Shangri La Botanical Gardens, a garden fairy tale

Shangri La Botanical Gardens, a garden fairy tale

December 15, 2022 Dancing Sisters bottle tree sculpture at Shangri La Sleeping Beauty has nothing on Shangri La Botanical Gardens & Nature Center. Located in the small town of Orange, Texas, just across the Sabine River from Louisiana, Shangri La’s very existence is in some ways as fantastical as the ...
Piet Oudolf meadow in fall bloom at Delaware Botanic Gardens

Piet Oudolf meadow in fall bloom at Delaware Botanic Gardens

March 15, 2022 The last public garden I visited on my road trip down the East Coast last October was newly opened Delaware Botanic Gardens in Dagsboro, Delaware. The big draw? A 2-acre meadow designed by revered Dutch plantsman Piet Oudolf, who also designed the plantings of the High Line ...
Early spring blooms and Athena the owl at Wildflower Center

Early spring blooms and Athena the owl at Wildflower Center

March 20, 2021 When they’re offered, I take advantage of late-admission hours to gardens. The light is better for photography in the early evening, and you have a better chance of seeing wildlife. On Thursday our local native-plant botanical garden, the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center, stayed open late, and ...
Children's Garden at Denver Botanic Gardens: Denver Garden Bloggers Fling

Children’s Garden at Denver Botanic Gardens: Denver Garden Bloggers Fling

July 17, 2019 Part of the Mordecai Children’s Garden at Denver Botanic Gardens, which I visited during the Denver Fling (June 2019), sits atop a parking garage, making it one very large rooftop garden. A pretty alpine garden, including this crevice garden, greets you as you enter, and it surprised ...
In the Thicket of things: An urban boutique nursery in Portland

In the Thicket of things: An urban boutique nursery in Portland

September 24, 2017 Sopping up a plateful of sausage gravy with fluffy, fist-sized biscuits at a picnic table outside of Pine State Biscuits, I glimpsed an open gate and profusion of plants just a dozen yards away, tucked behind a nearby building. We were in Portland, Oregon, on a mid-August ...
New shade sails and other garden goodness

New shade sails and other garden goodness

May 05, 2017 We’ve always wanted shade for our deck, which is one of the few spots in our yard not overhung by live oaks. Facing south, it gets blasted by the Death Star all day long, and even our kitchen table overlooking the deck gets unpleasantly toasty by midafternoon ...
RH Austin rooftop garden showcases contemporary outdoor furniture

RH Austin rooftop garden showcases contemporary outdoor furniture

October 06, 2016 Three weeks after its grand opening, I climbed the glittering, mirrored grand staircase at the 62,000-square-foot mansion known as RH Austin (Restoration Hardware, rebranded), one of the anchor stores in the new Northside section of The Domain shopping center in north Austin. After a cursory inspection of ...
Visit to Big Red Sun garden shop in Venice

Visit to Big Red Sun garden shop in Venice

October 09, 2015 Named after a Lucinda Williams song (so of course I like it), Big Red Sun shuttered its cool boutique nursery in East Austin years ago. After briefly reopening in a new location, under new management, it closed again, and now Big Red Sun in Austin is strictly ...
Xeriscape is not a zeroscape: Scottsdale Xeriscape Garden demonstrates the beauty of saving water

Xeriscape is not a zeroscape: Scottsdale Xeriscape Garden demonstrates the beauty of saving water

May 09, 2014 It’s a common mispronunciation, but it’s also a bit of a Freudian slip: saying “zeroscape” instead of “xeriscape.” To xeriscape is to design a garden that conserves water through the use of drought-tolerant plants grouped according to water needs, water-collection systems, mulch, non-wasteful irrigation, and other rather ...
Support Your Independent Nursery: The Natural Gardener GIVEAWAY

Support Your Independent Nursery: The Natural Gardener GIVEAWAY

October 01, 2012 Buddha says, Support your local nurseries. Each week in October, which is Support Your Independent Nursery Month, I am featuring one of my favorite Austin-area nurseries here at Digging. To make things even more interesting, I’m also hosting a giveaway every week—one from each nursery! This week ...