You know those Victorian-style wrought iron garden chairs – all curly cues and roses? I’m not a big fan of them. Despite their diminutive size with miserly seats not much larger than a dinner plate, they can weigh a ton. And as much as they’re designed to enhance a garden, beckoning guests to stay awhile,…
When my brother and I were kids we spent several formative years enjoying a backyard that had no lawn, a veritable forest of unclimbable trees, vast swaths of mulch (known back then as ‘beauty bark’) and an enormous cement patio. We were forever suffering from scrapes, bruises and splinters from this decidedly child-unfriendly garden. But,…
Have you ever walked down a sidewalk and felt a real sense of community was happening there? Front yards can do that. It’s surprisingly easy to communicate either openness, inclusiveness and friendliness or just the opposite – various iterations of self-imposed isolation – by your front yard garden choices from fencing to flowers to adding…
Of all the colours you can find in a garden, orange can be the trickiest, I think. As hues go, it can glow brighter than red or yellow all the while doing more clashing than complementing. It’s very much a shout out colour. But that’s what also makes it a great colour to have in…
With April showers come May flowers and lots of bees (hopefully) to lap up nectar and do their pollinator thing. I always thought that whatever was served up in a flower was good enough for the average bee but it turns out that pollen and nectar aren’t great sources of moisture. Bees need sources of…
Is this the year you’re going to rip up your turf? Are you looking for an alternative ground cover that’s low maintenance, drought resistant and yet still delivers an eye-soothing swath of green where you once had a lawn? (Yes, I realize I’m sounding like a bad TV infomercial. I’ll stop now.) I’m really excited…
Gardeners have double vision, I think. You’ve got one view towards what’s happening in the here and now. But you’ve also got a picture in your mind’s eye of what will be happening months from now and even into the next season. One way we play out this balancing act is when we plant now…
I learned a new word the other day: hortifuturism. I also learned about a new colour: Cyber Lime. The Garden Media Group, a U.S.-based garden industry PR firm was championing both as hot, hot, hot for 2024 in their annual trends report. “What better color to symbolize the traits of hortifuturism?” the giddy copy gushed…
Of all the trends that pundits are hailing as hot, hot, hot for 2024, none intrigues me more than stumperies. Elegant and always on point Garden Design magazine declared that, along with other rising trends such as installing a rain garden and accommodating for climate change, building a stumpery will be a really big thing.…
Winter gardens are simply gardens that have “great bones” as my mother-in-law used to say. These ‘bones’ are the structures that support and delineate a garden throughout the year but can look particularly striking in winter when there’s nothing else (like flowering plants) to distract the eye. They can be man-made, such as a gazebo,…
Goth gardens are a thing now, apparently. Garden Media Group (a public relations firm supporting the home and garden industries) points out in their annual Garden Trends Report that #Gothgarden(ing) is a natural progression of “our culture’s love affair with the occult”. This year, in fact, they predict we (Gen Z, in particular) will be…
I want to share my thoughts with you about an app I’ve been using that I think has really exciting potential for gardeners. It’s called One Second Every Day (1SE) and, no, I’m not getting paid to tell you about it. But I think you might find it really handy. Or just loads of fun.…
A week into 2024 and so far, so good. I’m very lucky to be looking ahead and figuring life is pretty good. The world is getting more complicated, for sure. But I have so many wonderful reasons to feel grateful and you are one of them. Thank you so much for your interest, for following…
There are so many wonderful flowers that can light up an early autumn garden but I can’t think of one that brings so much to the party as Strawflowers, also known as Paper daisies. Gorgeous colours? Check. Easy to grow? Check. Some weird attribute that makes it a stand out? I think blooms that have…
If you need to install a staircase in your garden you probably have a really good reason for doing so. People don’t usually throw a staircase into their hardscaping plans just because they love to climb steps. There’s a good reason for them and there’s no getting around the fact that they’ll have to be…
Horticulturist, Arborist and Garden Columnist
Celebrating gardens, photography and a creative life
Garden of Flowers, Beads, and Yarns
ruminate vb. to chew (the cud)
Reflections On A Life in Exile
Saint Andrews Forest Farm Blog
a chat over the garden fence
There's always room for one more plant.
a little garden near Gawler
.....and nurturing my soul
Ministry of the fence 