Landscape Sketchbook - Plan View

I came to landscape design through drafting and design, not through plants or gardening. When I first started landscape design classes I seriously did not know a single plant. LOL. One of the first classes I took was planting design for some reason. It was kinda hard since I knew absolutely zero about plants. :D

But I looooved hand drafting so much. It’s one of those activities where I can really get into a flow state. I like CAD drafting as well but it is not nearly as soothing.

I like to doodle these plan view symbols. Would it be weird to get some of these tattooed on myself?! No, no it would not be weird.

colorful plan view plant symbols

colorful plan view plant symbols

Plant Combo

Sphaeralcea ambigua, Dichondra argentea 'Silver Falls', and Carex testacea.

I got this Sphaeralcea from Mountain States Nursery a few years ago, I can’t remember what variety this nice peach color is. The yard was still being trampled by construction so this spot was where I put all my randomly acquired plants. So far I have NOT cut this plant back in the Fall so it tends to get leggy and awkward looking. It really should be cut back to about 6 in when it is done flowering.

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Texture and Pattern in the Landscape

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.

CA native plant seeds

The S & S Seeds site has a bunch of cool seed mixes AND the extra cool thing is you can request a custom mix based on your particular criteria.

Their database for searching plants is also very granular and so useful.

Picture of bright orange California Poppies,Eschscholzia californica, in full flower and the interesting seeds heads that are exposed when the petals fall off. In the background and out of focus is a Convolvulus cneorum, a low ground cover with silv…

Picture of bright orange California Poppies,Eschscholzia californica, in full flower and the interesting seeds heads that are exposed when the petals fall off. In the background and out of focus is a Convolvulus cneorum, a low ground cover with silver-grey foliage and white flowers.

Moving a Palm Tree

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.

More APLD Tour Goodness

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.

Iresine herbstii 'Aueoreticulata'

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Iresine herbstii 'Aueoreticulata'

This is also called Beefsteak Plant. This particular plant is hanging out outside my hair stylist building. Normally this isn’t a plant that we see planted outside in our Mediterranean climate. But it’s doing quite well in this protected area with reflected heat in a container.

I love how vibrant the variegated leaf and bright pink stems are.

Garden Tour - Keelya Meadows

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.

Some plants and a visit to American Soil and Stone

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.

Right Tree, Right Place

This is a handy tree guide made up for PGE by California Polytechnic State University for the Bay Area, Northern and Central California. If you're working on a site with power line issues this tool can be quite useful.This page has some handy guides for selecting the right tree for the right place based on some other guidelines like allergy and toxicity or fire safety.

You can order a Right Tree, Right Place poster from PGE here and download a cute poster for Palm trees appropriate for use near power lines.

The people who planted redwoods right next to the power lines at a recent client's property could have used this guide 15 years ago...

Pretty Little Grass - Melinis nerviglumis

This is such a pretty grass! I have one that I got from Annies Annuals. Devil Mountain has it listed as Rhynchelytrum nerviglumis but I have only seen it as Melinus nerviglumis. It’s not exactly low water but I really love the soft pink plumes.

From San Marcos Growers site:

Melinis nerviglumis (Ruby Grass) - A small semi-evergreen cool-season grass from S. Africa that forms a tidy 1 foot tall clump. It has blue-green foliage that turns purplish-red in the fall and showy pink flowers that rise a foot above the foliage in the spring and summer with spent flowers still attractive into winter. Best in full sun with regular water in a well-drained soil but tolerates considerable periods without irrigation and near seaside conditions. Is hardy to around 20° F and perennial in gardens in USDA Zones 8 and above but useful as an annual in colder climates. Cut back in fall to midwinter to allow fresh new foliage to emerge in early spring. A very attractive grass massed or scattered in a border planting or as a container specimen. This grass is called "one of the showiest of the small flowering grasses" by John Greenlee in his "Encyclopedia of Flowering Grasses". Ruby Grass is native to large areas of Africa south of the Sahara and also in Madagascar. There are several interpretations for the entomology of the genus name. One thought is that it is derived from the Greek 'melas' meaning "black" for its black seeds but another thought is that it is from the Latin 'mel' meaning honey for the sweet aroma some species have. The specific epithet is in reference to the veins on the glume (flower bracts). We have grown this plant since 1997 and early on used its older name Rhynchelytrum neriglume. This same plant is marketed under the names 'Pink Crystals' and 'Savannah' and besides Ruby Grass is commonly called Bristle-leaved Red Top. It should not be confused with the related Melinis repens that has naturalized in disturbed sites along the California coast. 

Pleasant Hill, CA Rasputin Music Green Roof and Landscaping

I'm just starting to drive around the far East Bay (i.e. Walnut Creek, Pleasant Hill, etc). I drove buy this Rasputin Records Shop the other day and was kind of surprised to see the nice landscaping and green roof! I stopped to snap a few pics and I probably should have run in to ask who did their landscaping. Next time!

Anywho, how cute is this?! Do I see some invasive grasses? Yes. I am trying to ignore them though. :)