All week, we’re revisiting the most popular stories of 2025, including this one from March.
Anyone who knows British garden designer Jo Thompson’s work will not be surprised by the title of her book, The New Romantic Garden. Over the decades that Thompson has been working as a designer she, has always created atmospheric gardens with a softness and sense of atmosphere and mystery. The 30 gardens that fill the book show how a modern romantic aesthetic can be applied anywhere—from a tiny city garden to the meadows of a country estate. Thompson’s text is delightfully laced with romance, too, with references to fairies, sun goddesses, and Narnia.
Above: Benton irises and roses mingle in this romantic London garden designed by Thompson. Photograph by Jason Ingram.
The “new” in the title reflects the fact that while Thompson’s work may feel nostalgic in some regards (there are many an English rose in this book), it is firmly of-the-moment. A longtime advocate of organic gardening, Thompson designs to support biodiversity and soil health, which are on all gardeners’ minds today. There’s also a looseness and a naturalness that will appeal to fans of the new perennial movement and more naturalistic styles. This book is a fresh perspective on what a “romantic” garden is today.
Photography courtesy of The New Romantic Garden by Jo Thompson (Rizzoli).
1. Start with the story.
Above: Romantic and natural, this garden has a real sense of place and to whom it belongs (writer Justine Picardie and her husband, Philip Astor). The wildflower meadow of mostly native grasses is peppered with a few nonnatives to extend the season of pollen and visual interest. Photograph by Rachel Warne.
For all of her designs, Thompson develops a story for the garden based on her clients’ desires and the place itself. For Thompson this involves “beating the bounds of the place and really getting to grips with the space,” plus trying to understand its history and what might have been there before. But she says, storytelling can be a delicate dance. “You want to avoid creating a pastiche,” she cautions. “If I’m working with a Tudor cottage near Canterbury, I’m not going to create a little Tudor medicinal garden, but there might be elements, like medicinal plants within the planting.” Likewise, Thompson says she trusts her intuition not to take a garden too far from its roots.
All week, we’re revisiting the most popular stories of 2025, including this one from May.
A transportive garden can owe as much to a magical setting as to the plantings. At the garden of brothers and award-winning garden designers Harry and David Rich, the surrounding landscape ramps up those feelings before a visitor even sets foot in the garden. Nestled deep in Welsh woodland, this is a fairytale cottage fully immersed in nature—including roving herds of sheep—where access is possible only by bridge over a stream, a tributary of the River Wye.
The atmospheric garden is one of 18 featured in my new book Wonderlands: British Garden Designers at Home, in which I explore the private spaces of leading landscape designers, revealing how their own homes become testbeds for their professional projects; these are spaces for the slow evolution of ideas, schemes, and plant combinations, as well as private idylls where they can retreat from the world. Some are grand projects created over decades, but many, like Harry and David’s cottage garden, are hands-on gardens created with limited resources in the past few years.
Photography by Éva Németh.
Above: A run of pleached crabapple trees dissects the space and creates a link from the building to the garden.
Harry relocated from London to the secluded cottage just north of the Brecon Beacons in Wales, where he now lives with his wife, Sue, and their two children. But the garden has always been a shared project between the two brothers, who together became the youngest winners of a gold medal at the Chelsea Flower Show in 2012, when Harry had just formed his landscape architecture firm and David was still at university. They went on to create two more gardens at the show, winning another gold medal in 2014.
Above: Plantings are taken right up to the cottage walls, increasing the sense of full immersion in greenery.
I learned that one simple gardening trick can boost harvests quickly while cutting pest numbers almost in half. The trick is companion planting: nature’s way of helping plants work better together.
After many seasons of trial and error, this method turned my weak veggie beds into a healthy, busy garden in no time.
No need to stress about fancy layouts. These 10 plant partners work well with little effort. Ready to match plants the easy way? Let’s go.
Plant Partners That Work Wonders
1. Tomatoes & Basil: A Reliable Match
This pair isn’t just delicious on the plate. Basil’s strong smell helps keep away pests like aphids and hornworms that usually bother tomatoes.
Growing them together can even make tomatoes taste better. (Seriously. My tomatoes tasted so much better once I planted basil beside them.)
2. Carrots & Onions: A Simple Defense
Carrot flies can wipe out a crop fast, but onions help block them. In return, carrots help loosen the soil for onion bulbs. They just work well together.
3. Corn & Beans: The Old “Three Sisters” Duo
This old planting method makes sense. Beans add nitrogen to the soil, which corn needs. The corn stalks give the beans something to climb. It’s a natural setup that works smoothly.
4. Cucumbers & Nasturtiums: The Decoy
Nasturtiums act like bait, pulling pests like aphids and beetles away from cucumbers. They also have pretty flowers that you can eat with a pepper-like taste.
5. Peppers & Marigolds: Root Protectors
A common mistake is planting peppers without help. Marigold roots release compounds that chase away nematodes that damage pepper roots.
Some studies show that marigolds can reduce nematode populations by up to 90%. Their blooms look nice, too.
6. Lettuce & Radishes: Soil Helpers
Radishes break up compacted soil, allowing lettuce roots to grow deeper. This makes lettuce stronger on hot and dry days. Radishes also grow fast, so you get an early harvest while waiting for your lettuce.
7. Squash & Borage: Bee Magnets
Squash needs more bees, and borage attracts them. These bright blue flowers pull in loads of pollinators and help keep pests away from squash. Knowing this pairing gives you better fruit.
8. Potatoes & Horseradish: A Surprise Team
This pair sounds odd, but it works. Horseradish contains natural compounds that help keep potatoes strong and beetles away. Plant horseradish at the corners of the potato bed for protection.
9. Strawberries & Thyme: Berry Guards
Slugs love strawberries, but thyme helps stop them with its strong scent. Thyme also acts as ground cover, keeping berries off the soil and reducing fungal problems. Simple and smart.
10. Cabbage & Dill: Friendly Bug Attractors
Dill doesn’t chase pests. Instead, it brings in helpful insects like ladybugs and lacewings that eat cabbage worms. It’s like having tiny guards watching over your cabbages.
Why Companion Planting Works
Companion planting is more than old advice. It’s backed by how plants interact. They use scents and root signals to communicate with one another. The results can be big:
Less pest damage, fewer sprays
Better pollination
Grow more in small spaces
Better soil use
Shade where needed
When you match plants well, everything grows better together.
How To Start
Try just two or three partner groups this season. Watch how plant health, pest problems, and harvest amounts change.
Remember: it’s not just about putting plants next to each other. It’s about letting them support each other. Keep them close but not crowded; about 12–18 inches apart works for most pairs.
With the right partners, your garden becomes a group that works together instead of single plants growing alone. That’s the goal for most of us anyway.
In the first decade of America’s post-war boom, a million and a half new houses were built, creating vast tracts of suburbia and giving young families their first opportunity to own a home. Nowadays, however, homebuyers who stumble on a 1940s relic in vintage condition often wonder if it’s worth it to buy a house that needs a major remodel?
For Raleigh and Michael Zwerin, the answer was yes. In 2004 they bought a circa-1944 cottage in Mill Valley, California. From the moment they moved in, baby in tow, they started thinking about the house they wished they had. Nearly a decade later, after having a second baby (and learning firsthand that the charming creeks that crisscrossed the neighborhood were prone to flood in winter), they asked architect Kelly Haegglund for help.
For Haegglund, who lives just a few blocks from the Zwerins, the challenge was to design a modern-family-sized house that didn’t loom like the Hulk over the rest of the neighborhood, where one-story bungalows and cottages were built on narrow lots. The result? A modern three-bedroom bungalow with pleasing architectural details borrowed from the Arts and Crafts era. A low-water landscape, designed by Mill Valley-based Bradanini & Associates, surrounds the house in year-round greenery.
Photography by Mimi Giboin.
Above: After searching for months for just the right dark stain color, Raleigh Zwerin suddenly saw it by accident when she drove by a house under construction in nearby San Francisco.
“I went back to that house in the city several times until I met the lead contractor and asked him for the color, but he said the owner of the house said it was proprietary information and he didn’t want to give it out,” says Raleigh. Luckily, though, the contractor took pity on her plight. “He said, ‘I’ll meet you somewhere and give you a shingle so you can match the color.’ We ended up in a rendezvous by the side of the road. He brought two shingles in his truck, I brought a box of cookies, and it was great.”
The custom trim color? The Zwerins also gleaned it from the same side-of-the-road exchange.
Above: A curtain of cape rush (Chrondopetalum elephantinum) will reach heights of from 4 to 6 feet, creating an airy screening layer behind the picket fece.
If you are looking for a simple, tasty way to get your daily dose of vitamin C, along with plenty of antioxidants, look no further than your rose bush! Rose hips’ benefits are plentiful—here’s how to grow, harvest, and enjoy them.
LoriAnn’s Green Blessing:
This article was reviewed by herbalist LoriAnn Bird. This is not to be used as personal medical advice; always consult your health care professional for individual concerns.
Here is what LoriAnn had to say:
Rosehips are sought after by birds, squirrels, rabbits, wild game, and bears! Considered a herb dietary supplement, rosehips are often fed to horses and dogs recuperating from illness or injury as they help to restore the immune system and aid tissue repair. Feeding rosehips as part of the daily diet is beneficial for preventing illness. Chickens LOVE rosehip seeds, and like wild birds, they don’t seem bothered by the hairs.
Rosehips are so loaded with nutrients! Like a superfood, they contain Vitamins A, B complex, C, E, K, and minerals including calcium, silica, iron, and phosphorous. Rosehips are particularly high in bioflavonoids which are rich antioxidants including rutin that help strengthen heart and blood vessels as well as prevent degeneration of tissue. The natural pectin found in rosehips is beneficial for gut health and removing toxins from the body.
What Are Rose Hips?
If you grow roses in your garden, you may get the added benefit of rose hips, a cool-cat fruit that packs a healthy punch!
Rose hips are the rose plant’s seedpod/fruit. Although most home gardeners don’t get many as we prune back our roses to encourage strong blooming. This year, decrease your pruning and see if you can encourage a crop of tasty, healthy rose hips to bloom!
Which Variety Should I Harvest?
The rugosa roses are typically harvested for the tastiest hips, but all roses will produce them in the late summer and fall if left alone by secateur-wielding gardeners.
What do Rose Hips Look Like?
Identifying these edibles is not too challenging. They look like an oblong cranberry or perhaps a miniature cherry tomato.
Rose hips are typically a vibrant reddish-orange. In some species, hips can even be dark purple or even black.
What do They Taste Like?
Rose hips are tart and reminiscent of a zesty crabapple in flavour, although not quite as tasty. They are, however, prized for their health benefits and are jam-packed with Vitamin C.
Did you know that the rose petals are edible, too? Yes, they are! Read more about Edible Flowers here.
Don’t deadhead your roses so that they can develop rose hips.
Rose Hips Benefits
Now that you know what they taste like and what they are, let’s chat about why you may want to consume or use them. Here are some of the most important rose hip benefits
High Levels of Vitamin C
As mentioned above, rose hips are prized for their high concentration of vitamin C in particular. In fact, they contain 50% more Vitamin C than oranges!
Vitamin C is essential for our immune systems and can help our bodies stimulate white blood cell production.
Anti-Inflammatory Properties
If you suffer from an autoimmune disease, adding these cherry buds to your daily consumption can help reduce pain. In fact, a study conducted showed that 65% of participants with osteoarthritis had a reduction in pain.
High in Antioxidants
While your body produces antioxidants on its own, changes in diet and increases in stress can leave your body out of whack. Antioxidants have been shown to help reduce the potential for chronic conditions in healthy people, meaning your risk of diseases such as type 2 diabetes or heart disease can be mitigated.
Other Benefits
Rose hips also strengthen capillaries, regulate blood circulation, and relieve teething problems in infants. Rose flowers also have a lot of healing benefits as well
Medicinal Uses
Rose hips have been historically used for many treatments. A few of these ailments include:
arthritis
heart disease
diabetes
menstrual cramping
varicose veins
bladder or urinary irritations
Rosehip seed oil is a great carrier oil to use in skincare recipes.
How to Grow Rose Hips
If you are growing hips in your own garden, do not use any chemical sprays or pesticides. Make sure that you grow natural, organic roses for edible purposes.
Do not prune or cut back roses after blooming. The hips are coming. Get ready! You will see them decorating your rose plants in autumn, and can start picking them fresh at any time.
Harvesting Tips
The best time to harvest Rosa rugosa is in the winter when they turn soft, particularly after the first frost. But if you live somewhere with lots of rain, the rosehips can get soggy. If you’re growing a Rosa canina, then it’s best to pick them when they are firm and bright in colour.
Rose hips are ripe when they are bright red and soft to the touch.
Harvest them with pruners to protect the shape of your rose plant. You can harvest rose plants heavily, and they will thank you for it.
It’s best to prune them back in winter so that the new growth is delayed until spring.
Remember, roses come with thorns, so protect yourself with rose gloves, long trousers, a long-sleeved shirt, and closed-toe shoes.
Place the rose hips in a colander and rinse with water, and they are ready for use!
LoriAnn, our herbalist mentor, also suggests abiding by the honourable harvest. Harvest only what you need in a way that doesn’t hurt the plant or the other wildlife that enjoys the rosehip.
Harvest only what you need, to leave behind enough for the plant and wildlife.
Preparation Tips
When preparing the rosehips, the hairs can get everywhere. To prevent this, try cutting the rosehips and then placing them in water. This way, you can scoop out the seeds and the hairs so that the hairs are not flying around.
There are several different ways you can enjoy rose hips. Here are some of my favourites:
Make Tea
Perhaps the most popular usage of this edible is making tea. To make the rosehip tea, crush the hips with a pestle and mortar to help release the goodness. Then steep the rosehips in boiling water.
Jams and Jellies
You can also use rose hips to make preserves. It’s best to remove the seeds before you use them to make syrup, jams, and jellies. Wash, then trim off the two ends and slice them in half to remove the seeds.
Dry Them
While you will get the most rose hips benefits with fresh buds, you can also dry rose hips and keep them for use all year.
After harvesting, wash the rose hips and cut off the blossom end and stem. Set them out in a single layer on a cookie sheet to dry for a few weeks in a cool, dark place.
Or if you are in a hurry, add them to a food dehydrator until they are hard, wrinkly, and darker in colour.
Add dried rose hips directly into hot water for tea, or grind dried hips into a powder using a food processor. Dried deseeded rosehips can be made into a delicious jam or added to a variety of dishes, including soups, sauces, and desserts.
Add the dried rosehips to wet ingredients, or rehydrate them by mixing them with a little water so they are not hard in baked goods. You will be surprised to discover that powdered rosehips add depth and tartness to chili or black bean soup!
Crafting Projects
Not only are they good for you, but rose hips are also gorgeous! Check out this stunning Rose Hip Wreath as part of a round-up of Fabulous Fall Wreaths!
More Herbal Tips for Autumn
A city girl who learned to garden and it changed everything. Author, artist, Master Gardener. Better living through plants.
Today, we’re thrilled to open up this column to all R/G readers, not just subscribers, to share the Quick Takes answers from our very own Kendra Wilson.
Kendra is among the OG Gardenista crew—she’s been a contributor to the site since its launch in 2012. She’s also worked for British Vogue (“my first writing job”), contributed to The Guardian‘s gardening blog, created her own “secret blog” about estate gardening in Northamptonshire, England (it was the era of blogs), and written ten (!) books—the latest being Gardenista: The Low-Impact Garden. In bookstores October 14 and available for pre-order now, it’s the newest addition to the R/G collection.
We couldn’t have dreamed up a better author and collaborator for the book. Kendra, who was born in Fairfield, CT, but moved to the U.K. as a child (“I’m essentially American, despite the English accent”), is passionate about gardens and the people who bring them to life and is opinionated in the best possible way. Read on to learn what strikes her fancy (including new-to-us, and now must-have, gardening gloves), who gets her goat, and why “gardening for nature is not a trend.”
Photography courtesy of Kendra Wilson.
Above: A spread from The Low-Impact Garden.
Your first garden memory:
Petunias. Exploring the woods and meadows around our house in Weston, Connecticut, always barefoot. The sounds: cicadas, frogs, blue jays.
Garden-related book you return to time and again:
I return to these singular voices: Russell Page (The Education of a Gardener), Christopher Lloyd (The Well-Tempered Garden and many more), Vita Sackville-West’s columns for the Observer newspaper (“In Your Garden”). And less imperious: Marjorie Fish (We Made a Garden), Eleanor Peréni (Green Thoughts), and Derek Jarman (Derek Jarman’s Garden). His description of the photographer Howard Sooley is one for the ages.
We’ve been following Midwesterner by birth, Californian in spirit Louesa Roebuck for more than a decade, describing her as a “fearless forager” in one story, “renegade florist” in another, and “rebel against convention” in a third. During that time, the floral iconoclast relocated from the Bay Area to Ojai, CA, and wrote two books—Foraged Flora and Punk Ikebana—that make the case for floral designs that are more art than arrangement, and more feral than formal. She is currently at work on a third book.
If you’re not familiar with Louesa, this is great place to get acquainted with her eccentric perspective and strong opinions (of which, she concedes, many are unpopular).
Photography by Ian Hughes for Punk Ikebana, courtesy of Louesa Roebuck, unless otherwise noted.
Above: Before she became a floral designer, Louesa worked in the food world (Chez Panisse) and fashion industry (with Erica Tanov), both of which fed her love for California living. Photograph by Sean Jerd.
Your first garden memory:
My most vivid childhood garden memories are of a Victorian gothic yet sweet, very small garden plot behind my ancestral home in Medina, Ohio. My mother’s people built the Victorian house in 1856 or 18765, depending on who’s telling the tale. White wood with dark, almost black, green shutters and trim. There was a generous gray-floored porch that wrapped around three sides, meant for living and even sleeping in muggy Ohio summers. My grandmother ( my momma’s momma); my great grandmother, Lena; and my mother, Maggie, all spent time together in the very old-fashioned English garden behind the house. My family was old-school: NO color in front of house—that was considered very tacky and low-brow. Color and culinary were reserved for the lesser-seen, more hidden bites of the “yard.” Every year, my momma’s momma battled the birds eating her blueberries. Even as a child, it felt too combative and high maintenance to me—I was rooting for those birds to snatch the berries and escape the evil netting.
She grew Monarda, a fabulous pollinator botanical, black-eyed Susans, herbs for the kitchen, and more. The memories have a fairytale quality, complete with dappled summer sunlight, dragonflies, clover in the grass. I would often get lost in the realms of clover. And then, being my gothic family, there was a lot of shadow.
Garden-related book you return to time and again:
Above: Hieronymous Bosch, published by Taschen, collects all of the 15th century painter’s fantastical works into one volume; $200.
Humans behind critters. Or…semi feral verdant. Or…human hands secondary. Or…chill on pruning. Or…herbs herbs herbs.
Plant that makes you swoon:
Above: Heirloom roses from friend Cindy Daniels’ garden and Queen Anne’s lace in a kenzan sitting in vintage ceramic ikebana trays.
It changes with every micro season and with every place. Scented geraniums, jasmine, magnolias, heirloom roses, any herb gone to seed, passion vine and fruit, persimmon (especially in late autumn on the branch), Datura, Solandra, Cobaea, nasturtiums, stone fruit blossoms, wild trillium, Usnea lichen, Queen Anne’s lace, begonia, wisteria, fennel, fennel, fennel!
Plant that makes you want to run the other way:
Anything from the flower mart, covered in poisons, transported, grown under monoculture agribusiness conditions, wrapped in plastic, cut the same length, uniform, painful, and full of toxins. Tropicals flown in and waxed really get me grossed out and worked up.
In general, flowers are probably less important than form. Some have a fleeting season, perhaps blooming just once before doing nothing for the remaining eleven months of the year (I’m looking at you Iris germanica). Others have an important support act, providing an abundance of flowers or beautiful foliage for the majority of the year.
Yes, I want plants that are beautiful (and that work well together), but I also want them not to be too much trouble. So increasingly, as I’ve realized that you can never really fight the existing conditions in your garden, I just plant more of these low-work plants. If something does well, and needs little to no TLC then it’s very welcome in my garden.
Earlier this week I read a quote from the late plantswoman Beth Chatto, about her much-copied borders in Essex, England. “The point I need to stress,” she wrote in her ground-breaking book Drought-Resistant Planting, “is that copies of my gravel garden will not necessarily be successful or suitable if the principles underlying my planting designs are not understood. When visitors to my garden tell me they have attempted to make a gravel garden but the plants don’t look or behave as they do in mine, they wonder what they have done wrong. I ask ‘What type of soil do you have?’, ‘Very good,’ they reply. The amount of rainfall? ‘Twice what we have here,’ they tell me. I laugh and tell them if I had good soil and adequate rainfall I would not be growing drought-resistant plants.”
Favorite plants should always come with this disclaimer—what works in one garden may not work in another, because the soil, moisture, and conditions will vary immeasurably. Some of my most cherished plants will flourish in all conditions, but some do particularly well because they are especially suited to my garden, which has very free-draining sandy soil and is largely in full sun.
With that in mind, here are the plants I would not be without.
Above: I love almost all salvias and they all tend to love my garden, too, so long as I put them in a sunny spot. ‘Caradonna’ has the most intense deep purple flowers that will be smothered in bees for weeks on end. Once it’s finished flowering I cut it back and it will re-flower again, although less prolifically. This is a very upright salvia and looks best softened with hazy grasses or more unruly perennials such as Knautia macedonica.
Nepeta ‘Six Hills Giant’
Above: Arguably the most prolific, no-trouble plant I grow. Catmint springs into life early in the season, often flowering well before any other herbaceous perennial. It’s healthy, seems to cope with almost any conditions, and is particularly beloved by bees that smother this plant while it’s in flower. As soon as it starts to go over, I cut the whole plant back to a few inches from the base and it will usually regrow and flower again within a few weeks. It’s also very easy to divide and replant and looks fabulous flopping over a pathway.
Verbena bonariensis
Above: All the verbenas work really well in my garden, but the tall, billowing Verbena bonariensis is a brilliant border plant, emerging in mid-summer amongst other perennials and grasses. It’s a favorite of many butterflies and has an extremely long season. It looks wonderful though the autumn and winter as it holds its structure, but it will also happily self-seed so I am normally selective in how much of it I leave standing. Finches love to eat the seeds in winter, too.
New Yorkers who discover Rockaway Beach, the sandy peninsula at the end of the A train, tend to fall in love. Alexandria Donati and Jonathan Chesley, the husband and wife duo behind Ktisma Studio, were among those who appreciated the charms of the beach-meets-urban setting. The couple first visited Rockaway Beach more than a decade ago when their friends began buying up houses on a block where 1920s bungalows had survived development. In 2017, Donati and Chesley finally got a chance to buy their own bungalow in the community, and perhaps equally important to Donati, who is a landscape architect, the tiny yard that came along with it.
Over time Rockaway’s original wooden boardwalks have been replaced with concrete, and Donati and Chesley’s yard was no exception. “When we moved in there was an old privet shrub growing on a fence line, a pile of debris, and a lot of concrete,” says Donati. So, the first order of business was to remove concrete to make way for planting beds and to replace and repair fences. (Donati had already been on a years-long campaign to convince friends to rip up their concrete. “I told them I would help them plant it if they just jack-hammered it out,” she says.)
Since buying the property, Donati has experimented with the planting and carved out distinct gardens within the petite lot. In front, the west-facing garden has a warm palette inspired by the sunsets; there’s a rambling berry patch along the side of the house; and the back garden, which is all about scent, even includes an area rug-sized stretch of lawn. Pots of herbs and flowers are scattered everywhere.
Above: No irrigation here—Donati hand-waters her bungalow garden because she prefers to encourage stronger roots. “I definitely stress the garden out, but I do it on purpose,” she says. “I feel like gardens get over-irrigated, in general.”
Donati has been strategic about using plants to both conceal and reveal views from their small yard. Espaliered fruit trees, for example, soften the border between neighboring yards and an elderberry hides an unattractive deck. String lights and a shade sail that they hang in the summer help to enhance the feeling of enclosure, while matchstick blinds add privacy (and shade) to the front porch. “There’s a giant apartment building that says ‘luxury condos’ nearby, but that’s New York City life,” says Donati. “Even in a Brooklyn brownstone, you could have the nicest house and garden, but you can’t change what surrounds you.”
Not being realistic about gardening in wetland conditions and thinking plants will survive if I plant them high enough. But even some of the hardiest can’t stand up to salt-water floods. I have had to let go of my love for boxwood hedges, which were wiped out in Hurricane Sandy. I try to focus on native shrubs and hardy plants. My vegetable beds are very high now as well.
Unpopular gardening opinion:
Above: The Rosa multiflora on her property provides food and shelter for the birds.
I have embraced the invasive species that the birds help spread. Planting on a barrier island with climate change evident in the rising waters and frequent, bigger storms presents many challenges, to say the least. The season starts with yellow flag irises surrounding the house to the multiflora rose explosion in May and finally capped off with a profusion of purple loosestrife in July to August.
Gardening or design trend that needs to go:
A gardening practice that has to cease is the use of toxic pesticides that are killing us with cancer-causing chemicals seeping into our water and killing the pollinators, birds—destroying the food chain. It’s unbelievable that the US has not banned Roundup yet. There are so many old-school, inexpensive, non-chemical options readily available.
Old wives’ tale gardening trick that actually works:
Always plant lavender by your doors to ward off evil spirits (this has been a pretty happy little house for 30 years so who’s going to say it doesn’t work?) Coffee grinds to keep critters away.
Favorite gardening hack:
Growing marigolds with tomatoes to helps enrich the soil and deter pests; cardboard to suppress weeds when laying in new gardens.
Favorite way to bring the outdoors in.
Above: Found natural treasures on Alex’s fireplace mantel.
Cuttings from whatever is blooming outside. love the drama of the long arching canes of multiflora roses, so dramatic in our little cottage, or the tall stems of drying fennel and grasses, mixed with bits of nature, fallen birds nests or antlers shed from our local deer. Then there are the rocks, they are everywhere; collected from beach walks and travels, it’s a problem.
Every garden needs a…
A bit of white to contrast against the shades of layered greens, from variegated leaves to sweet autumn clematis, hydrangea ‘Limelight’. And a little bit of chocolate for contrast—I love the stark contrast against greens—chocolate cosmos, black cornflowers, hollyhocks ‘Blackknight’, coral bells.
Lots of flowers planted amongst the vegetables for the pollinators—particularly African blue basil—they love the blue flowers when it goes to seed and it smells so great when you brush up against it.
Favorite hardscaping material:
Above: River rocks line a planting border.
River rocks. Living with wetland conditions, we wanted a way to elevate our beds in a rambling, natural manner.
Tool you can’t live without:
Lindsey Taylor introduced me to my favorite Japanese hori hori knife a few years ago—so many uses. Sneerboer Narrow Perennial Spade is a recent purchase and a game-changer.
Go-to gardening outfit:
Vintage French work top I bought from Marston House years ago at a garden show pop-up, great pockets and faded fatigues. Gardenheir clogs on dry days and BOGS boots for the wet weather.
A trip to Daylesford in the Cotswolds and a spin through a few of the storied English gardens
Not-to-be-missed public garden/park/botanical garden:
Jardin du Plantes in Paris. And the transporting experience of Tokyo’s Nezu Museum garden + teahouse. I always welcome green refuge on busy work trips.
The REAL reason you garden:
It keeps me sane and nurtures my soul; providing much needed quiet and reflective time away from screens with my hands in the dirt.
Thanks so much, Alex! Follow her on Instagram @mybloomist.
A career in art direction is a useful grounding for anybody wishing to go into garden design. Sheila Jack’s career shift was not so much a break as a continuum—of research, editing, and presentation. Before designing the pages of Vogue magazine, her first job was for the architect Norman Foster, and these visual strands from the past feed into her present-day career as a landscape designer.
We visit the project which turned Sheila’s design ideas into something more three-dimensional: her own urban garden.
Above: A work studio faces the house in Sheila Jack’s garden in Hammersmith, London.
“When we installed my husband’s garden studio, we needed to create a pathway to it,” explains Sheila of the garden’s layout. “Our children were beyond the need for lawn, so there was scope to include more planting.”
Above: Photograph by Sheila Jack.
I first met Sheila by the photocopying machine at Tatler magazine, several decades ago. Amid the madness, Sheila stood out as a beacon of clarity, in a crisp white shirt. A few years later I spotted Sheila, ever crisp, at 444 Madison Avenue, a recent arrival at Condé Nast in New York. While I failed to take my job on the 17th floor seriously, Sheila worked hard downstairs, in the scary offices of Vogue. Fast-forwarding a few years, she suddenly appeared on Instagram, with beautifully composed pictures of gardens, in focus. How had she got from there to here?
Above: Sheila’s London garden of mainly green and white.
You’d think choosing plants was easy enough—just find the ones you like, right? And for single specimens in a pot or a monoculture of, say. roses or hydrangeas, it is as simple as that.
But what about designing a border where plants need to relate to each other in a well-thought-out design? And what if you have a large blank canvas to fill with a whole range of plants. This is when it can get a little more complicated. For the third post in my column on creating A Garden From Scratch, I tackle how to figure out the kind of plants you might want in your landscape. Before you get too excited, let me clarify that I’m not talking about choosing specific plants here; this is about the bigger, long-term picture of how to put plants together in a space and why.
(To read my earlier stories in the Garden from Scratch series, go here, then here.)
Photography by Clare Coulson.
Above: Where to even begin? My cottage garden, photographed here in midsummer, is an ever-changing tableau of favorite plants and supporting acts that lurk in the background. It’s always good to remember when you start out that plants can be moved, replaced, or relocated and that the picture is never final or complete—there’s always something that can be tweaked or improved—and that is half the enjoyment of gardening.
1. Get trees in first.
Above: Early spring in my garden and there’s still not that much flowering, but the Amelanchier lamarckii tree provides starry white blossoms. By the time the spring bulbs really get going, the pretty bronze foliage of this tree will emerge providing an interesting contrast with the bright colors below. Additional structure here comes from the domed forms of Choisya ternata, hebes and Ilex crenata. In the distance, a lot of euphorbia.
Planting design is about a series of layers, from the woody plants, including trees and climbers, to the shrubs, herbaceous perennials, biennials, and annuals. Most gardens will have a mix of all of these types of plants to create a succession of interest throughout the year, and a balance of structural plants that will provide a backdrop to herbaceous plants that will flower and die back.
It’s logical to begin with the trees since they generally need the most time to mature. They are also arguably the most important thing to get right, being the least ephemeral. Incorporating some trees, or even a single specimen, can instantly ground a space, bringing strong structure, height, and impact—as well as, in many cases, year-round interest. For this same reason think very carefully before removing any mature trees or shrubs from an inherited space.
It’s the one place perhaps where it’s worth spending some money to buy something really beautiful—a trio of Amelanchier or Prunus multi-stem or specimen trees, for example, may feel like a big investment, but it will have instant impact, as well as blossoms in spring, lush foliage through summer, and then great leaf color later in the year. In winter its form has its own allure. Tip: Buy young trees—they are far more economical and will usually settle in faster than mature specimens. Buying bareroot plants also helps to keep down costs.
2. Invest in evergreens.
Above: Controlled chaos. There are a lot of frothy plants in this border snapshot including Valerian officinalis, hesperis, roses, Allium sphaerocephalon, catmint, and hardy geraniums. But the structure from clipped boxwood, hebes, and other foliage helps to ground the space and provide moments of contrast.
Another worthwhile investment: evergreen forms that will provide four-season structure. Boxwood would have ticked all the boxes, but now that these are under the dual threat of box blight and box caterpillar, few gardeners would take a risk with them. There are plenty of alternatives—yew, Ilex crenata, many pittosporums, rosemary, hebes, daphnes can all be grown into shapes that will provide permanent year-round forms and act as a foil to herbaceous plants. Deciduous plants like beech and hornbeam can also provide structure, too. (See Landscaping 101: Boxed in by Boxwood? 5 Shrubs to Try Instead.)
As with fashion, floriculture also has its trends. Dutch botanist Jacqueline van der Kloet signals two color trends.
“First we see a tone-on-tone preference; combinations of the same color tone such as bright yellow combined with dark yellow.” One of Jacqueline’s favorite yellow combinations is: yellow Dahlias, Begonias, Buttercups, Chlidanthus and Callas.
The second color trend goes against the tone-on-tone trend, and involves a more daring use of multicolored species. I see a variegated use of flowers that have more than one color. For instance: red and pink or lavender and blue. Species such as Ixia, Sparaxys, Tritonia and Leuco-coryne are summer bulbs that have two or more colors”, Jacqueline says.
Professional flower arranger and author of the book: ‘Flowers are almost forever’ Libbey Oliver, also sees Lavish use of colors in the US. Rather than mixing the different colors, she sees grouping of colors and species. “You will see a combination of eucalyptus leave ‘Optimism’s in the middle surrounded by groups of yellow roses, red roses and lilies.”
Tips from Jacqueline and Libbey
Less is more
Finding the right summer bulbs for your garden is a matter of trying. Lesser is better so go for twenty bulbs of two or three species rather than two or three bulbs of twenty species. This will allow you to get familiar with all the characteristics of the species.
Cut flower corner
Create a special corner in your garden to plant cut flowers.
It would be a waste to cut into a wonderful created border in your garden. Choose a sheltered spot: the warmer the spot the better they will grow. For more cut flower tips please go to our Cut Flower Corner.
Texture
Combine bulbs with grass and leaves such as eucalyptus. Use cut flowers in different stages as well as different parts of the flower. Think of exotic leaves or nice flower buds.
LOS ANGELES, February 7, 2018 (Newswire.com)
– Designed to shake up the ways and whys we send flowers, allows users to send flowers anytime, anywhere in a moment’s notice via their iOS device. Flowerlings bud, bloom and wilt in real time with a lifespan of eight days … digitally! And, with every Flowerling sent, we plant a live tree in Madagascar through our partnership with Eden Reforestation Projects — plus, the app comes complete with a real-time planted tree counter. And, with over 25,000 trees planted to date, Flowerling is well on its way to rewarding the planet by offsetting our global carbon footprint.
Each Flowerling rose, bouquet and plant is professionally curated and photographed by our own floral stylists and design team. Photographs are rendered using our proprietary IP, creating the real-time, digital aging that unfolds for the user over eight days. This unique interface allows users to experience real-time aging of their Flowerlings via their iOS device. For wilted Flowerlings, options to add food or water to extend their lifespan are available. There is no other app experience like it in the world.
With more and more people focused on the state of our planet, Flowerling allows users to do what they already love to do – send flowers – but in a new and unique way that brings joy and happiness to those who receive them, and makes a positive impact on the world we all share.
New rose varieties from America’s premier rose grower feature beautiful flowers and improved disease resistance
Press Release –
updated: Feb 16, 2017
Wasco, CA, February 16, 2017 (Newswire.com)
– For Spring 2017, Weeks Roses is introducing seven new roses to its extensive line of popular garden roses. The newrose varieties for 2017 and many other popular roses grown by Weeks Roses in California are available at garden centers and select mail order vendors nationwide.
“Weeks Roses has built a reputation and a strong international following for its unique rose introductions,” said Christian Bedard, Research Director of Weeks Roses. “All of our plant varieties are field tested for flower color and form, flower production, cold hardiness and disease resistance. Weeks Roses celebrates the rose as an enduring part of gardens everywhere.”
Weeks Roses has built a reputation and a strong international following for its unique rose introductions. All of our plant varieties are field tested for flower color and form, flower production, cold hardiness and disease resistance. Weeks Roses celebrates the rose as an enduring part of gardens everywhere.
Christian Bédard, Research Director for Weeks Roses
All My Loving™
Leading off the list of new roses from Weeks Roses is All My Loving, a beautiful hybrid tea rose created in England by the talented breeder Gareth Fryer. The long cutting stems of All My Loving™ are great for bouquets, and the plant’s excellent vigor guarantees a profuse production of blooms.
In true hybrid tea fashion, one stunning dark pink blossom sits atop each long cutting stem. The large 4- to 5-inch flowers have 30 to 40 petals. Whether All My Loving™ is planted in sunny California or in a colder, rainy climate, the color will stay true until the petals drop and the plant will reward gardeners and homeowners with a show of attractive, semi-glossy medium green leaves. This variety features many hybrid improvements including disease resistance and bloom longevity.
Cupid’s Kisses™
Roses are certainly one way Cupid spreads love around the world. The aptly named Cupid’s Kisses™ is a climbing rose, but it is shorter and more compact than full-size climbers. This new variety brings just the right height (up to 8 feet tall) to more confined areas of a landscape, and it is a good choice for container planting.
The two-inch-wide flowers have a distinctive “pink lipstick” hue that contrasts nicely with the white on the base of each petal and the yellow centers. The prolific flowers are produced in medium-sized clusters, and the pink and white blooming show continues until late in the fall. Cupid’s Kisses™ is quick to establish itself in the garden, and its “patio climber” size makes it a welcome addition to almost any yard.
Children’s Hope™
Children’s Hope™, a new Spring 2017 variety from Weeks Roses, is a delightful and prolific bloomer that supports the Children’s Brain Tumor Foundation. Every medium red, double-petal blossom is a reminder that each child is a beautiful flower. The blooms are childlike and dainty, measuring just 1.5 to 2 inches in diameter in large clusters that can cover the entire plant.
This Polyantha Shrub rose has a compact habit that makes it ideal for small spots in the landscape as well as decorative containers on a balcony or patio. It grows well in most climates throughout the USA, and it has very good disease resistance.
Every sale of a Children’s Hope™ rose bush helps to support the treatment, quality of life and the long-term outlook of children with brain and spinal cord tumors through the research, education and advocacy of the Children’s Brain Tumor Foundation. For more information visit http://www.cbtf.org.
Tropical Lightning™
Tropical Lightning™ is a new full-sized climbing rose with good disease resistance. The tropical warmth of this exotic-colored new rose is generated by a unique flower that’s a combination of sunset orange and a purple smoke layer accented with cream colored stripes. The colors mix together differently on every flower, creating a pleasing striped effect that’s stunning in any garden setting.
The canes of this climbing rose reach 10 to 12 feet tall, so Tropical Lightning™ is both big and dramatic. Each perfectly shaped flower holds its crazy color for days, and the prolific plant only slows down the flowering as it cools down for winter. This variety is new for Spring 2017 from Weeks Roses.
Easy To Please™
Easy To Please™is the newest addition to the Easy-To-Love® Collection of roses from Weeks Roses. This easy-to-maintain pink Floribunda rose bush boasts blooms that are fuchsia pink with a lighter reverse. The flowers are 2 ½ to 3 inches in diameter with 20 to 30 petals each.
The plant’s medium-sized growth habit makes it easy to fit into most gardens. Best of all, Easy To Please™is easy to grow and maintain because its disease resistance surpasses many landscape shrubs. This variety grows well in a wide variety of climates and conditions. The prolific flowers have a fragrance of cloves with hints of cinnamon, and the vigorous plant is truly easy to love.
Edith’s Darling™
Edith’s Darling™ is the third addition to the popular Downton Abbey® Garden Rose Collection from Weeks Roses. This new variety is a fitting tribute to the Lady Edith Crawley character and her beloved daughter, Marigold, from the popular British television drama Downton Abbey.
The Edith’s Darling™flowers are a soft apricot-gold color that slightly darkens toward the center of the bloom. Each full, old-fashioned 2.5- to 3-inch blossom boasts 50 to 65 petals. The fragrance is much like a fruity, fresh-cut apple. Small, with a compact bushy habit, an Edith’s Darling™ rose bush is the perfect choice for containers or for a tidy spot in the garden where a show of fragrant, full-sized blooms can be viewed up-close.
Violet’s Pride™
Violet’s Pride™, the fourth and final addition to the Downton Abbey® Garden Rose Collection, is named for Lady Violet, the feisty Dowager Countess of Grantham as portrayed by Maggie Smith on the popular Downton Abbey TV show.
The lovely lavender blossoms of Violet’s Pride™ are made even more exquisite by a magenta-colored heart decorating the inner petals. This prolific bloomer produces spiraled, medium-large double blossoms with 35-45 petals. Worthy of winning any Best of Show title, Violet’s Pride™ boasts a fruity fragrance with a hint of grapefruit. The flowers are held proudly on top of a vigorous, evenly rounded bush with disease resistant dense foliage.
