The Madonna Inn Secret Garden

This was my first time staying at the Madonna Inn. I’m a fan, for sure now. So pink! So over-the-top opulent! We stayed in The HideAway Room which was a tad dank, if I’m honest. But who cares?! I got to shower in a pretend grotto!

The pool was great.

We only stayed at the hotel for like under 16 hours. We had to check out and rush off in the morning to go tour CalPoly. But I did jump out and take a few pictures of the Secret Garden.

I dig this entirely secret garden that literally no one knows about!

I’m always paying attention to color combinations in plantings. Peachy pink with purple, pink with dark maroon, dark red and yellow. All super pretty for a lovely cutting garden.

Mission San Juan Bautista and Mission San Miguel

My son and I headed down to Southern California lat week to visit colleges.

We took the 101 down and went to a couple of CA Missions. The first one was the San Juan Batista Mission. There was a lot going on! Live music and Mass outside, I think. Someone there is having a blast making succulent containers.

Visiting California's missions is always pretty interesting. I didn’t grow up here so I never had the elementary school missions curriculum that so many here tend to have. Instead, I had mad amounts of Texas history shoved down my throat. I really like visiting old historic sites in general. The missions do make me feel pretty sad though. I can't help but feel unsettled by how the missions' darker history is often glossed over. While they do often have exhibits about the pre-mission cultures the devastating impact these institutions had on indigenous peoples and their cultures should be more prominent.

This visit was a tad different from my previous visits as it was Sunday. It was CROWDED! And, I have to say, the activity and joyfulness of whatever was happening was really nice to see. Like, the past was some pretty horrific treatment of the indigenous population but now, at least, they seem to be vibrant centers for local community celebrations.

The other mission we visited was the Mission San Miguel. This mission has a larger museum and it was also very busy! There was live music, immense amount of tacos being made, and a quinceañera or two happening as well.

Baskets! I love basket weaving. They had a really nice exhibit of the different plants that were used and a display case filled with examples of baskets from a variety of indigenous cultures.

Some architecture and church pics. I only took one picture in the church because a girl was having her quinceañera photoshoot. I wanted to take a picture of her and her amazing fluffy purple dress but I did not! Every picture I took I was secretly seething because they just put signs everywhere and on every wall and door. So ugly! I tried hard to get the least amount of ugly signs in my photos.

My Animal Crossing New Horizons Island

I got a Switch Lite in 2020 during the pandemic and it was a huge source of comfort. I had played one of the other Animal Crossings, one that was on my phone and I eventually deleted it because it was taking too much of my time. At some point in 2020 I had to back up my island and move it to another switch and I thought I lost the save data and I cried. In front of my kid. Since then I have started a bunch of new islands. This newest one is called Eschscholz and my character is Poppy, obviously.

I am at the point in my island where I have most of my villagers and am already crapping up my layout.I need to get this thing under control so I have made a bubble diagram.

Key Elements/Areas

  • Shopping/Commercial District by the airport

  • Housing areas - mainly the suburbs, a beach community, and my personal estate.

  • Secondary housing areas - Hermit in a woodland swamp that leads to my cheesy Florida Beach Motel.

  • National Forest and camping area with a large lake. I might add an island in the middle that you can access using the Mario pipes.

  • The River Anduin that leads through river valley to The Argonath and Mount Doom where I will attempt to create a rock circle.

Why, you may ask yourself, is an adult obsessed with this kinda silly-seeming decorating game? Because it's awesome, that's why. It's a cozy, low-stakes game where all my cute little animals are happy to see me. I can decorate their houses and yards to match their personalities, and I can terraform and breed flowers to my heart's content.

Moving people through space and 'decorating' that space is what landscape design is all about, after all. We're constantly thinking about circulation patterns, sightlines, and spatial hierarchy. Where should paths lead? How do you create inviting gathering spaces? What views do you want to frame or conceal?

While the flower colors and textures are limited, breeding them is fun, and so is experimenting with color combinations and accessories for the gardens.

Personally, I think this is a perfect video game for landscape designers.

I should do a post about flower combos at some point!

Atlanta - Day Four

Day four was the day of the wedding but we had some time beforehand to take a walk to the Jimmy carter Presidential Library. I gotta say, I was underwhelmed. The map and descriptions made it sound better than it was. And it was hella hot out. Here I am looking sweaty yet pretty obviously Presidential. Hahahaha.

There were some nice, serene moments in the garden.

We walked to and from the library on the Freedom Park trail. There were many squirrels. I was unsure what this tree with the bean pod looking things was.

Then off to the wedding where we looked very cute.

The wedding venue was really pretty. The bride had, hands down, the best wedding dress ever. Some silliness with old friends. The flowers were all hand picked by the bridal party and arranged for the tables. So pretty!

I’m sorry to say that it all went downhill (in a good way) after the bride and groom left in their Georgia Tech themed car. :P

Exploring Atlanta - Day Three

Day Three!

We decided to walk to the Atlanta Botanical Gardens

The greenway walk on the way there was pretty nice with lots of people out and about. Also, seen... a dog restaurant with a hilarious promotional photo I did not photograph. There was a huge open air market getting set up and what looked like an epic bouncy house festival with a million huge bouncy houses.

The Botanical gardens were setting up their Alice in Wonderland exhibits. Some are there all the time and some are new for this event.

It is always inspiring to see gardens in places you are not familiar with. I loved all the sculptures. the first one was this pair of wire birds sitting in really pretty swathes of green grasses. I just love how the color blocking draws the eye to the birds and the water feature.

I don’t think we managed to see all the Alice in Wonderland themed sculptures. This Earth Goddess woman is part of their permanent exhibits.

Some of the more specific Alice ones were the Cheshire Cat, Alice falling down the well, the queen playing crochet, and the shaggy dog (also in the permanent collection) made out of Carex testacea.

Oh man, there’s just a lot! There was a little conifer collection. I love confers ever since touring the conifer garden of the President of the American Conifer Society in maybe 2016-ish(?). A few pictured here in hypertufa pots making me want to try making hypertufa pots again…

We headed in to the Conservatory next.

They had a really great cloud garden. I’m embarrassed to tell you how many times I have attempted to insert one of these into a clients garden. LOL. At this point I should just try putting one in my own tiny backyard landscape.one can buy round pruned plants from many nurseries. Cloud pruning - or Niwake style pruning - is just pruning hedges into cloud-like shapes. I feel like I want to make joke about all the CA native plants I see horribly box pruned around here. A video about cloud pruning in case you are wondering how this is different from box pruning.

Anyway, check out these balls.

More plant pics incoming. I almost didn’t go into the orchid garden for some reason. I am glad we did.

There were many nicely designed containers all over the gardens. I love this cobalt blue and peach color combo! I really want to spend more time designing containers. I have a couple in my yard that are in sore need of replanting.

We were so hot and exhausted at this point. We ate at the fancy restaurant there and then on the way home we rented those Lime scooter thingies. My first time doing such a thing and I was terrified. But it ended up pretty easy to pick up how to do it and we made it home. I will say those, money-wise, it was way more expensive than just getting an uber or a ride share.

Then, we were off to the beer garden party for our friends’ wedding. I kinda wish I had a pic of my dress because it is my new favorite. I wore it with sneakers because my feet were tired from walking all over the garden!

Exploring Atlanta - Day 2

We are within walking distance to a place called Ponce City Market and I see they have a breakfast restaurant called Pancake Social. It did not disappoint. Behold the custom tiled floor. Pancakes were a bit gluey but still good.

After exploring the market a bit we we attempted to take the bus to Fernbank. We failed and ended up calling an Uber because the bus never came. Fernbank is a Natural History Museum with some attached gardens called Wildwoods and Fernbank Forest.

First, dinosaurs!

Y’all, it’s hot out okay? I am pink and frizzy.

On to the other garden walks. This portion is a raised wooden walkway with some really lovely cathedral like structures. In some of these photos you can see stone walls. Those are part of the original land granted to the museum by the Harrison family. After the raised walkway , there are more paved paths and then you can walk through the rest of the old land on some rockier trails. I was not wearing the correct shoes. And I swear I took photos but… I don’t see them in my photo roll. I might actually have been too hot to take many photos.

We headed back into the museum to see the show about polar bears but first we stumbled on to my favorite natural history museum thing… dusty old dioramas. I swear, I just love them. I don’t know why. Again, where are all my pictures?!

This whole series of sequential dioramas of a dinosaur dying and being buried was epic.

A dusty ground squirrel and two raccoons harassing a turtle. Heh.

Exploring a bit of Atlanta - Day 1

We made it to Atlanta!

Is it just that I am old now that a flight across the US utterly knocks me out? It ends up being an entire day of travel, and then I am left feeling grubby and dehydrated.

Before traveling, I tend to do a lot of googling of the location, and I made a saved places list in Google Maps. After I figure out the hotel, I google to see if there are any gardens close by or any gardens/landscapes in the city that are noteworthy that I think I might want to see. In this case, I settled on the Hotel Clermont - a refurbished motel and apparently a local iconic establishment. There is a local neighborhood shared garden just around the block! Perfect! What else looks good? The Atlanta Botanical Gardens and some place called Fernbank. That is really all we'll have time to squeeze into this visit.

Anyhow, we made it here, and I LOVE our hotel. It is so freaking cute. Great details, lobby is super nice, a bar and a restaurant, and a rooftop bar as well. Did I steal a Clermont Hotel pen? Yes, yes I did.

two happy looking people relaxing in a hotel lobby holding plastic cups of champagne.

We arrived, checked in, dropped our stuff off, and headed to the bar where we had some delicious cocktails. Then we walked down to the Atlanta Goddess Garden - https://www.goddessgardenatlanta.com/about. The weather here is... sultry. It all feels sort of primally familiar even though I am no longer acclimated to this kind of humid heat. It's nice to have a warm evening walk though.

This garden has a wild and overgrown feeling. Walking along the paths, there are many small shrines, seating areas, and spaces for growing edibles. There are also a lot of rats scurrying in the undergrowth, so I'm unsure how they can sustain any veggies or herbs!

Here is the description from their website:

"Created by Shasta Zaring in 1990, the Goddess Garden Atlanta is an urban wilderness habitat and healing sanctuary nestled in the heart of the City of Atlanta. It is a sacred space dedicated to the Divine Feminine in all religions, paths and cultures. Altars to Goddesses from various world cultures adorn the paths and are tended by the Garden's keepers.

This one-acre private preserve, open to the public during daylight hours, is cultivated without the use of pesticides and herbicides and is a certified Audubon Society Wilderness Habitat. Located just off the Atlanta Beltline, the Garden is in walking distance to many city attractions, such as Ponce City Market, Historic 4th Ward Park, Carter Center and Little Five Points."

So it is privately owned but publicly available space. I wonder if they have to worry about insurance. Apparently, they have classes there, an attached AirB&B, and does seem like a nice place to go and chill in some lush green space! i can see that it is def. a labor of love for people in the neighborhood!

After our stroll we headed back to the hotel, drinks on the rooftop bar, and some dinner.

Plants are the cheap part

I still love that I get to draw for part of my job. Having grown up with the notion that drawing was fairly useless and not a viable career, I of course steered myself in other directions and did not strenuously pursue drawing seriously. I regret that! I mean.. look around, how is it possible to think that drawing is not a thing of value? Everything you look at was most likely drawn by someone at some point in its development. aaaannnnywhooooo… I’m not bitter or anything.

Image of my messy and colorful desk covers in books about plants, drawings, and markers. there is also a tiny cat paw in the upper left.

Plants are almost the last thing to go in and everyone has sticker shock at that point. “Can we reduce the number of plants”? Yea, I guess you could. But why? You will just be disappointed with how sparse your landscape looks!

Here is what your hellstrip will look like with jut the ground covers.

Here is what it will look like with some flowering yet easy care shrubs and some boulders and cobbles. Do it!

The NY High Line and Little Island

We jaunted over to the Easy Coast this summer. T** and I went to NY. I had a whole different thing planned with J*** but then he ended up not able to go. I am versatile! I can adapt! T** and I did have a good time.

We visited the High Line again. They had a cool native plant area and some pretty cool art. I think this was a part I had never been to.

More beautiful plants and interesting spaces. Adding to the native plant exhibit they had a new prairie grasslands area all planted up. The contrast of the wild and messy plants with the industrial leftovers of the railroad and the NY skyline makes me feel a bit weepy? I am not sure why! It is just so pretty but then also makes me think about the apocalypse and rewilding of urban landscapes contaminated by humans.

We stopped and cooled our feet at this fountain again. I love this fountain! We stopped to have a frose again as well before heading down to the food market right below here.

For a bit of a new adventure we walked to Little Island. I had not been here before (it is pretty new) I think it was maybe under contraction the last time we were here? Either way I had not even heard about it until I was looking around for more gardens to visit for this trip. Like, wtf?! This is so super cool!! This is a park built on an artificial island on piers out on the water!

Oaky, wow. I am having trouble with all my photos from Little Island! I do not know what is up but I will have to come back to this post when I figure it out. :(

In the meantime you can checkout the wikipedia page for Little Island.

Quick Sketches

Sometimes you need to just do a quick sketch and send it off to the client or a contractor. In this case the client has a bunch of metal bookcases from her now closed retail store. we are the king up ideas to use up some of this metal that is currently cluttering her garage! What to do?!

scribbled sketch of an idea for a metal sculpture in the landscape

This piece would be serving several purposes. It will help block the view from the next door neighbors upper window while the trees and shrubs grow in, it will use up some of that extra metal in an interesting way, and if we powder coat it to match the fountain color it will serve as another bright focal point in the garden.

This is not a careful sketch, obviously, but it gets the point across in an expressive and informative way.

Project In-Progress

Oof, projects in-progress can look like a mess! There is some order to this chaos, I swear! Although, I will say that I prefer less chaos. In my ideal installation EVERYTHING gets done and then, like a week later, we come in with the plants, place them, ponder everything, and then plant. If contractors leave enough wire with their lighting fixtures we can then adjust those at that time. In this install we just din’t really have control of that. I can also see here that the sheet mulching is…. not great. I need several layers of OVERLAPPING cardboard. what happened here was that they literally planted the plants BEFORE they sheet mulched? It didn’t make a lot of sense.

This very small backyard was very boring. Why have a boring backyard when you can have color, and texture, and useable space?

Before picture. Photo is a long narrow lawn with a house on the left and a retaining wall on the right.

Currently, It looks like this. You can see we have added a new path and meanders through the middle of the landscape rather than crammed uncomfortable against the house. We’ve got some colorful plantings, a few small trees to help the absolutely scorching heat, and towards the far end there is a small patio with some raised beds, some really cute terracotta pots for herbs, and a self-contained ceramic water feature. We also bought a nice trellis from Terratrellis to help break up a very large and boring hot wall.

Anyway, I’m looking forward to seeing how this turns out!

Pet the Plants! Stachys byzantina

Lamb’s ears are so charming. They are one of those plants that will attract the attention of everyone, even folks who are not interested in plants, no one can resit petting them. They are great for sensory gardens and children’s gardens. I was just enjoying how they looked in rows at the nursery.

Helen von Stein is a variety that has larger leaves. I think this is one of the ones that doesn’t really flower. So maybe good for a garden with kids who are allergic to bee stings.

Very soft fuzzy silvery grey leafed plant. called Stachys byzantine Helen von Stein

Stachys byzantine Helen von Stein

A couple of other varieties were at the nursery today, including ‘Fuzzy Wuzzy’ and ‘Silver Carpet’.

Keep in mind that these guys spread pretty easily, they are not invasive though. Also, do not give them too much water or they get kind of gross and rotten! ew!

Garden Design Styles

When I tell people I am a garden designer, they often ask me what style of garden I design. The answer is usually that I design (to the best of my ability given a million variables) the garden that my client desires. The garden needs to work for the client! I know many designers prefer to design in one style or another, and so their portfolio reflects that, and then people wanting that style seek out that designer. I have not really reached that point and I probably never will.

I did name my business Wild Things, in part, because I love a wild and unruly garden with lots going on and colors and wildlife and fun garden elements and nooks to explore. That kind of garden is great but not always practical. I ALSO love designing super modern gardens with clean lines and architectural plants just as well.

A lot of what I love about designing residential gardens is the space planning aspect of it. I spend an inordinate amount of time imagining what my clients might want to do in the garden, how they will move about in the garden, what will happen at different seasons, what they say they want/need vs. what I think they might actually want/need, etc. Of course, I'm just imagining all this, and what I really need is for the client to be as articulate as possible about THEIR OWN garden imaginings.

There is a business plan activity that I have encountered several times now that wants you to describe your perfect client. One of the items on my list is a client that is really engaged and curious about the possibilities. They will have a Pinterest or Houzz board with ideas, they will have memories of gardens from their childhood, and they will have some practical views on what they and their landscape can manage.

It's actually a tall order. If someone has never designed a landscape, it might be hard for them to come up with all of these ideas. That's why Pinterest and Houzz are actually such good resources for folks. Just diving in and getting a feel for what might be possible and what you find visually intriguing is a great start. I do often have to sit down with clients and dive into WHAT about a picture they are drawn to. Is it a specific plant, the style, a color combination, etc.

So the job of figuring all this out is really what draws me to this vocation. I do, of course, love plants, but plants come much later in the design process.

I was thinking the other day about how I played as a child. And I basically sat around in my room with my dollhouse decorating it and redecorating it. I had a million of those glass or ceramic animals you could buy at the Hallmark store (there was one just outside my neighborhood), and they were the inhabitants of my dollhouse. Mainly because I thought most human dolls were creepy. So, that's a lot like what I do now. LOL.