Flowering trees and more unfurling
March 02, 2023 Yesterday the Mexican plum (Prunus mexicana) burst into full bloom, transforming itself from bare twigs to fluffy white flowers seemingly overnight. And early! Last year, according to this blog post, the Mexican plum bloomed 2 weeks later than usual, in late March. This year it bloomed on ...
Organic sculptures by Steve Tobin at Houston Botanic Garden
February 22, 2023 When I fled to Houston during Austin’s ice storm aftermath earlier this February, I made a visit with family to Houston Botanic Garden. Even in Zone 9 Houston, winter had not spared palms, grasses, and many other plants. Still, an art exhibit by Steve Tobin called Intertwined: ...
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 ...
Autumn gardens and biking at Biltmore House
November 17, 2022 During our visit to Asheville, North Carolina, earlier this month, we spent one day at Biltmore House — but not to see the castle-like chateau erected by the New York-based Vanderbilts as their summer place. We’ve toured the house before, and it’s interesting, but I didn’t feel ...
Cynthia Deegan’s free-spirited, collected home and garden
November 01, 2022 The mossy green doors of Cynthia Deegan’s milagro-spangled garden gate opened to me again a week or so ago, when she generously invited me and Garden Spark speaker Teri Speight to come on over. What a treat to follow up our visit to Lucinda’s garden with Cynthia’s! ...
Day of the Dead in Lucinda’s colorful garden
October 27, 2022 Lucinda Hutson welcomed me and Teri Speight, my recent Garden Spark speaker, into her garden last week to see it decorated for Day of the Dead. This is a treat I look forward to all year. Lucinda’s garden and purple cottage always glow with color in October, ...
Native plants and Hill Country style at Paula Stone’s Fredericksburg garden
October 25, 2022 Two Fridays ago a couple of friends and I drove out to Fredericksburg, a charming town in the Texas Hill Country, founded in the mid-1800s by German immigrants and built out of native limestone block, pressed-tin ceilings, and galvanized roofs. We’d been invited to visit by Paula ...
Walking the rails at Santa Fe Railyard Park and Farmers’ Market
October 17, 2022 Back to Santa Fe! During our stay in late August, we hit the farmers’ market at The Railyard one morning. A tree-studded green space caught David’s eye on the way over, so we stopped to check it out. We found ourselves in Railyard Park, where train tracks ...
Hotel Magdalena courtyard evokes Hill Country canyon
October 06, 2022 After an all-day meeting on South Congress recently, I strolled down Music Lane to Hotel Magdalena, a boutique hotel that opened in 2020. I’d been wanting to see the place since learning that Ten Eyck Landscape Architects did the landscaping and Lake|Flato Architects designed the hotel itself ...
Beautiful flora and fauna at Santa Fe Botanical Garden
September 19, 2022 During our stay in Santa Fe at the end of August, I spent one morning at Santa Fe Botanical Garden. I first visited in 2016, three years after it opened and right before the opening of Phase 2, Ojos y Manos: Eyes and Hands. My 6-year absence ...
Doors, gardens, art along Santa Fe’s Canyon Road
September 14, 2022 Santa Fe’s adobe structures seem an extension of the earth itself. Curvy walls in warm, desert hues — tan, soft rose, terracotta — rear up from the gravelly soil to enclose courtyards and residences. Wooden doors, some with slatted windows for a glimpse inside, add mystery and ...
James David and Gary Peese’s new garden in New Mexico
September 09, 2022 Landscape architect James David and Gary Peese departed Austin about 5 years ago, leaving behind a 36-year-old, swoon-worthy garden that regularly starred on Open Days Tours and was covered by Martha Stewart, Architectural Digest, and, ahem, yours truly (click for my final visit). Looking for cooler weather, ...
Snapshots from Olbrich Botanical Gardens’ meadow, event, and herb gardens
August 12, 2022 Coneflowers at the entrance to Olbrich While in Madison for the Fling back in June, I had time for a pre-Fling visit to Olbrich Botanical Gardens, and then of course the garden was on the official tour schedule as well. Double Olbrich! I first visited this fine ...
Cindy Fillingame’s glowing, rainy-day garden
August 09, 2022 Let’s pedal on into another lovely Wisconsin garden from the Madison Fling in June, this one belonging to Cindy Fillingame. An old, three-wheeled bicycle greets you out front, a tub of yellow pansies glowing behind the seat, pink penstemon popping up through the spokes. While Austin continues ...
Ann Munson’s woodland garden invites mystery and play
August 05, 2022 Woodland gardens aren’t show ponies of dazzling flower color. Their beauty shines through in subtler, shade-loving foliage plants, in dappled light glinting through leaves, in cool shadowed paths that gradually reveal tucked-away art and secret hideaways. Such is the garden of Ann Munson, which I toured on ...
A garden on wheels and colorful decor convert driveway into patio garden
August 03, 2022 When you arrive at a purple Victorian-style house on a Rainbow Row, with a dozen planetary-painted bowling balls tucked amid foundation ferns and coleus, accented by jewel-toned bottles on a bottle tree — well, you know you’re in for a tour of a fearless color-lover’s garden. Such ...
