Kathy’s Calabasas Garden – FineGardening

Today we’re off to California to visit with Kathy Sandel.

I am a landscape designer, now retired, and I want to show you pics of my garden in Calabasas, California. This is a property I lived at for more than 20 years while I was doing other people’s gardens. I moved from there about three years ago to be nearer my daughter. However, I loved my garden so much I often look at pics of it.

I lived in a small house overlooking a man-made lake in Calabasas. A terrace hung out over a hill of about 12 to 15 feet in height. The slope beneath was planted and bordered a walkway around the entire lake. The gardens adjacent to the terrace all around the house were paved with Saltillo tiles, and I built a series of planters the better to see my planting from inside the house. It was an ideal environment and something I never thought I would leave. But life is full of changes.

The terrace at night

Looking out at the lake at dusk

My kitchen garden

View of the garden from inside the house

Peonies (Paeonia hybrid, Zones 3–8) are growing happily beneath a Melaleuca nesophila (Zones 9–11) tree.

Red valerian (Centranthus ruber, Zones 5–8) is spilling out of the bed with flowers.

A rose blooms amid the red valerian.

Clematis (Zones 4–9) surrounded by Polygonum capitatum (Zones 8–11), with leaves of a potted blood orange tree (Citrus × sinensis, Zones 9–11)

A Chinese magnolia (Magnolia × soulangeana, Zones 5–9) in bloom

The blooms of the rose ‘Climbing Dainty Bess’

This is one of the David Austin roses, but I don’t remember which.

The climbing rose ‘Eden’ with the rose ‘Othello’

The roses ‘Polka’ and ‘Angel Face’ were trained as climbers on the wall next to the fountain, with alstroemerias (Alstromeria hybrids, Zones 9–11) underneath.

Kathy shared so many beautiful photos that we’ll be back to see more of this garden tomorrow!

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