Plant Talk

Anacortes Artists' Front Garden Engulfed in Silky Beauty as Poppies Take Over Streetside

When Anacortes artists Anne Schrievogl and Al Currier returned home from seven weeks on the road, painting their way through the Grand Canyon, Yosemite and other western States, they found their front garden colonized by a mass of silky splendor. California poppies have taken over streetside. "Look what I came back to! Color!" Anne wrote me last week.

These eager little poppies volunteered - and their sunshine colors are so perfect with the color of the house and moongate. As with the 'Tropical Sunset' poppies (above, left) from Renee's Garden Seeds, California poppies are annuals that bloom for a long time and happily self-seed. Their warm, luminous colors are the perfect antidote to chilly, gray summer days...

"I credit the birds for planting these," Anne explains.  When I ask what she did to encourage the poppies, she replied "I left town. (plants thrive when I leave, quiver when I approach them). Seriously, they've been sporadic in growing, yet building in volume. I think in the past 6 months we broke them up and evened them out a bit. They seemed to like the extra space and attention. That's it!"

See more of Anne and Al's home and work in a story I wrote in Pacific Northwest magazine last spring about their garden and studios in Anacortes...

The "It" Plant for Summer 2012? A Truly Black Colacasia Is In The Running...

Will we ever get over our romance with black plants? Not if they keep producing glories like the new Colocasia 'Black Coral', with glossy black leaves veined in electric blue - really, this is such a jolt of a plant, it could carry a big pot or anchor a border all by itself.I think it must have the most truly black leaf I've ever seen - usually "black" plants are dark shades of burgundy, purple or brown....

Supposedly hardy to zone 7B, this colocasia should probably be treated like an annual if for no other reason it'd take so long to get going in our cool springs - it wants the days to be above 70 degrees and the nights at least 50 (hey, so do I!). This exotic looker wants as much sun as you can find for it, and moist, rich, well-drained soil; the same conditions as a hydrangea or a hosta, but with full-on sun.

You'll want to pair the deep, dark leaves of this showy elephant ear with hot or pale colors so it really shows up - the more sun resistant huecheras maybe, or there must be some blue-flowering annuals with fluffy yellow foliage, although I can't picture any at the moment... I can see pumpkin-colored calibroachoa foaming up around it, or the chartreuse sweet potato vine (Ipomoea batatas 'Marguerite') tumbling down the side of the pot. Just keep it simple, because 'Black Coral' is a scene-stealer all by itself...

Photo courtesy of PlantHaven

     

White Flower Farm "The Garden Book" for Summer 2012 is a Stunner...and It's Free

I was lured into planting my first garden more than thirty years ago by the images in the White Flower Farm catalog - I remember ordering daylilies and delphinium...I probably never even got past the "Ds".....

Hydrangea paniculata 'Vanilla Strawberry' is the cover girl on the Summer 2012 catalog (order a copy of the catalog here), and only a small example of the plant porn to be found within...

Our local nurseries are so well stocked now with most everything you can find in the WWF catalog, and with other advantages (pick out your own plants, no shipping, lower prices) I rarely order from the catalog anymore, but I still adore and study it. It's such a great source of information on new varieties, planting combinations...really, the photos are so gorgeous you can nearly smell the roses, lilies, and lavender, feel the silkiness of the ruffled clematis and poppy petals.

If you're in search of inspiration for pots and hanging baskets, check out the "Carnivale" combo in a tall bronze urn: "Canna 'Tropical Salmon', Coleus 'Bronze Pagoda' and Verbena 'Aztec Plum' with a hit of lantana and yellow helenium.

I got into growing tuberous begonias (like B. 'Orange Cascade', left) because of the catalog's luscious photos. And the dahlias...it's like a primer of the most covetable of these most covetable summertime beauties.

It's a sign of the times that WWF is emphasizing annuals less and vegetables more; they're selling tomatoes, peppers, salad greens, raspberries, and a "Beginner's
Veggie Garden Collection"

From my first garden nearly forty years ago to now, White Flower Farm has been about quality. It's still the place to buy as close as you can get to a ready-made garden, pick up something new and glamorous (I fell for their extravagant Clematis 'Crystal Palace' a few seasons ago when it was still exclusive to WWF), or just study, and dream over the beautiful, and still free, catalog.

White Flower Farm has always specialized in soul-stirring flowers, like this red and pink Clematis 'Avant-Garde', which hardly looks real, and poppies like P. orientale 'Salmon Glow' (bottom photo). All photos courtesy of White Flower Farm.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Natural Green Walls and Hanging Baskets - Summer at Snoqualmie Falls

I've been thinking about our great attraction to vertical green surfaces, in part because a vast green wall will be a feature of Seattle's first West Elm store - to open in early October across from Whole Foods on Denny.

And while manmade green walls are a pretty impressive dose of nature, especially when created indoors, I was reminded this week that there's nothing like a natural rock cliff sprouting ferns, mosses and native plants. Especially the green cliffs of Snoqualmie Falls, kept abundantly lush by the continual spray from the falls - which were plunging vigorously and noisily even this late in the summer when I'd expect the water pouring over to be diminished (not this wet summer, I guess...).

The haze on the photo is the intense mist generated from the falls, which slicks the sidewalks and drops the temperature about 10 degrees...behind the falls is the Salish Lodge, known for its spa and how, at Sunday brunch, the wait staff pours honey from high onto fluffy biscuits.

Isn't that the most beautiful green wall ever? We were on our way over Snoqualmie and then Blewett Pass on our way to Sleeping Lady Resort near Leavenworth - more on that special place in my next post. But of course we paused long enough to admire these hanging baskets, at the front of the Salish Lodge, planted in multi-colored impatiens skirted with a dangle of fuchsia....

 

Flower Fireworks in Red and Blue for the Holiday

The  garden is blooming red and blue for the 4th of July. Between towering spires of delpinium in blues from pale Delft to deepest indigo, lacy love-in-a-mist seeding all over the place in washy shades of azure, and hydrangea heads coloring up, blue is covered. Red, too, in nasturtiums just coming on, especially 'Empress of India' with its deep red flowers and blue-tinged foliage, begonias, and poppies...now if the brightest red flower imaginable, Crocosmia 'Lucifer', would just bloom a little early, we'd have a full-spectrum color palette at ground level to rival the fireworks overhead...

Blue, blue delphinium are the stars of the early July garden...usually they flower too early for the 4th of July, but this cool spring slowed them down to coincide with the holiday.

Begonia boliviensis is a red/orange stunner that blooms until frost....

Nigella damascena, or love-in-a-mist, is an self-seeding annual in shades of true blue, not a hint of purple. Plant it once, and you'll have it forever - it seeds itself in my gravel garden, but its easy to pull out any you don't want...

Old-fashioned Oriental poppies bloom brilliant red...

And don't forget to keep your dogs safe from all the noise and confusion over the holiday.....

 

 

A Few Nursery Catalogs are Still In Print and Such a Pleasure....

  I keep leafing through a few special nursery catalogs, contemplating a purple cauliflower here and green kniphofia there. I get nearly as much pleasure from the plants on the page as from the plants growing in my garden...perhaps more so because the plants in the catalogs are pure potential.

Just as with magazines and newspapers, it's so satisfying to hold a paper nursery catalog in hand. I admit I search out plants online all the time, but turning pages, marking favorites, and flipping back and forth between possibilities is much easier and more fun than clicking around. I get so much better sense of the plants, the nursery and the people behind both with a catalog in hand than on a computer screen.

So here's what is in the pile right here on my coffee table:

Annie's Annuals and Perennials offers such a tantalizing selection of unusual plants...Annie gives lots of commentary ("How to Have a Fabby Garden....") and the catalog is packed with color photos...from a ruffly pink double cosmos called 'Prom Dress' to the fragrant heirloom orange sweet pea 'Henry Eckford', Annie's offerings are irresistible... be sure and check out the poppies, like 'Black Swan' (left) which is dark purple and so double it's positively shaggy, or Papaver 'Drama Queen' with ruby red flowers that look like mini-petal-explosions....

Also free and in print: White Flower Farm, B&D Lilies, and the full-time-job of a fabulous catalog from Plant Delights Nursery. I don't know about you, but I may as well just endorse my paycheck over to this nursery, for it has the best assortment of hostas and the coolest hardy succulents you'll find anywhere...

 

Cool New Container Plant

Graham Rice  wrote recently about Cordyline 'Pink Passion' on his RHS new plant blog, so we too should take note of this flashy new annual. Perfect for containers, 'Pink Passion' is all about color, with stiff, slender spikes in white, beige, dull purple and rich magenta. The effect is of gray and pink sparked with a touch of white, and I can imagine it planted with a cuff of plum-colored superbells (Calibrachoa 'Million Bells Purple), or as the focal point in a pot of dark and chartreuse sedum, all of which would enjoy the same hot, droughty conditions as the cordyline. Or it'd be fun to play against the sweetness of this cordyline's color scheme by surrounding it with spiky black mondo grass in a galvanized metal tub....okay, I'm off to the nursery....

Not Your Grandma's Bedding Out...

I drove up to Vancouver B.C. last weekend to pick up my husband after he rode his bike up there in the RSVP event. I took Bridget, our rambunctious Wheaten terrier, who was welcomed and made over everywhere we went. The staff at the Sylvia Hotel gave her biscuits, even after she had an impromptu play date in the lobby with a pair of glamorous Saluki hounds.

I had dinner with Tom Hobbs and Brent Beattie, before a tour of their cool new urban condo - stay tuned for a story and photos of their fresh new aesthetic in Seattle Times' Pacific Northwest magazine.

I try not to be envious about how civilized Canada is - they are so far ahead of us, and not just in how dogs are welcome nearly everywhere.  They have gun control, efficient public transportation and equitable, affordable health care, as well as flowers everywhere.  How about this updated take on bedding out in the West End? Notice how beautifully these plantings are maintained in a very busy public park.