A little stir crazy during this dumb pandemic? Thankfully, we have so many lovely places to visit and the weather that makes it even nicer.
This is a fun new area with pots and succulents.
I spy a new play area over there.
This looks like another new area. some awesome boulders and a twig teepee structure. I def want to play here.
I’m currently obsessed with Daniel Smith Pyroll Orange. It is perfect for this cone.
Watercolor sketchbook with some pots and succulents and an orange cone.
“Everyone needs a sideyard”, as my boss tends to say. Usually she is talking about people needs a messy work area - a place to keep shovels and buckets, etc.
In this case, as we only have one side yard, I wanted it to be a beautiful entrance to our garden. The crappy stuff is hidden in a back a bit.
We are finding that this side yard stays nice and cool during the summer The bamboo is growing in to add shade and will hopefully screen the house from our very nice neighbor at some point. I love the way the path turned out. It is very weird to remember that this whole area was mostly underground previously and then WAS a trash area for quite a while as we did the deck construction and laundry room rebuild in the back.
A fine and shady spot to drink a cocktail and have some snacks.
I am a tad concerned for the changing light over the seasons in this area. It is mostly full sun on one side in the summer and then in winter it really does become all shady with some morning and evening light. Originally I wanted this inch to be a live edge bench but with all the chaos and decision fatigue of construction we just went with whatever. It’s nice enough!
Cotinus ‘Grace’, Ceanothus ‘Diamond Heights, Bulbine ‘tiny tangerine’, Achillea and some Armeria
Tim got me that egret at Burning Man in 2012. As we were driving out someone had a bunch still up in their camp and he got out and asked if we could have one. I love it so!
It's a cold and damp here in Oakland. We went for brunch and then took a walk over by Lake Merritt, where we played on the Mid-Century Monster and explored the Mediterranean Garden.
The Mid-Century Monster, recently renovated and repainted green, everyone loves playing on this sculpture and it's so nice to see if back up and accessible. It was originally created for the 1952 California Spring Garden Show. I need to look up pictures of that to see how it was displayed.
I'm such a fan of the Lake Merritt Gardens and have been bringing Jack here since riiiiight before he was born. Here is my TMI story... A month before Jack's due date, and just two days after starting my maternity leave, my water broke unexpectedly. I was freaking out, and the doctor advised me to wait before coming in for some reason! To calm me down, we took a walk at Lake Merritt. I vividly remember wearing a muumuu and Crocs—quite the sight! No amount of walking around in a nice garden and looking at Canada Geese was going to calm me down though.
We walked around through the Mediterranean Garden and I was just struck by all the texture and patterns during this walk-through. Once again reminding me of one of my favorite landscape books From Art to Landscape by W. Gary Smith. That book is one of the things that firs got me thinking about the use of these forms and pattern in actual landscape design. When I was in school for Computer Animation creating textures from photographs was one of my favorite parts of modeling
There are a number of patterns found in nature. Types include repetition, symmetry, drift, serpentine, spiral, branching, radial, and fractals.
Of course many of these are used in any kind of design work.
I like this example of serpentine and repetition. The tall upright palms are repeated all along the serpentine path, both drawing the key farther and farther into the landscape.
One of the interesting things about going on garden tours in other areas is that you get to see the local trends. One thing I noticed at the APLD 2019 National conference in Seattle, WA this year was that almost every garden had Dolly Tub planters, from fancy French vintage ones, to reproductions, to plain old galvanized tubs. This is a very french garden look to my mind and I just love the PNW twist all the local designers gave their pot designs.
This one is probably vintage and fancy but couldn’t you just use a trash can? LOL. Here the pic and then my trashy interpretation.
A dolly Tub is just an old fashioned wash tub and the ‘dolly’ part was the agitator stick women used to swish the washing around. The tubs are barrel shaped to keep splashing to a minimum. Some of the old authentic ones you can see the round marks on the bottom from the dolly. Pretty cool! Here are a couple of other examples from the tour.
You can find these by just searching ‘Dolly Tub’ or ‘galvanized planter’.
Once again I am writing this way after the fact and I don't have all the names of the designers, etc. It's hard to keep pictures and notes straight while out and about on a tour. There are people everywhere, there is no where to sit, the tours are actually pretty short. like how much time do we really spend in each garden. Not to mention that fact that these tours are OVERWHELMING. It is so hard to process all this info in the moment. After the tour of a specific garden you are then hustled on to a bus and I ALREADY am a bit queasy on a large bus so I absolutely do not want to be looking at and typing on my phone on the bus.
What would be ideal organizational method be going forward?
maybe,
1. create directory in Apple Photos for each garden when you get the tour itinerary. 2. then create heading in maybe the NOTES app so that I can write up any specific quick notes I have. 3. have a small notebook to take notes in while walking around?
The project we are working on now is big and fairly complicated. They have an amazing palm tree in the backyard that is in the way of the new pool pavilion we have designed for them. It's a residential lot with some weird angles and an existing pool and other built elements that are making siting the pavilion difficult. Hence, we are moving the palm. It is a huge and mature Brahea armata - Blue Palm, how much does this thing weigh?! A lot.
We called in the local 'Palm and Avocado Tree Guy', Gary Gragg, of Golden Gate Palms Nursery fame. You can visit the nursery in Richmond, California; find more info here: https://www.goldengatepalms.com/
We invited Gary out to take a look and to ask about the possibility of moving the palm. He comes out and says, "No problem, let's move this baby girl!" Or something like that, anyway.
Mature Blue Palm getting transplated
Gary is a bit of a character - outgoing, gregarious, knowledgeable, and very positive. A true and delightful plant geek. We actually had him out to our own house a few weeks ago to consult about avocados. My spouse is obsessed with having avocados. We bought three and they got planted all together in one large hole - 3 plants, one hole. Read what Gary has to say about avocados in the Bay Area here: https://www.goldengatepalms.com/avocados
Back to our Walnut Creek project... Gary and his crew arrive and maneuver their excavator/forklift into the backyard. The receiving hole has already been excavated and the palm is ready to go. After lifting the tree out of the hole, they decide to go get a smaller forklift. I love how insect-like this machine is!
We all leave for some lunch and freaking out. But Gary comes back with the new forklift and they get back to work. I go back to standing around watching and kind of squealing in alarm. At some point, the palm is off-balance and all the guys jumped on the back of the forklift to balance it out. I admire this "get it done" attitude that appears to be fairly reckless about personal safety, but at the same time I do NOT want to see someone get flung ass over teakettle onto the pavement.
They can't grab the tree from the base like I was expecting. Which makes sense, there is no way to keep it stable from that position. The thing is dang heavy. Instead, they grab it around the middle and slowly drive around the pool to its final resting place.
The pool toys gently drifting about is making me crack up for some reason. So serene!
HOPEFULLY, it will bounce back from this fairly traumatic move! Palms, as you can see from some of these photos, have a fibrous root ball rather than a tap root. They don’t mind being moved but it’s still a trauma and you never know! They need to keep the root ball HELLa moist for a while, while the palm acclimates.
We did a whirlwind tour of some gardens and nurseries with Nigel Dunnett when he was here giving a present ration the Bay Area APLD district.
I would love to try this naturalistic planting design that he and Piet Oldof and such talk about but I’m not sure our clientele is the best for this technique. So, Client context matters and ongoing maintenance matters.
Our work primarily involves small to medium residential gardens NOT large scale public installations we are seeing in photos. It’s not as though our clients have dedicated gardening staff.
Who will maintain these gardens post-installation? The homeowner? A standard mow-and-blow service? I’m just not sure the more loosy-goosey evolution of a garden like this will work for say, a busy family of four.
And like, detailed written-out progression plans? idk. But my sense is that any POE visit after installing one of these at some normal Lafayette homeowner is just going to show a field of weeds and oxalis. Is this cynical of me? I’m thinking particularly of a client sending me photo of her garden a year or two after it was installed and it was all just Centranthus ruber °՞(ᗒᗣᗕ)՞°. I mean.. Centrathus is a pretty pink flower and all but NO. /rant
Back to the garden tour! This was a very fun and wild garden that you can see evolved over time and at the whims of the homeowner and designer. There were so many fun paving details like this and surprise seating moments
This is a John Greenlee project and he joined us for the tour. So it was great to have him there to talk about the gardens evolution.
A nice picture of Nigel Dunnett and John Greenlee
I love an old shed with tools moment.
the planting textures really stood out to me.
There were many ‘view moments’ where you turn a corner and suddenly you have a cool view or an interesting garden sculpture or water feature to look at. At one point I was so pleased to see one of the glassword color-changing roses made by The Sun Brother’s Studio folks! I swear I took a picture but now I can’t find it.
Gamble Garden was nice enough to let us use their pretty dining room for our board meeting this year! We had a new member join us with some really awesome new ideas. We got a lot of work done in a lovely setting!
I’m into the rainy fall weather will all the colorful fallen leaves
In September I went to sketch with the East Bay Sketchers at the garden on top of the Salesforce Transit Center. Two weeks later they discovered cracks in the beams and closed it! I hope they figure out what is happening and reopen it soon.
I did not know that there was a little funicular to get to the top. sadly, it was not open when we got there.
We walked around and looked for good views to draw. Somehow, once again, I seem to have not taken any pictures.
I drew the courtyard area. It was a very lively and colorful space!
I was very interested int eh planting plans. There were some trees that I gave the side-eye as ones that get HUGE. like is this really engineered to deal with a 130 ft.dgf Aurucaia araucana? I’m sure they did think of everything.
I absolutely love the book Fearless Color Gardens by Keelya Meadows. I knew she was a local designer because she has a little exhibit at American Soil and Stone and I knew her home garden was open sometimes but I was not sure of the details. I joined the Garden Conservancy this year and lo! her garden was on the Open Days list! I made T. come with me.
I love all the quirky paving, concrete forms, and amazingly fun use of color. I wish my own garden was just like this. It was a bit over the top for T. though and I suspect he will object.
I’m desperately in love with that leopard-spotted Ligularia and must acquire one for myself immediately.
I like the textures in the photo I took at American Soil and Stone. So stripes, much vertical! I find visiting stone yards to be very satisfying. Magpie-like I usually want everything there.
Two plants I am enjoying in my own yard right now. This yellow lotus plant and my Spraxis bulbs! Aren’t hey pretty?!
What else has been happening? We have been doing a few small plant installs at work.
Oh and I kind of love this picture of J*** buried under plants in the car. LOL.
I had a fantastic time at my second APLD Conference. It was wonderful to reconnect with friends from last year and see familiar faces from the Bay Area.
Just outside the hotel was the Santa Fe Railyard Park. The park featured beautiful hardscape and plant designs, a children's play area, and lovely gardens. I particularly admired how the designers incorporated the railroad tracks and other historical railroad elements into the park's design.
Right from the start, I was so excited that the keynote speaker was W. Gary Smith, the author of From Art to Landscape: Unleashing Creativity in Garden Design. I totally fangirled a bit and brought my copy of his book for him to sign. He was super nice and signed my book for me. Gary is an accomplished landscape designer, having won APLD Garden Awards and worked on many renowned gardens. Coming from an art and design background myself, his book really attracted me and I often refer to it.
These are in no particular order. I’m just dumping photos.
Check out these interesting gabions. They are partially filled with glass slag chunks! Neat!
This garden just had a TON of amazing architectural details. I love to fun round pavers, the colors! The whole thing!
During our East Coast visit, we spent some time on the MIT campus. It was really lovely to see where T** went to school and to show J*** around. The campus is beautiful. T** shared a fantastic story about dropping thousands of super balls from the ceiling of one of the buildings. We’ll leave out the environmental impact of that little adventure!
This might be the building he was talking about.
We came across signage for a rainwater harvesting project that was quite impressive. It’s great to see these types of initiatives on a college campus, inspiring young minds. This project features a 50,000-gallon cistern, and all the collected water is used for flushing toilets and landscaping irrigation around the building. Here isn article from 2009 about it.
Rainwater Harvesting at The Strata Center
We came across signage for a rainwater harvesting project that was quite impressive. It’s great to see these types of initiatives on a college campus, inspiring young minds. This project features a 50,000-gallon cistern, and all the collected water is used for flushing toilets and landscaping irrigation around the building. Here isn article from 2009 about it.
We also admired a rock wall memorial, complete with a water feature and seating area. I like how the rock retaining wall follows the form of the built up soil behind it.
The campus had some gabions in use as well. For those who are unfamiliar, a gabion is a wire container filled with rocks, which can be construction waste like broken concrete or other large rocks. They can serve as seating if you add a nice cap, and as retaining walls if you include a barrier on the retaining side. My feelings about gabions are mixed. While they’re an excellent way to keep broken concrete out of landfills, they need to be filled with pieces that fit well and look nice, which can add time and labor to a project. Moreover, there’s the concern about little fingers getting caught or small rodents and spiders making homes in them. However, with the right client willing to cover the extra effort, they can be a sustainable and attractive option.
The weather was incredibly humid, something I'm not used to anymore! I do love the East Coast though. Later we will meet up with some old friends and then we are off to RI, one of my favorite places!
It’s road trip time with my sister! You can find her here: Bookmaniac. She’s incredibly smart, funny, insightful, and all the things I love. Simply the best!
Anyway, we’re embarking on a road trip south towards Santa Cruz filled with infinite silliness, and our last stop is to pose by the giant artichoke, stay tuned. It’s May in California so it is grey and FOGGY. We have many layers with us.
Succulent Gardens
2133 Elkhorn Road, Castroville, CA 95012
I mostly took pictures of succulents on this trip because we stopped at Succulent Gardens in Castroville, CA, to marvel at their amazing collection. This huge nursery, hidden along a winding road near Moss Landing and all the otters in CA, specializes in a wide variety of succulents and has some fun and creatively designed display gardens and greenhouses. I don't know why but seeing rows and rows of tiny succulents all alike is so visually pleasing! While there, I also signed up for a workshop to create a succulent frame planter, though I somehow forgot to take a picture of it.
Succulent close-ups.
More succulents….
I did buy some stuff…
As promised, here were are looking a bit disheveled in front of a large artichoke.
I heard the Sunset headquarters is going to move so I wanted to dash down there to visit it before it relocated. When I first moved to CA I worked just down the street but did not know about Sunset magazine at that time. Nor did I particularly care about gardens at age 19. Anyway, my friend and I jaunted down there to take some pics.
I’m so glad we did! I just love the color and texture they are playing with. The bright orange, round trellis is also speaking to me. I would like to own this moon gate trellis for myself!
I have an absurd amount of photos and I simply am having trouble picking which ones to upload so there will be a lot. I have already lost the actual garden info so this is for your eyeball enjoyment only.
This garden was amazing.
Look at this gorgeous copper gutter. I want this.
I like how they carried this purple color throughout the garden
