About 4 years after acquiring them, my spuria iris are blooming at last. Passalongs from Linda Lehmusvirta of Central Texas Gardener, who told me she received her divisions from author/designer Scott Ogden, these tall (about 3 feet), beardless irises would send up their slender leaves each winter, attaining a lovely, grassy look by spring, but never bloom. In summer they melted away, going dormant for the season.

Having always been successful growing bearded iris, I was frustrated by the tease of the spurias.

They came up in conversation with Scott and his wife, Lauren, also a designer and author, during a visit to their garden two years ago. Lauren told me not to move them around, as I’d been doing in hopes of finding the right spot for them. Spurias resent being transplanted and divided, she advised. So I put away my shovel and just let them be.

I sat out another bloomless year and became convinced that they were in too much shade, although Linda and Scott both said spurias could take some shade in our hot climate (they need sun in cooler-summer climates). My hands were itching for the shovel. One more year, I promised myself, and then I’ll try another spot.

And then, late this spring, I noticed buds. Yay! Now they’re blooming—an elegant, burnt-gold flower with chocolate striping on the petals. My shovel is nowhere in sight.

Note: My Plant This posts are written primarily for gardeners in central Texas. The plants I recommend are ones I’ve grown myself and have direct experience with. I wish I could provide more information about how these plants might perform in other parts of the country, but gardening knowledge is local. Consider checking your local online gardening forums to see if a particular plant might work in your region.

Lawn Gone! News
If you’d like to hear the podcast of my Earth Day appearance on “The Faith Middleton Show,” which airs on public radio in Connecticut and New York, visit the link and then hit the black triangle “play” button. Faith and I talked about replacing the lawn with low-care grasses and “people places” and creating an inviting, greener landscape—AND she made my book the station’s pledge-drive prize!

You’re Invited!
I’ll be at BookPeople on Saturday, May 4, at 4 pm , along with author Jenny Peterson, to talk briefly about design tips for losing the lawn or paring it back. Jenny will be sharing styling tips for houseplants. And we newbie authors will BOTH be signing copies of our books! Whether you have a green thumb or a brown one, let’s fill up BookPeople with people who care about plants and the earth!

The talk is free and open to the public, and I’d love to see a lot of friendly faces! If you do want an autographed book, BookPeople requires an in-store purchase. Just FYI.

All material © 2006-2013 by Pam Penick for Digging. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited.

My friend Lucinda Hutson invited me over to her purple cottage on Sunday to see her angel’s trumpets in bloom, plus all the rest of her exuberant, flowery garden.

Lighting up her quiet Rosedale neighborhood street like a fiesta in full swing, Lucinda’s garden is an irresistible mix of color, romance, humor, and creativity. Colorful paint brightens every vertical surface: house (3 different body colors, depending on which side you’re looking at), wooden fences, and a detached garage-turned-shed. Flowering roses, angel’s trumpets, and sweet peas scent the air. Enticing gates and arbors beckon you onward, through a succession of intimate garden rooms. A “tequila cantina” anchors the rear garden with a party-ready set-up and a tequila-bottle bottle tree.

I long ago fell under the spell of Lucinda’s El Jardin Encantador. Perhaps you will too. Come along with me for a tour.

First of all, you can see she owns the cutest house in the world. Painted purple with lavender trim and a rosy-mango door, its arched frame accented with tiles, the house announces that someone with a zest for life lives here.

The front yard is given over to a flowery cottage garden filled with roses, annuals, and native perennials. There’s no lawn except for a narrow, grassy path near the front door.

The promised angel’s trumpets (Brugmansia) were indeed gorgeous. I inhaled their residual sweet scent left over from the evening.

Lucinda is growing sweet peas this year, and they smelled heavenly too.

A closer look at the sweet peas

And another view of the angel’s trumpets

Buttery roses—’Julia Child’ was one—make a sunny backdrop to the sweet peas.

Star jasmine (Trachelospermum jasminoides) in bloom added another sweet scent to the garden. You can see it behind this white-winged dove, which alit on the birdbath and posed for a photo.

A small angel kneels among salvias and snapdragons.

Yellow snapdragons lit up a partly shaded area under a ginkgo tree, one of a few I’ve encountered in Austin.

Sancho the cat lounged on a purple garden seat.

A wider view of the garden reveals an enormous Jerusalem sage (Phlomis fruticosa) in full bloom.

Along the left side of the lot is a gravel drive, which no longer leads to the detached garage in the back yard. It stops short, blocked by a stone wall over which heartleaf ice plant (Aptenia cordifolia) cascades and a peaked, wooden arbor supporting a ‘Don Juan’ rose.

An intricate iron gate offers peek-a-boo glimpses of the garden beyond.

I adore this gate! Now we’ve walked through, and here’s a look back, with the front garden abloom in the background.

Another view, with nasturtiums tumbling along the ground

In the very back of her lot, behind her former garage, Lucinda created a festive cantina for her frequent parties. A rustic table serves as a bar, sheltered by an arbor constructed of unpeeled cedar posts topped with a metal agave. On the turquoise wall, a wooden sign proclaims this to be “La Lucinda Cantina.” At left, a tequila bottle tree is mulched with corks, and metal mariachis play. Horseshoes line the eave for luck.

What a perfect setting for Lucinda to show off her brand-new book, Viva Tequila! Cocktails, Cooking, and Other Agave Adventures, soon to be released in May. By the way, if you want to hear the always entertaining Lucinda speak about her new book—and her agave adventures—plan to attend the Garden Club of Austin’s May 23rd meeting, 7 pm, at Zilker Botanical Garden.

I got a sneak peek. It’s a beautiful book!

And the cantina is awfully fun, isn’t it?

Lucinda is bold with color, painting even her wooden privacy fence to festive effect. Here’s her mermaid garden, with blue and green capiz shells creating a watery curtain behind a metal fish and a preening mermaid. Snake plant (Sansevieria) and succulents like ‘Sticks on Fire’ euphorbia add to the wavy, under-the-sea vignette.

Lucinda created this mosaic Madonna altar out of an old bathtub and mortared it into a stone wall.

Mexican folk art is prominently displayed throughout her garden.

These are children’s chairs from Mexico, turned into an artistic collection along an orange wall of her house.

A closer look

In front of her former garage, Lucinda built a large raised bed over her old driveway and planted edibles and more roses.

Silverware flowers pick up the edible theme with a touch of whimsy.

A wider view

An eye-catching flower. This is some sort of African daisy, Lucinda said. Update: This is an Osteospermum hybrid, perhaps ‘Soprano Lilac Spoon’ by Proven Winners.

Aren’t they cool?

This is the dining deck immediately behind the house. A purple umbrella shades the table and cushy chairs. It always amazes me how many distinct garden rooms Lucinda was able to carve out of her tiny lot. And the beauty of it is that they make her garden live much larger than you’d expect.

A frilly metal chair stands by the door to her detached office, where she writes and prepares for her many speaking engagements.

A heart-shaped pad on a spineless prickly pear—Mother Nature’s own valentine?

My thanks to Lucinda for another delightful garden visit! Readers, if you’d like to see more of Lucinda’s festive garden, check out my previous posts:
Lucinda Hutson’s Easter-egg colorful garden, April 2012
Enchanted evening in Lucinda Hutson’s cantina garden, April 2011
El Jardin Encantador: Lucinda Hutson’s garden, October 2009
Lucinda Hutson’s enchanting garden, April 2008

All material © 2006-2013 by Pam Penick for Digging. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited.

So many wildflowers were in bloom last Friday at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center that it’s taken three posts for me to show you everything. Today I’m leading with the eye-popping hotness of a swath of Indian blanket, also known as firewheel (Gaillardia pulchella).

Can’t you just bask in its warmth?

Pink evening primrose (Oenothera speciosa) blooming behind it added a sweetness to the scene—a sweetness belied by that plant’s aggressive nature.

But what a surprisingly pretty combo it makes.

Another meadow scene stars twistleaf yucca (Yucca rupicola), an unknown penstemon, and Texas bluebonnets, as well as various native grasses.

Could this be standing cypress (Ipomopsis rubra)? I admired the vertical, ferny foliage against last season’s tawny grasses.

Another interesting textural contrast was provided by gone-to-seed golden groundsel (Packera obovata) backed by Texas bluegrass (Poa arachnifera), a grass I hadn’t encountered before.

A closeup of the golden groundsel seedheads

Moving on to something a little fresher, I spotted this beautiful iris blooming in a shallow pond…

…as well as this pretty white flower.

Heading back toward the parking lot, I passed another open meadow awash in sunlight. This Texas persimmon (Diospyros texana) seemed spotlit, its gnarled, silvery-gray trunks edged with white, its fresh green leaves illuminated like stained glass.

Then I noticed that a live oak’s low branches perfectly framed another trio of Texas persimmons, like dancing nymphs.

Bluebonnets and penstemons bloomed at my feet.

A closer look

An aqueduct, draped in Virginia creeper, transports rainwater from one of the building’s roofs to a stone-sided cistern—the first structure you see as you enter the Wildflower Center. Here, water is treated as the precious resource it is.

Virginia creeper (Parthenocissus quinquefolia), so pretty in fall when it turns red, is equally pretty in springtime, cloaking a stone pillar in greenery.

And here’s one last kinetic sculpture, part of a temporary art display, to bid you goodbye.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this series of posts about my recent visit to the Wildflower Center. For a look back at Part 1 and Part 2, please click the links.

All material © 2006-2013 by Pam Penick for Digging. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited.