Hilltop pollinator garden of Ruthie Burrus: Austin Open Day tour
November 20, 2019 Having visited Ruthie Burrus’s garden before (including at Austin Garden Bloggers Fling), I knew it would be one of my favorites on the Austin Open Days tour in November, sponsored by The Garden Conservancy. Let’s start with the entry garden, where a concrete trough softened by ferns ...
The happily-ever-after Berger Street Garden: Austin Open Day Tour
November 07, 2019 It’s time to kick off my coverage of last weekend’s Open Day tour in Austin, sponsored by The Garden Conservancy. Six private gardens were open to the public, and I started at the Berger Street Garden, where a homey blue shotgun cottage extends its front porch with ...
A city park floating on air: Klyde Warren Park in Dallas
November 03, 2019 A remarkable green space floats overhead, literally flashing before your eyes as you commute or pass through downtown Dallas. Built above 3 blocks of the Woodall Rodgers Freeway, Klyde Warren Park is a remarkable green roof that has become a beloved public park. Traffic flows beneath the ...
Line dancing and Stickwork sculpture at Chatfield Farms: Denver Garden Bloggers Fling
July 23, 2019 The Denver Garden Bloggers Fling (June 2019) wrapped up, after 3-1/2 days of touring Denver-area gardens, at Denver Botanic Gardens Chatfield Farms. Chatfield Farms, a 700-acre native plant refuge and working farm in Littleton, has a number of interesting gardens, including a prairie garden designed by Lauren ...
Joy to the Weird: Austin’s 37th and 35th Street Christmas lights
December 25, 2018 Merry Christmas, Joy to the Weird, and festive holiday greetings to you from Austin! Last night, on Christmas Eve, my family and I joined curious throngs of people walking and cruising along W. 37th Street, with a jog down Home Lane and over to W. 35th Street, ...
Moonstruck and aglow at Wildflower Center’s Luminations
December 10, 2018 Under a fingernail sliver of moon, we strolled quiet garden paths illuminated with hundreds of glowing luminarias, ultraviolet uplighting on trees, and the occasional white moon light at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center last night. The annual holiday event runs for four nights, but following two ...
Sculptural light installations glow along Austin’s Waller Creek during 5th annual Creek Show
November 19, 2018 Last Saturday, on the final day of Creek Show 2018, hundreds of tents floated sinuously above downtown Austin’s Waller Creek, glowing orange and purple like fairy lights. To reach the start of this temporary art exhibition sponsored by Waller Creek Conservancy, which is remaking the long-neglected creek ...
Garden powers through a Texas heat wave
July 24, 2018 Arizona-level heat is plaguing us here in Austin this week. Temps reached 110 F (43.3 C) yesterday, and we’re cooling down to “only” 101-105 F all the rest of this week. The Death Star is on high beam! The garden must power through, as must we all, ...
Peggy Martin roses adorn stone garden shed
April 18, 2018 Ruthie Burrus used a pile of limestone rocks dug out of her garden to build a charming garden haus in her backyard. Adding antique doors, recycled windows, and metal roofing, she modeled the shed after the humble limestone structures constructed by German immigrants in the Texas Hill ...
Ellsworth Kelly’s “Austin” brightens University of Texas campus
March 07, 2018 Resembling squares of lime, cherry, berry blue, and grape Jell-O, the glass-block windows of artist Ellsworth Kelly’s new artwork, Austin, are colorful, playful, and flat-out fun. You kind of want to slurp them up, or stick your finger in them to see if they jiggle. A new ...
Fair grounds at Fareground food hall in downtown Austin
February 06, 2018 Twice last week I visited buzzed-about Fareground food hall on Congress Avenue in downtown Austin, killing time before shows at the Paramount Theater. I’ve yet to see Fareground in the daytime, but at night the softly lit landscaping and plaza sure are enticing. (The stairs and outer ...
The twinkliest town in the Hill Country
December 22, 2017 If you want to see trees made of light and a charmingly illuminated main square, go visit Johnson City, a small town of 2,000 residents, located about an hour west of Austin. Every December they turn their town into a beautiful spectacle of light — called Lights ...
Austin shines brightly at Trail of Lights and Zilker Tree
December 13, 2017 Five years have slipped by since we’ve walked Austin’s beloved holiday light display at Zilker Park called Trail of Lights. When our kids were little we went every year, and our last visit was in 2012, but this year it was just me and my husband keeping ...
Luminations lights up the Wildflower Center for Christmas
December 11, 2017 Luminations, the annual holiday light display at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center, didn’t happen last year. But it returned this year for a 4-night run that ended Sunday night. Our family went last night and had a lovely time viewing the lights along the paths and ...
Snow day in Austin! It only takes a dusting
December 08, 2017 The flakes started hitting my windshield at 2:30 pm over in central-east Austin. By the time I got home I thought it was all over, but the heavy, gray sky and cold temps convinced me to start pulling pots of tender succulents up against the sheltering walls ...
Water-saving Ridgewood Road Garden: Austin Open Days Tour 2017
November 22, 2017 The talented Annie Gillespie of Botanical Concerns designed the water-saving garden at Ridgewood Road, the next garden in my recap of Austin’s recent Open Days Tour. From the street you’re invited to stroll through a low-water garden of oaks, grasses, agave, and yucca to reach the house ...
