as they always do. This spring is not the best we have ever had, but any spring is a moment worth cherishing.

I have had this picture on my computer for ages. It is spring photograph, featuring spring blooming trees, in Japan.  Astonishing, this. Although my spring does not look like this, it feels like this.

 

 

 

Posted on: May 12, 2018 11 Comments
Filed Under: Spring, Deborah Silver and Co Inc, Color