Kirk Walden’s Hill Country garden atop Lake Austin
May 25, 2018 With this killer view of Lake Austin, many homeowners might have sodded a lawn, plunked a few pots of annuals around the pool, and called it done. But Kirk Walden, whose garden was the final stop on the recent Austin Garden Bloggers Fling tour (I photographed it ...
Glorious wildflowers and agaves in Jenny Stocker’s garden
April 20, 2018 Spring in Austin is glorious this year, and especially so in my friend Jenny Stocker’s garden. The Rock Rose blogger cultivates a gravel garden of mostly Texas native wildflowers and grasses sown among woody lilies like agave and yucca, accented with structural rockwork she and her husband, ...
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 ...
Yippee Ki Yay! Austin has its own Stickwork sculpture in Pease Park
February 03, 2018 Have you ever seen a bowerbird’s elaborate, woven-twig structure? That’s what the Stickwork creations of North Carolina artist Patrick Dougherty remind me of. I’ve admired his twiggy sculptures in other cities and gardens. And now we have one in Austin at Pease Park. Titled Yippee Ki Yay, ...
Leaf-peeping, zombies, and Thorncrown Chapel in Eureka Springs, Arkansas
November 03, 2017 Last Friday my husband and I drove up to northern Arkansas for an extended weekend just before Halloween, hoping to see colorful fall foliage while making a first-time visit to Eureka Springs. I didn’t know what to expect from Eureka Springs aside from hilly terrain, natural springs, ...
Linda Peterson’s green-walled xeriscape garden: San Antonio Open Days Tour
October 25, 2017 The highlight of the recent San Antonio Open Days garden tour, as I knew it would be, was Linda Peterson’s beautiful xeriscape and green-walled courtyard garden. Twice before I’ve had the pleasure of exploring Linda’s garden (in September 2015 and April 2016), and the artistry of her ...
Historic San Antonio style in Tupper Beinhorn Garden: San Antonio Open Days Tour
October 22, 2017 Compared with the formality of the Ware Garden, the rambling Old San Antonio style of the Tupper Beinhorn Garden couldn’t be more different. I visited last weekend during the San Antonio Open Days Tour sponsored by the Garden Conservancy. Located in the historic and charming Monte Vista ...
European formality with relaxed Texas style in Ware Garden: San Antonio Open Days Tour
October 18, 2017 Last Saturday I road-tripped to San Antonio for the Open Days garden tour, sponsored by the Garden Conservancy. Shirley Fox of Rock-Oak-Deer was one of the organizers this year, and I was eager to see the gardens that she’d chosen for the tour. The Ware Garden is ...
Pumpkins in the land of Oz at Dallas Arboretum
October 12, 2017 Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain! But the woman in front of the curtain? That’s Diana, my friend and fellow explorer last weekend at the annual Pumpkin Village at Dallas Arboretum. This year the Arboretum carries you off like a tornado to “The Wonderful ...
Sunny day at Portland Japanese Garden
September 25, 2017 A trip to Portland, Oregon, wouldn’t be complete without seeing the city’s luminous Japanese garden. During our mid-August visit, we had to try twice because the first time, on a Sunday afternoon, we simply could not find any parking, even after circling for a half hour. Even ...
Lan Su Chinese Garden, a downtown Portland oasis
September 23, 2017 While vacationing in Portland last month, we visited Lan Su Chinese Garden in downtown Portland. It was my third visit, and I find I enjoy it more each time I see it. Chinese gardens have had to grow on me, so different do they seem from the ...
Long views and classic garden rooms in Brinitzer Garden: Capital Region Garden Bloggers Fling
July 03, 2017 Much as I love my contemporary-naturalistic garden, and enjoyed puttering in my flowery cottage garden before that, my next garden — whenever and wherever that turns out to be — is going to be more like this one: smaller, with formal garden rooms laid out along axis ...
Blue fantasy in the garden of Linda Hostetler: Capital Region Garden Bloggers Fling
July 02, 2017 I saw some truly wonderful gardens during the Capital Region Garden Bloggers Fling last week, and one of my favorites was that of landscape designer Linda Hostetler in The Plains, Virginia. From the street you admire a handsome farmhouse-style home at the end of a wide, curving ...
Summer solstice evening
June 21, 2017 A pink sunset through the trees drew me outside this evening, but then I got sidetracked by the garden, including this pretty combo of ‘Color Guard’ yucca, Mexican oregano (Poliomintha longiflora), and ‘Vertigo’ pennisetum, which has been a successful trial plant from Proven Winners for me, returning ...
Bald cypress creek, beer patios, & other comforts in Comfort, Texas
May 31, 2017 For our 27th wedding anniversary last weekend, my husband and I enjoyed a weekend away in Comfort, Texas, a tiny Hill Country town two hours southwest of Austin. After reading about the stylishly rustic charms of Camp Comfort in seemingly every regional magazine (Tribeza, Southern Living, Texas ...
