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Books: Scented Design

The latest in the series of wonderful handbooks from the Brooklyn Botanic Garden focuses on the importance of scent in the garden. Without scent, there would be no pollinators, and we wouldn't have the fragrances we all love, whether in soaps and perfumes, in floral bouquets, or outside as we walk through the garden.

Fragrant Designs (Brooklyn Botanic Garden All-Region Guide) includes several introductory essays explaining how scent works: how the brain sorts scent into certain chemicals it can identify and remember; how scent triggers emotion and memories; why men and women experience odors in a different way; the role of scent in pollination; and the threat to pollinators from air pollution.

What follows are several designs for fragrant gardens that can be enlarged or reduced in size and adapted for any zone in the country.  Each garden that's featured has a section containing design and cultivation tips that will make your fragrant garden a success, no matter where you live. There's a description of each plant used in the design as well, and there are many photos throughout the book that illustrate the best attributes of each plant.

There's a "Wildlife-Friendly Fragrant Hell Strip" -- that ugly area between the sidewalk and curb -- planted with Agastache rupestris (sunset hyssop) , Caryopteris x clandonensis (bluebeard), Virginia rose, lemon daylily, English lavender, Sporobolus heterolepis (prairie dropseed), and other plants.  Drawings accompany every design, with numbered illustrations to identify each plant.

Other fragrant designs work in many garden areas:  the front yard, a native woodland, an evening garden, a garden for children, containers and more. I particularly liked the "Thai Curry" container, with variegated ginger, coriander, lemongrass, Thai basil  and coconut-scented geranium, among others. 

If you -- or your clients -- want a garden with fragrance, this book is a wonderful small reference guide as well as an inspiration.

Happenings August 09

Selected Events Around the Country:

Aug 1-2 Flower Show, Stockbridge, MA
Berkshire Botanical Garden, 413-298-3926

Aug 2 Chickenomics, Brooklyn, NY
11AM-1PM, Workshop, Brooklyn Botanic Garden, 718-623-7200
Aug 2 Garden Conservancy Tour, IL
10AM-4PM, West Chicago, IL
Aug 6 Design Strategies, Berkshire Garden, Boylston, MA
6-8 PM, Lecture by Rick Pomerantz, Tower Hill Botanic Garden, 508-869-6111
Aug 7  Cacti & Succulents Seminar, Swarthmore, PA
9:30AM-2PM, Scott Arboretum, 610-328-8025
Aug 8  Sustainable Rose Gardening, La Canada, CA
10AM, Workshop, Descanso Gardens, 818-949-4200
Aug 8, Garden Conservancy Tours, NJ
Mendham, Randolph NJ

Aug 9 Garden Conservancy Tour, NY
Cold Spring, NY
Aug 11-12 Invasive Plants Conference, Johnstown, PA
Univ of Pittsburgh 215-247-5777 x 125
Aug 12, Butterfly Gardening Workshop, Washington DC
10:30AM-12 noon, US Botanic Garden, 202-225-1116
Aug 15, Garden Conservancy Tours, NY, WA
Mountainville, NY; Olympia, WA

Plant Awards - PHS 09

Illicium floridanum 'Halley's Comet' (Florida Anise)
 

Why haven't I tried this plant before?  If it's zone 6, it'll grow in Washington DC and maybe even in protected areas of coastal New England.  No wonder it's one of the 2009 award winning plants selected by the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society (PHS).  It's also deer-resistant, making it a great candidate to replace rhododendrons. This new cultivar is hardier than other cultivars in cold weather and it will survive in dry shade once it's established in the landscape.  Brilliant red blooms cover the plant in May, and the size is about five to six feet high and wide. Plant in part shade, as too much sun will turn the leaves yellow.

Juniperus conferta 'Silver Mist' (Shore Juniper)

 

I've long been a fan of shore juniper -- in my opinion, it's simply the best looking low-growing juniper around, mainly because of its soft, blue-green foliage and lovely trailing habit. But now, there's a new cultivar with a more compact growth habit.  It was found by plantsman Barry Yinger and introduced through Brookside Gardens in suburban Washington DC.This shore juniper is less than a foot tall, is hardy in zones 5-b to 9, and is very tolerant of heat and drought.  It needs good drainage and lots of sun, but if it's planted about three feet apart, it'll knit together into a beautiful year-round ground cover. 

Styrax japonicus 'Sohuksan' (Emerald Pagoda Snowbell)

This particular version of the Japanese snowbell tree was discovered in 1985, when scientists with a plant expedition organized by the US National Arboretum happened upon it on Sohuksan Island off the southwest coast of South Korea.  A cutting was brought back to the JC Raulston Arboretum, where it was established in cultivation.  'Sohuksan' is distinguished because of its superior growing habit, it's large leaves and super-sized fragrant blooms. It grows best in light shade with morning sun, is hardy zones 5 to 8 and will reach a height of about 30 feet.

Conifer Paradise

Iseli Nursery, Boring, Oregon

The next time a client of mine wants a perennial garden, I'm going to scream! I've never been able to understand why so many so-called "gardeners" dismiss needled conifers as plants they simply don't like.  What on earth could they be thinking? This picture above is boring???

During the APLD (Association of Professional Landscape Designers) conference earlier this month in Portland, several of us sneaked away one day for tours of two incomparable Oregon nurseries, including Iseli.  It's only open to professionals for special tours, but if you ever get the chance, don't miss it.  The Iseli offices are surrounded by acres of gardens featuring some of the most incredible plants and combinations I've ever seen.   I always tell my clients they simply cannot have "one of everything" because it's bad design ... but in an instant, I succumbed at Iseli.

 

As you drive into the nursery, you pass a Mobius strip (seen above in the distance) woven from golden Deodar cedar.  It's probably 15 to 20 feet high and at least a few hundred feet long.   It's a long, chartreuse colored undulating wave that is one of the most amazing "plant" sights you'll ever encounter.

Water-wise Urban Projects

Tanner Springs Park Portland

Sustainability ... it's about the only word you hear these days in landscape design, so it was no surprise that the annual conference of APLD (Association of Professional Landscape Designers), held earlier this month in Portland, OR, focused on that issue for a day or two.

One of the city's top environmental landscape architects, F. Michael Faha, ASLA, of Greenworks PC gave a great presentation on the city's efforts to conserve water, increase open space, and protect the environment.  You can see highlights of the presentation by clicking here.

One of Faha's projects, above, was planned as a place for contemplation in the busy Pearl District.  It was formerly a railroad yard, and although the creek that ran through the property has long been buried, the design recalls the former wetland that once upon a time occupied the site.

10th & Hoyt Apartments

On our walking tour, we saw many other water-wise sites, including the Apartments at 10th & Hoyt Streets (left) by Koch Landscape Architecture. This innovative design channels water (only when it's raining) through gutters that spill into water features throughout the building's plaza.

The Koch web site here has many more photos of the water features and other views of the gutters and the main plaza.

Origami Roof Garden

Check out my cover story .. An Origami Landscape ...  in the July 09 issue of Landscape Architecture Magazine ...

It's a Brooklyn roof garden in the DUMBO (Down Under the Manhattan Bridge Overpass) area along the riverfront ....

A stunning design by landscape architect Steven Tupu of Terrain-NYC Inc.  You won't often see anything more original.

Books: Classic Italian Gardens

There is something about a black and white photograph that conveys a certain kind of emotional response that you never get with a color image.

Now, for the first time in decades, some of the most beautiful and important images ever taken of Italian gardens are available once again in Italian Gardens: Romantic Splendor in the Edwardian Age with text by Helena Attlee and photographs by Charles Latham (Monacelli Press, 2009).

In the early 1900's Latham was a photographer for Country Life Magazine in England (still published today), and they sent him on a journey to Italy to photograph the country's finest gardens.   He took along a large format camera and glass-plate negatives -- and because of their weight, he took only one carefully composed shot of each view, estimating his exposures as he went.

Country Life published a book with his photos in 1905, and a review in The Guardian said the book was "profusely illustrated with some of the finest photographs we have ever seen." And judging by the new book, that is certainly an understatement. The new book is in 9.75 x 11 inch format, and the larger-than-normal size beautifully illustrates the light and shadow and all tones in between that Latham captured in such a brilliant manner.

You may have seen pictures of Villa Lante, but nothing like the ones published in this book.  Latham's work leaves out nothing: it includes the water and the statuary, the architecture and the plantings in simply amazing detail.

In all, the book has photos of 22 central Italian gardens from those at the Vatican to Villa Falconieri in Frascati, the Boboli gardens in Florence, and the Villa Medici in Rome.  While many of the gardens pictured have been restored (at least in part), some of them, sadly, have been lost forever -- except in this photographic record.

If you've been to Italy or are planning a trip, the book is an invaluable resource.  But even if you can't go to Italy, you can take an unforgettable trip with this lovely volume.

(click on text link to purchase book from Amazon)

Amazon Plant Extinctions

A new study by scientists at Wake Forest University predicts that more than four thousand of the Amazon's 50 thousand plant species face extinction within the next 40 years, mainly due to loss of habitat.

The co-authors of the study, Kenneth Feeley and Miles Silman, examined several hundred individual plant records to map the kinds of plants found in the Amazon.  Using the maps, along with predictions about deforestation and changes in land use, the two researchers were able to make extinction risks for about 80 percent of Amazonian plant species. The study was published in the current issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The Authentic Mt. Vernon Garden

There aren't many gardens (at least in the United States) that require the services of an archaeologist. But at George Washington's home, Mt. Vernon, Director of Archaeology Esther White (above) has recently discovered that Washington's "pleasure garden" (known as the Upper Garden) was very different than the garden that exists on the same site today.

In a recent meeting with garden writers, White said that a new "dig" in the garden has revealed that the arrangement of space and what was planted there are much different than what historians have thought.

White's team is sifting through soil and uncovering new, older paths in different locations; they're collecting soil samples and sending them to a lab at the University of Massachusetts to determine what was planted.  White explained that 18th century plant remains, including seeds, pollen, and silica crystals, can date the layer of soil where they were found.  They know already that Washington's garden contained daffodils and corn, boxwood and flowers, maybe fruit trees and other vegetables.

Happenings July 09

Selected Events Across the Country:

July 8, Creating a Fall Veg Garden, Bronx, NY
10AM-2:30PM, Workshop, NY Botanical Garden, 718-817-8747
July 9, Garden Tour, New Seabury, MA
10AM-4PM, Enchanted Garden Tour, 508-888-3300 x 111
July 10-11, Garden Tour, Rockport, MA
10AM-4PM, 15 private seaside gardens, 978-546-7871
July 11, Garden Conservancy Open Days Tours, CT, NJ, NY
10AM-4PM, Bloomfield CT; Tenafly NJ; Catskill, Mattituck, Southold, Ithaca, Bearsville, New Paltz, Saugerties, West Hurley NY

July 12, Garden Conservancy Open Days Tours, CT, NY
10AM-4PM, Easton, Greenwich, New Canaan, Riverside, Meriden, Wallingford CT; Marcellus, Amagansett NY
July 13-19, APLD Annual Conference, Portland, OR
Lectures, Garden Tours, Trade Show
July 15, Garden Conservancy Open Days Tours, NY
10AM-4PM, East Hampton, NY
July 17 Woody Plants Conference, Swarthmore, PA
8:30AM-5PM, Scott Arboretum, 610-388-1000 x507
July 18, Surviving Drought Seminar, San Francisco, CA
9AM-1:30PM, San Francisco Botanical Garden, 415-661-1316 ext.400
July 18, Garden Conservancy Open Days Tours, CT, MA, NY
10AM-4PM, N.Stonington, CT; Williamstown, MA; Amenia, NY

July 19, Garden Conservancy Open Days Tours, CT, ME, NY, WA
10AM-4PM, Avon, Rockville, Vernon, New Hartford CT; Canaan, Hillsdale, Cold Spring, Bedford Hills, Bronxville, Cortlandt Manor, Larchmont, Scarsdale, Valhalla NY; Bainbridge Island, Kingston WA
July 19-24 Perennial Plant Symposium, St. Louis, MO
27th annual meeting.  Garden tours, lectures & much more.
July 19 Garden Tour, Chicago, IL
12 noon-5PM, 51st annual Dearborn gardenwalk, 312-632-1241
July 18, Organic Veg Gardening, Boylston, MA
9AM-12 noon, Workshop, Tower Hill Botanic Garden, 508-869-6111
July 21, Plant Exploration in W. China & Vietnam, Atlanta, GA
7:30 PM, Lecture, Plant collector Scott McMahan, GA Perennial Plant Assn
July 22, Creating Gardens of Serenity, Bronx, NY
10AM-3:30PM, Workshop, NY Botanical Garden, 718-817-8747
July 23-25 Youth Gardening Symposium, Cleveland, OH
17th Annual Symposium, Am. Hort Society,
July 25, Water Garden Tour, Wilmington, DE
9AM-4PM, Annual self-guided tour, 302-658-6262 x 105
July 25-26 Gardenwalk, Buffalo, NY
10AM-4PM, Billed as the largest garden walk in the country.
July 25-26 Garden Tour, Portland, OR
Two-day tour sponsored by Northwest Hort Society, 206-780-8172

July 26, Garden Conservancy Open Days Tours, IL, ME
10AM-4PM, Winnetka, Lake Bluff, Lake Forest, Mettawa, IL; Blue Hill, Brooklin, Sedgwick ME

LOOKAHEAD:

Aug 6 Design Strategies, Berkshire Garden, Boylston, MA
6-8 PM, Lecture by Rick Pomerantz, Tower Hill Botanic Garden, 508-869-6111