Summer Garden Projects - How to Create & Manage an Exterior Design Project

Now that we’ve witnessed the majesty of the total solar eclipse - we turn our eyes back to the glory of our terroir - our land - our gardens.

No special glasses needed.

Every summer I tackle a home-based garden room project or hardscape design that time and budget allow.

This year, there must’ve been something in the air - and I mean more than those ions swirling - pre-eclipse. Because most of my clients also had some major projects in the queue.

For the month of July especially, we were happily overscheduled; Designing, presenting, installing.

For sheer beauty, for best horticultural practices, and to solve a problem or correct a space flaw. Good garden design offers the single best makeover for a better lifestyle. I just love when my clients text and email me how much they are enjoying their new garden(s) -- how they feel they are in a splendid vacation locale! Nothing beats garden love.

Here then are a few snapshots of garden makeovers -- from concept to completion. I love those HGTV Shows that take the viewer from Yikes to Yesssss! So without too much text -- Pictures are worth a thousand words -- let’s get going with the magic of technology.

Project 1 

Challenge: New patio. Hardscape needs, plus garden beds to soften the look. Careful to not limit egress with garden beds. And produce a new garden under the windows looking out to view and pool.

Before-ish image of patio. Already, the top deck has been removed here. A blank slate.





Here is the interim -- arches are in, stucco going on.

I pick up from here with garden design - here are the before and afters.



This is the artist Jean Galle's rendering that was part of the client presentation. My garden design drawings spring to life with Jean's talent -- allowing the client to readily see the change and design.

Here, the design was to create a series of Pillar Potting Beds

* Five, 3 different sized beds - allowing for egress, conform to pillar and arch metrics and location

* Drainage to channel drain

* Center bed 30 x 24 x 8

* 2 side beds - 30 x 16 x 8 - flush w pillars

* 2 corner beds - angled

Here and below - you see how we laid out the Pillar Planters for size & scale

This is the actual first planting in the new Pillar Planter Beds!




So exciting -- getting there!

Next up was the mason -- our wonderful Irish national mason, Aiden. I had them put in a sleeve for the irrigation hook up later, along with drains in the side window border garden. I asked previous mason, a great Mexican American, who also worked at our home, to put in drainage from the Pillar Planters out to the french drain in the lawn, some distance away. Grading and drainage is key here. The gardens front the bay and the view of the Manhattan skyline beyond. 

Sandy beat up this area rather badly…  Recovery continues in stages...



Window Garden

I wanted to design a 4-season garden that can be enjoyed as a winter garden and not block the view during the summer or warm-weather season. There should also be a plant show element - using perennials for not only low maintainance (even though the Duchess team does the horticultural fine gardening work we need to create a garden bed that doesn’t require fussy care.)  That show part is garden entertainment -- something always in bloom -- lots of color and texture. Good bones.



This is the before. The pavers were removed to allow a garden bed. And like the High Line, not a deep garden bed.

This is the artist's rendering of mixed border to-be:






With the client’s approval - we got to work.

I went with Aiden the mason, to choose the border pavers. I wanted a textured top; nothing too expensive as the plants will swoon over the tops. The gray color will match the pool pavers that will be installed next year -- so thinking ahead.

Needed to take out the weeds and the “dirty” soil that was er, dumped in, following all the construction work. Duchess team put in topsoil blended with horse manure for a rich, bedding environment to welcome the new plants.



Exciting first shot of the new, English Garden bed!



As part of the Garden Design Presentation, offered a number of choices: edible, single plant or mixed border.













Boxwood provides good bones and evergreen look. Together, we decided a mixed border would offer the most bang and joy.

I also wanted plants that provided a pretty look from inside the kitchen windows -- almost a flat top looking down perspective.

Here’s the varied plant list that punched up the color and look and feel of the transitioning outdoor design.

Plant List:

• Lavender ‘Hidcote Blue’ 12” x 12” summer
• Salvia ‘Marcus’ 8” purple
• Aster ‘Happy End’ 3” Pink autumn
• Achillea ‘Love Parade’ June - Sept. 18-23”
• Toad Lily Tricyrtis - 30” h x 12” w
• Gaura- ‘Stratosphere Pink Picotee’ 18-24” May - September
• Verbena ‘Homestead Purple’ 12-18”
• Eupatorium ‘Baby Joe’ 2-3’ purple - Autumn - I had to get this -- not only do I love it -- I have the big Joe in my border garden -- but the client’s name is Joe!
• Hydrangea serrata ‘Tiny Tuff Stuff’ 18-24” x 18” blue to pink - Love this size and color - even in the winter.
• Delphinium grandiflorum ‘Summer Blues’ 10-12” spring to summer
• Baptisia ‘Screaming Yellow’ - 2-3’ x 2’ spring/ early summer -- We planted these in the blueberry garden bed for texture and color contrast (love blue and yellow - so French).
• Liatris ‘Kobold’ 2’ x 12-15”

Everyone was thrilled with the results. 

I just love when the client clasps their chest and repeats, “Oh my gosh. Oh my god!” Over and over. And then takes the time to text how beautiful it all looks and how the family is enjoying. 

Such garden glamour...

Good garden design is hardscape, grading and drainage planning, careful selection of plants -- all with a recognition of lifestyle and personalities.

This is the start of a change in the use and look of the outdoor space. More summer projects to report on.

What projects have you taken on this season?

If you want to make a change in your garden design -- after all, lifestyle changes occur so outdoor needs can grow from a child’s play area with lots of turf to one that boasts more of an outdoor living area with kitchen, sitting areas, and healthy edible gardens.

Tips for creating a garden room

Planting gardens and hardscape construction both require a professional. Whether you ultimately end up with a DIY project, it’s best to get a seasoned pro to offer ideas and design concepts and a suggested budget estimate. Yes, that will cost money - just like you pay an architect or an attorney or other professional for their talent; but at the same time you will benefit in terms of time and budget by bringing in outside counsel.

From there, you can retain the garden designer as a garden coach - helping lead you through the process but with you doing most of the work and labor involved in researching hardscapes and plant choices, shopping the nurseries and quarries, securing soil, mulch, pavers and more for the bones of the landscape space.

Did I mention irrigation and lighting?

And finally there is the installation of the plant material - by season, height, color, texture -- to garner maximum benefit. Knowing plant companions and interactions is knowledge accrued from experience and learning. I myself attend as many lectures and garden tours with horticulturists as my schedule allows. I bring that knowledge to my clients’ projects.

If you choose to have your garden designer carry through the project to completion, you can rely on their design and build expertise -- and follow up for the fine gardening maintenance that will need to be provided. Gardens are dynamic. They require care - even if low maintenance plants are selected. After all, they are living things! And there’s no denying it -- Gardens are an investment. Gardens and good landscape design (vs. “mow, blow, & go” lawn care) add to the value of a home with estimates ranging from a ten to 25% boost to a home’s cost.

And the intrinsic value is well -- priceless...

What luxury and enduring garden glamour….

Greenacre Park is a Jewel of a Garden - Like Tinkerbell, She Needs You to Keep Clapping. Fight For Light

This is a park with a pedigree.

It surely was kismet when a Rockefeller helped create a pocket-sized, jewel-box of a public park in Gotham back in 1971.

Creating a park in that era was an investment - a sign of hope for the future of a city that some thought wasn’t worth it -- even the American president in 1975 offered a kind of Bronx cheer to the citizens of New York City.

Today, NYC can truly be thought of as the “shining city on the hill” that other American presidents from Kennedy to Reagan emphasized when referring to America.

But we really are that city! Everyone who moves to New York City comes with a dream. To be the best. To feel that urban frisson and work with all kinds of people. And contribute to our shared community.

Greenacre Park is a beacon. Yet, its own light is slowly being snuffed out… We can’t let that happen.

Greenacre Park

Recently, I was privileged to be part of a garden tour with our Metro Hort group - the “association of professional horticulturists in New York City and the the tri-state region.”

I so appreciate this working group of professionals - we meet at the Fifth Avenue/Central Park Armory in the winter for lectures and how-to’s and bonhomie - in order to increase our knowledge and skills, and in the warmer months, we tour outstanding gardens and parks, organized and led by the respected hort professional, Sabine Stetzenbach - who I had the honor to work with at The New York Botanical Garden

First up this season was the outstanding public garden: Greenacre Park.

I think I have it right that we were the first professionals to be invited and accorded a full tour by the Greenacre Foundation staff who manage, operate, and maintain this urban arcadia. Our Greenacre hosts were Joe Renaghan and Lois Cremmins.

I’m kind of embarrassed to say that I never visited this park previously. Don’t repeat my mistake. This is a must-see; trust me.

In an elevated, theatric sense of style, you enter this garden space by stepping up into it. You alight upon it. There is that sense of arrival -- leaving the street and - like crossing a threshold - entering another world. It’s indeed one of the more glamorous gardens I’ve seen - and I mean to compare it estate gardens, as well as parks and parts of botanic gardens.

In addition to the sheer delight taking in the trees, perennial plants, and that majestic 25-foot waterfall over granite that makes living in New York -- or any urban environment where one is delighted to discover so much dramatic nature and beauty - (just as in New York’s Central Park) - it’s important to note these urban oasis’ are a designed and built environment.

While I’m not entirely sure, I do think that many New Yorkers - and others - believe the parks - and for that matter - the botanical gardens - are preserved remnants or remains of what was once a more native landscape.

However, the truth is, all of our parks and gardens and public spaces have been professionally designed. With love.

Don’t Look a Gift Horse in the Mouth

Given all the jewel-like references to Greenacre Park, it seems quite appropriate to learn this gem of a park had a woman steering its creation and design. A rich woman too.

Abby Rockefeller Mauzė - granddaughter of the industrialist John D. Rockefeller Sr. gifted the park to the people of New York in October of 1971. With love. And she dedicated the park to her brother Laurence and his associate Allston Boyer, for their help in getting the park created.

She directed the cobbling together of three lots via the Greenacre Foundation that continues to manage the park today. Gail O. Caulkins, the president of the Greenacre Foundation is Mauzė’s granddaughter.

As part of our tour of this “vest-pocket” garden park, the Metro Hort members sort of clung to the hosts and speakers like so many hens and chicks - clinging to the mother plant - to absorb the privileged news and inside, first-hand information and lore. (And to hear over the roar of the waterfall.)

Don’t you just adore garden history? It’s all so precious with its links to money, heritage, locale, and politics and personalities.

The story unfolded… In the 1970’s, there were lots of empty lots in New York City.

Hard to believe it now when there is so much over-construction - (more on that later.)

With a desire to create a public garden, Abby Rockefeller Mauzė established the Greenacre Foundation to fund and maintain a very special space: roughly 60-feet wide by 120-feet deep.

Greenacre describes the space as “slightly smaller than a tennis court.” We’ll take the tennis “love.”

See, good things do come in small packages…

So it’s all the more dismaying to later learn that this gift to the people of New York is being besmirched in that harm will come to the jewel box after developers steal the light.

Garden Design
The look of the park, designed by Sasaki -- Sasaki, Dawson, DeMay Associates with Masao Kinoshita as lead designer and Hideo Sasaki and Tom Wirth - has remained true to the original design. It’s a classic, cultural landscape.

We learned, too, that Mr. Sasaki is still alive and visits the park. He made a surprise spring appearance and contributed to the spring pruning!

The park is comprised of three levels:

• The rear wall at the lowest level is punctuated by the 25-foot waterfall
• The central area, paved with russet brick and layered with tree canopy and seating
• A raised terrace along the west wall with a trellis roof of weathered steel beams and transparent acrylic vaults. There are heating elements there, built into the trellis roof. 

There are 12-foot honey locust trees in the center of the park -- six on each side of the runnel brook that navigates the length of the park from the sidewalk to the waterfall.

These sturdy yet delicate trees provide the much-needed and enjoyed “dappled shade” that visitors embrace and the designer planned for.

We learned these trees are living in giant container pots under the hardscape!

It’s a very unique design, described Lois Cremmins, Executive Director, Greenacre Foundation. “There are large pots beneath us, each with its own irrigation system.”

More magic beneath our feet.

Accessorizing the interior design of the park are mid-century Knoll tables and chairs.

Park goers can arrange them to create their own conversation pods and reading nooks.

We were told that visitors also come to practice yoga, propose marriage, and all kinds of connections.

I asked what the funniest things were that happened in the park -- after all, it is New York City. “There was the time a woman tried to wash her hair in the waterfall pool; and the lady in the winter of ‘72 who dove in the water in her dress -- only to be outdone by the woman who stripped naked to dive in… Ah, the theater of a public park…



We were told that from a construction standpoint, the park is unique because it was built from the “inside out.”

There was a crane on 51st Street that dropped in the granite back wall for the waterfall first, with three pumps. We were told it’s an imperative to keep those pumps in tip-top working order because it would be very cost prohibitive to replace the pumps.

Next, the blocks went in. The stone is gorgeous and dramatic too; a kind of stone art on the walls.

Trickles of water collect from the base of the highly textured ashlar masonry of the east wall and feed into the runnel.

On the west side, the higher terrace, is covered by trellising and acrylic domes, to provide a protected overlook down into the garden.






It’s a lovely perch to view the lower level of the park. And it shows what good garden design can do in spite of the size.

The designers created a sense of movement within the distinct “garden rooms” and offer elevation and movement with the different levels.

It’s a very transporting experience - a delight for the senses.

There’s no doubt the crowning glory of the space is the Greenacre Park waterfall.

The roar of the falling water is a kind of “white noise,” designed to block out ambient urban noise.

The Foundation is testing LED lighting for the waterfall now to replace the previous ones corroded five years ago. The Fisher Marantz lighting designers will complete the work by November. All the evening lighting is managed with a timer.



Here I am with Greenacre Park manager, Joe Renaghan. When I asked him what he did with the Park and he told me he was the manager I looked skeptical, saying I’d never met a park manager who worked in a suit. Without skipping a beat he told me, “I work for the Rockefellers.” So there you go. Gotta love a gentleman urban farmer / gardener!

Plants

The hardscape design creates the framework for the garden-like park. The plants are the fashion statement creating the alluring style and romance.

There is Boston Ivy clinging to the walls.

There are ilex shrubs as part of the evergreen plant portfolio. There are other low-light shrubs, including azaleas, rhododendron, andromeda - Pieris Japonica , Japanese Maple, Star Magnolia, to name a few. “We see what plants do well, “ added Cremmins. I especially enjoyed the crape myrtle, the Japanese umbrella pine and mock orange.

Sabine and her team from Town & Gardens are tasked with selecting the annual plant palette in the bowl and upright containers. They change out the plants two times a season, refurbishing the soil, pinching, pruning and providing plant love.

The colors and the textures just pop!

While the T&G team does the heavy hort work, Charlie Weston is the resident park maintenance guru for the park and has been there since the park opened! Talk about committed passion for a garden…



.

Can You See Me Now?

Greenacre has organized a “Fight for Light” campaign backed by the Municipal Art Society; New Yorkers for Parks; Gale A. Brewer, the Manhattan borough president; and City Councilman Daniel R. Garodnick, whose district includes the park.

Why? Because the simple reason is there is too much high-rise building approved that will produce so much shadow that the park will lose light.

Light for people; light for plants; light for life.

I read that as part of the Greenacre Park’s dedication by the City Parks Commissioner, August Heckscher said, the Greenacre “... places no burden on the city, which makes no demands, which asks of us only that we cherish it.”

Why don’t we cherish it now? I can only speculate. Greed comes to mind…

Here is my kinda garden rant:

Look, horticulturists and garden lovers understand that change is a matter of course.

Nature and time change things. We get that. And so just like that, neighborhoods change too.

But there needs to be an element to managing a sustainable change. Let’s not wholesale sell our neighborhoods away to building and real estate and the promise of profits for a few.

Let’s be realistic.  Don’t you think there should be shared “sacrifice” so to speak?  We can’t allow the few to be “Takers.”
And make no mistake, if the continued construction of these huge buildings continues, there is a quality of life that will be taken -- taken away forever from the people who live and work in the neighborhoods.

There is some cosmic comedy at play that is traces the thoughtless “Takers” in real estate development and city government and the “dark side” because of their ability to permanently create dark spaces in our life.

Don’t let this happen.

To continue to use the metaphorical - I hope that we can effectively combat the forces of darkness to preserve the light -- and the beauty of our gardens and parks.

Don’t get me wrong - I adore “Shadow Art.” So much so that I have a Pinterest board devoted to the interplay of light and shadow. But that s a natural, ephemeral, moment of beauty.

What we’re being subjected to in the case of Greenacre Park is the permanent “shading” of the space - as in “pulling the shade” and “lights out.”

Let there be Light

There isn’t a living soul who isn’t charmed by the romance and beauty of this garden park. Tourists, locals - residents and office workers.

So why smite those who only asked us to “cherish the space.” Why indeed?  Again, all signs point to selfish greed.
Building bigger and higher. For what? Half the time people don’t permanently live in these structures.

Paley Park has lost light as you can see in the photos below. I adore Paley Park - I ate breakfast and lunch there for so many years… It was a gift everyday to find a spot and soak in the ambience of water, oxygen, people and light.
I deplore the deliberate, calculated destruction of its environment just as I do that of Greenacre Park.

Think of this destruction of our parks as similar to that of the Amazon rainforest or the wholesale change in habitat in Africa or our seas.

Environmental destruction is a kind of creep. It catches us all unawares.
Next thing you know there is the man-made horrors of the Dust Bowl or the famine in Africa due to clearing of the trees…

We need to get mad - get angry enough to change this creep from occurring.

Nothing gets between a New Yorker and our parks. Remember when Bette Midler organized protests against the Giuliani administration to prevent them taking away community gardens? The running joke was that Rudy could bust the mafia but he couldn’t break the gardeners’ will. He bowed to the green enthusiasts. Bette created the New York Restoration Project that continues to honor art and beauty in our city.

If these gigantic buildings are allowed to continue - it has truly giant ramifications - not just for Greenacre Park but for other parks, for community gardens, for our quality of life.

Rezoning should be an issue that we all have a voice in. We need the power to control the element of light in our lives.

What to do?
Care enough to make a difference for Greenacre - and other parks.

• Like and follow Greenacre on social media - @greenacreparkny
• Join their mailing list to receive alerts. 
• Text GREENACRE to 22828 to get started.
• Go to www.FightForLight.nyc and send emails to Mayor Bill de Blasio urging him and his administration to preserve the sunlight
• Commend Borough President Gale Brewer and Councilman Daniel Garodnick for their support of the Fight for Light

You can make a difference.

Think of this like Tinkerbell in Peter Pan. If we stop clapping - or caring -- the light. Goes. Out.

I tell my own garden clients and often say at speaking engagements I’m privileged to talk at - that healthy plants need three things: water, sun, and love.

Can you show the love?

The Greenacre garden / park is open from the first week week in April to early winter.
You can get to the Park via public transportation: take the 4,6 and get off at the 51st Street station or the E, M to the 53rd Street station.

Plants of the Future and Edible Foodscapes Premiere at Plant-O-Rama 2017

As Bob Hyland, founding father of the horticultural celebration he christened "Plant-O-Rama" was thanking the packed auditorium at the morning session for coming to the 21st annual horticultural trade show, jobs fair, and symposium he conceived 30 years ago - it was worth noting that as he introduced the keynote speaker, Kelly D. Norris - that the young “hort-hero” is not yet 30 years old!

At the same time, Kelly is at the top of the Hort game - a leader extraordinaire in what has become known as the “Emergents” - meaning those young, up-and-coming leaders in horticulture.
I daresay it’s not far off the mark to affirm the Emergents and Kelly, especially, have totally “arrived.”
Kelly is a powerhouse plantsman with experienced knowledge -- so much so that I got to wondering later -- perhaps he is the long-lost prodigy or better yet - a reincarnation of Carl Linnaeus. While no doubt Kelly would have “grown” and “blossomed” on his own merits - (sorry - too rich to not use the hort references...), Kelly and his Emergent cohorts were introduced in a Rodale Press feature reported as the “next generation” of horticulturists by our favorite garden and hort author, Ken Druse.
(I have every one of Ken’s books - most autographed - and they are always relevant and delightful.) Thanks, Ken!
(And I’ve been buying the Ellen Hoverkamp scanner photography art showcased in his recent, gorgeous book, Natural Companions: The Garden Lover's Guide to Plant Combinations 

I was privileged to first hear Kelly speak at The New York Botanical Garden's 4th annual Hortie Hoopla - a robust career Green Day for NYC-area interns, conceived by NYBG’s Charles Yurgalevitch, Director, and I reported on the event at Garden Glamour.

Left to Right: Me, Kelly Norris, Ken Druse

More than just plant knowledgeable - Kelly hits the hort “hat trick” of taxonomy/botany/design); moreover he possesses an old-soul dynamic and confidence not to mention, authenticity, that both astonishes and delights garden enthusiast audiences.

Kelly manages to blend solid science with dreamy experience. In fact, that is the essence of his charm. He’s never that “gotcha” horticulturist that is more keen to snap you into ID’ing a plant with its botanical latin name (which he of course does with professional modesty and frequency); rather he is one to provide that essential information in a practical and respectful way while he shares his cosmic love and adoration of all that the plant kingdom has to offer and teach us. 
Plus there is that infectious enthusiasm. This man can’t help teach us about “gardening with a purpose.”

For me as a writer and author, I’m also gobsmacked by Kelly’s language and vocabulary skills. He positively radiates - shimmers - and glows - with redolent phrases, adjectives, and verbs -- to better captivate and intrigue his audiences. This is a rare talent and his linguistic skills and oratory mastery captures, teaches, and excites us - all at the same time -- while never stooping to snarky (well, maybe a bit) or ever stooping to a holier-than-thou hort elitist platform that can be off-putting to many plant and garden design enthusiasts.

Planting for the Future
What Did Kelly charm us with under the rubric of “Planting for the Future”?

He talked about gardening as an “experience.”

There are things that increase the experience - and that is “essence of a garden’s style. “Plants should not just survive but they should thrive,” he admonished.

Gardens need to have a purpose. It was enlightening and refreshing to hear that we need to garden with a purpose. We need to savor our plants and the environment.

Kelly made a point that I personally think needs no amplification - which is that today’s gardeners need to have the passion that today’s chef’s possess. He cited how chefs are focused on ingredients - and that gardeners and landscape designers need to have that same cobra-like focus on using the best plant ingredients in the garden as chefs do in the kitchen and restaurant. I write about food and drink - coming at it from the garden perspective - and I can tell you that my work researching and reporting on farm-to-table and garden-to-glass - has its own struggles and triumphs - all of it based on the ability to source and spec ingredients - by and large those that are plant-based and come from reliable growers.

While it makes sense that food growers and farmers may have led the way because we eat these ingredients - there's that intimate relationship with a chef's culinary creations - there is also a growing awareness about the need to not only bring local and seasonal cut flowers into the home, but there has been a long-standing movement to use native plants in garden design.

From my perspective, the problem isn’t the gardeners, but rather the plant nurseries that don’t stock the natives - they cater to the fashions and vagaries of what - the market? I am confounded as to how nurseries select, grow, and provide nursery stock. While many will readily admit they prefer not to sell exotics, or “invasives” - i.e. non-natives - they feel they must, because it sells.

I personally feel that it’s a closed loop - meaning that too many “landscapers” are merely “mow, blow, and go” guys -- and yes most are men -- and that they don’t know anything about the plants so they’ll take whatever is available at the nurseries - thereby inadvertently adding to the "it sells" strategy. Furthermore, the horticultural industry was too influenced by exotic plants that folks of means could afford to plant at their country houses and estates - so all fell in line to stock them…

Here in America, we gave short shrift to our native prairie grasses until a Dutchman, Piet Oudolf deemed them new and exotic for our gardens and parks, and suddenly they become the ornamental darlings they are today.

I go on..

But I do understand Kelly’s insistence that we need to have that passion for ingredients - in designing and creating our gardens - we need to pay attention to the plants that create the living palette or “dish.” It’s just that it does no good for garden designers like me to research and spec out the right plant for the right place only to have the nursery force the garden designer or true landscaper into a substitute. Or increasingly, breeders are increasingly creating or propagating plants that are patented - and possess branded products that aren't so readily available. We need to remedy this issue in order to truly make a difference and move the garden experience to where it’s beneficial for the sustainable ecosystems. Don’t you agree?

A really exciting element that Kelly presented and got the plant juices flowing - is to discover native and local plants “in the wild” that can thrive in our gardens. We can see how these plants have survived through climate chaos to grow in any number of “crazy situations” - and that because they can readily adapt, will work better in urban environments.

See, the thing is that even though we have a yearning for all things rural, more of us are living in urban worlds - and that’s only going to increase in the future. The plants that have proven themselves to be resilient and ecologically superior - are our friends. Let’s embrace them.

Plants are opportunists -- and context can be informational with a nod to ecology.

Kelly says he never uses wood-based mulch at the Des Moines Botanical Garden where he serves as the Garden’s first-ever director of horticulture. Instead he uses plants. Sedges are green mulch! Natural plant mulch will repair soil, capture nutrients, build biomass, according to Kelly.

He says there is a natural history to the plant combinations and ingredients he employs there so there is also that “sense of place” or Genius loci. 
Lesson learned is we shouldn’t forget that bottom layer of garden design. Plants can be that foil or cover for other plants as they go in and out of their “profile” or “portrait” moments… 
Think 3-D and the art of planting.

Further, Kelly suggested we garden designers - and by extension - you - consider scale. Most US home have a small footprint for the yard, all things considered, that is approximately 8,900 square feet - including the house. He pointed out that here is that enduring, sterile nature of suburbia with its endless lawn and foundation plantings… I think this started in the 1950’s and we’ve done so little or nothing to change our perception of American success from that vision of home ownership/lawn/flag of the housing developments that were created for returning GI’s and their families.  Isn’t it time we take gardening back to some of the natural plant companions that were plowed under to make way for these housing developments on a mass scale?! We can rediscover the beauty and charm of our native and natural plants, for sure.

Despite a garden's small size, Kelly cites the paramount need to provide more plant diversity -- noting that in some of his recent designs he’s included more 24 different species in a garden no more than 150 square feet. We need diversity in our plant portfolio just as we need it in our financial portfolio!

Native Plant Examples:

Examples Kelly provided included Eupatorium perfoliatum ‘Milk ‘n Cookies’ - an oh-so beautiful Boneset (burgundy foliage and white flowers) that “just need some friends to “lean on,” he joked. Don’t we all?

And like fashion on the runway - let’s think about New -- not those same ol’ petunias that one finds at the big box stores. Kelly showed a number of glamourous, strong dames including Silphium perfoliatum (Cup Plant)- Rosinweed that is a native, sunflower-like perennial is “resilient architecture,” stunning and has a lot of “sex appeal,” according to the Kelly. These plants moreover, hold the soil. Here the plantsman cited the tragedy of the Dust Bowl and how irresponsible plantings and arrogant development wiped away the top layers of soil. On the other hand, native Silphium has 10-15 inches of roots - a resource that does double duty. Plus the Land Institute and others are using Silphium to store carbon as well as to extract its oil for cooking and fuel. (Some claim it can be used with rice and 

molasses to avoid pregnancy!)

The aster family is truly breathtaking. I love its members and cultivars; using a variety of these colorful and strong plants in many of my garden designs.

Other water-wise plants Kelly suggested include, Eryngium leavenworthii - from the carrot family - this thistle or Sea Holly is strong and adds a showy and textured element to the garden palette.

Another example Kelly showed was the agave - in particular the Mangave ‘Lavender Lady.’ What a dame! This plant offers a big, smoky rosette - and rapid growth.  Geum triflorium, ‘Prairie Smoke’ was another beauty.

For dry shade there is the worst plant name ever: Diarrhena ovata (oops!) This is an American beakgrain ornamental grass that loves deep shade green and is evergreen, along with the much cuter-named Pussy Toes whose silvery foliage and late spring flowers add style to a dry shade garden as well as to green roofs.

What these hard-working natives have in common is their strength, ability to withstand climate chaos, and smart use of precious water -- they thrive when exotics have your water bill clocking ever upwards. So use them. These prairie plants can teach an urban (or suburban) city slicker a few tricks!

Kelly got us excited about being in a time where we are on the verge of “discovering” an entire new palette of plants.

It got me to thinking that while in past generations the adventuring plant hunter was revered because he found ever-more exotic plant species to bring back to our environment - the new plant hunter will instead research and find those hearty and beautiful plants right in our own landscapes - those that have learned to thrive and provide.  Just like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz said - “Next time I go looking for my heart’s desire - I won’t go looking further than my own backyard.” I’ve referenced those pearls of wisdom all my life but now it seems especially apropos. And it helps this reference that Dorothy was from the Great Plains - just like so many of these plant prodigies.

Kelly continued to provide plantings with a purpose and suggested that we design using plant “communities” using keystone species to achieve a kind of ecological minimalism.

And remember that “Plants provide Beauty and Purpose.”

Landscape design is one of the true luxuries that appreciates with time. Unlike other art though - it is dynamic -- it changes every day, bringing added, newfound joy.

Edible Urban Oases 
The irrepressible Brie Arthur - another "Emergent" - spoke about edibles and the Foodscape Revolution which also happens to be the name of her first book - out later this year and now in presale.

She describes herself a true “plant nerd” but also claims to love insects in an “irrational way!” You can’t help but want to hug this woman. She advocates for living green walls -- suggested that if the Mexican “wall” was built using green, fresh vegetables, and herb edibles - she’d be all for it!

She points out how we need green infrastructure and with it we can surely feed the world. And our soils and souls. She suggests using common spaces of communities and streetscapes for planting edible ornamentals.

I’ve used edibles as ornamentals for more than decade for garden clients and they love the color and texture -- and the taste! It’s a delight to group edibles by color and season.

Brie detailed how to grow organics, and use hydroponics as well as aeroponics -- employing a soil-less growing medium - a space saving strategy that works especially for tight urban spaces.

A great suggestion Brie offered is to use edibles at the front of an ornamental garden -- within easy reach and much better for the garden bed than that wood mulch; thus adding more biological diversity, as well.

Brie stressed the need for diversity in our edible gardens. Don’t think just tomatoes! She emphasized the beauty and ease and taste of growing one’s own grains and cruciferous plants. Lovely to see wheat and rice as part of an edible plant palette. My dear horticulture associate, EunYoung Sebazco was the first to grow rice in New York City - and has since devoted resources and experience to educating and exciting the rest of us about not only how to grow rice, but how this plant has influenced the world via its cuisine, nutrition, art -- think fashion, textiles, pottery, crafts, and fine art! See here at LiveRice.com - you will discover a new-found reverence for this ancient and hard-working grain.

Brie refers to rice and blueberries as the “gateway” plants to edible foodscaping! She showed chefs at upscale country clubs growing ornamental - and edible - rice (purple and red) with astonishing and tasty results!

Trade Show          

Later, we walked the trade show element of Plant-O-Rama. Some of my favorites there included:

Pennoyer Newman -- Virginia and her custom, classic garden containers and fountains that are always the talk of the show. Love the collections -- and Virginia!  

Virginia Newman

Rare Find Nursery - This Garden State plant nursery offers unusual (compared to the aforementioned, nameless nurseries) and intriguing natives that add glamour to every garden I’ve sourced from Rare Find. The container ‘Rochester’ witch hazel they showcased at their table was intoxicating -- strongest of the fragrant witch hazels -- I’d never smelled one so divine. I once gave my girlfriend Jelena a ‘Jelena’ witch hazel for her birthday!

Curb Allure - These metal tree guards are handsome and offer great utility. I first saw these creations a few years back and admire their look and their smart attention that work for the plants in the beds (including a “Pup-Pee Protector.) Too often the beds are lined with hardscaping that doesn’t allow for the water to reach the plants. This solves the issue.

Thank you, Plant-O-Rama.

The PawPaw Fruit Tree is not the Unicorn of the Garden! Discover its Homegrown Taste

PawPaw. Say it again. PawPaw. Isn’t it lyrical (in the true sense)? In fact, the pawpaw is indeed a beloved American folk song, a kind of treasured nursery rhyme, and a full-throated scout song. Sing it with me: “Picking up pawpaws; puttin’ ‘em in your pockets, pickin’ up pawpaws, puttin’ ‘em in a basket. Way down yonder in the pawpaw patch.”

Ahhh - it’s all coming back. Bet you thought it was just a fun song - and that it is, no doubt. However, the backstory to the popular ditty is based on solid horticulture.

The Asimina triloba or pawpaw is a true American, by and large eastern native -- and homegrown personalities from George Washington (a chilled pawpaw was his go-to dessert) to Disney Paw, paw, patch have sung its glories. The tree is the largest native North American fruit that boasts a banana-like, mango, honey taste with a custard-like texture. After all, it’s in the same plant family as the custard apple and ylang-ylang.

I planted an asimina triloba - aka: pawpaw about 16 years ago in a Garden State client’s yard in a front garden room, as part of that bed’s native plants composition. It was a good-looking tree right off the bat; big elongated, curvy leaves that appear rather tropical that turn a soft yellow in the fall.

From a design viewpoint, I wanted the Asimina to work with the other plants there, especially in the autumn complementing the birch’s yellow leaves and the callicarpa/Beautyberry's purple berries.

Yet, after the decade-plus euphoria about the tree itself waned, (just a smidge) and I was more horticulturally sophisticated :) -- I so yearned for the fruit. Where oh where was the pawpaw’s dreamed of fruit?

I reached out to Clemson and other land grant universities to determine why we had no fruit. The answer was embarrassingly obvious. We needed a mate! Yet how to determine the sex of your paw-paw was not entirely clear to me; plus with lots of seemingly more pressing deadlines and needs - I just didn’t learn the gender of our baby...

Then, with no matchmaking or OK-Cupid -- there was no denying those purple, royal-looking, double-frocked, cone-shaped flowers dripping from the paw-paw this spring - surely a hopeful sign of good things to come.

See, the paw-paws can spread by runners or suckers -- thereby creating the irrepressible “way down yonder in the pawpaw patch.” Somewhere in that patch tree love took root!

(There is a very scientific reason to explain the rhizomes and their ability to separate as new plants to reproduce.)

So, it was with great excitement that a few week’s ago, that Darin - a very talented horticulturist and Master Gardener I'm privileged to have work with me and Duchess Designs, pointed up to the low hanging pawpaw fruit! I could barely contain my joy.

This was news to share with friends and like-minded food and garden tribes on my social media: @chefsgardens on Twitter and Instagram and @GardenGlamour and on Facebook, too. Folks were pea-green with envy! :)

I couldn’t wait to try the fruit. One was soft already despite it being only August and the fruits generally don’t mature till early autumn around by me. I couldn’t wait.

Back home, I cut the fruit lengthwise - kind of like cutting into an avocado (the pawpaw leaves are not unlike that of the avocado, as well) - and reveled in the satisfaction of at long last seeing this kind of unicorn of the native fruit world.

Slowly, I scooped up the custard like flesh and tasted. It was thick, creamy, truly a mash-up of banana and mango -- perhaps a bit of pineapple or papaya -- as billed, with a bit of a sugary, honey aftertaste.

Altogether, it tasted like “more!”

I tried to stretch out the tasting as long as I could. It was refreshing and at the same time the texture was substantive - if you know what I mean. The pawpaw fruit premiere tasting was everything I’d hoped for - plus.

There was no denying that some of the pleasure was the built-up expectation - that feeling you get when you finally visit a dreamscape or see a work of art completed. Or “eat with your eyes first” when viewing a charming tablescape presentation. It all figures into the sensuality and enhances the overall experience..

I couldn’t wait to share the paw-paw: it’s a rare treat “discovery” and yet native stalwart that helped sustain the Native Americans and pioneers. This is such a great backstory of the known and obscure, the native and yet exotic.

At the same time, there wasn’t too much of the fruit to be had. I gave some to my client, after all. In thinking of recipes I could use to show off this native garden star - my thoughts turned to dessert; prompted by the custard consistency I opted for a pudding. I had just made the corn ice cream the week before or I might have created a paw-paw ice cream treat; I think the pulp would work very well in a frozen dessert: sherbet, sorbet, or ice cream. Or just add to cream or as a topping for ice cream - I tried it with the corn ice cream. Wow.

The recipe I decided upon to showcase and celebrate the first paw-paw harvest was a panna cotta. I adapted Giada’s Food Network Panna Cotta recipe. I figured the creamy texture and honey/sugar ingredients balanced out the paw-paw fruit - making it a perfect partner. More pawpaw love.

It was indeed perfect. Light, cool, smooth, with a hint of something tropical. Our guests delighted in the pawpaw treat while I shared the story of this native tree and fruit and its folklore.

So now that I’ve got you yearning for the pawpaw fruit -- my yoga friends were begging where to purchase - the stark reality is it’s just too darn rare to get.

I researched why it’s not available in stores and found confirmation. According to the Georgia Department of Agriculture, “The fruit’s short shelf life – two or three days at room temperature and a little longer in the refrigerator. A commercially viable fresh fruit must hold up longer for shipping and storage. Other reasons ... could be problems with propagation. Pawpaws don’t transplant well from the wild. However, unlike apples and pears, pawpaws grown from seed are similar to their parents. The downside is that the seeds should not dry out, are slow to germinate and require a period of moist chilling before they will sprout. These things could have kept the best forms of pawpaw from spreading beyond their local area in the days before there were nurseries to select, propagate and distribute the best ones.”

Yet, I urge you to forage for them if you’re in the pawpaw’s native growing region -- and that is a pretty wide swath. When ripe, the fruit drops to the ground - so look down -- and pick up these beauties while singing “pickin’ up pawpaws” and puttin’ ‘em in your pocket.”

Or grow your own. Pawpaws are pretty much a maintenance-free plant. No fertilizer needed. No real pruning. Just watch the suckers or rhizomes. The Asimina triloba are either a large shrub growing 15-20' tall and are noted for growing in low bottom woods, wooded slopes; near water. My baby is in the sun but shaded somewhat by that now tall river birch -- but the property is on the bay - so the water table is ideal.   

I’m a complete native plant advocate for reasons that have everything to do with beauty, pollinators, environmental sustainability, and not the least - their contribution to what makes gardens interesting and enduring. Gardens shouldn’t all look alike using the same plants just because they’re propagated more readily on a global scale. Seek out natives and you’ll be surprised at what you discover. Pawpaws have a place “in the garden and in the kitchen.” And they’ve made so many people happier.

Cheers!

Pawpaw flower photo courtesy of Carolina Nature