Inside Austin Gardens Tour 2009: Best of the rest
Pull up a chair in Randy Case’s eclectic garden
I’ve shown you three of the six wonderful gardens on last Saturday’s Inside Austin Gardens tour. Time constraints and harsh midday sunlight kept me from taking as many pictures in the other three gardens, but they were lovely too. Today I’ll show you the features that grabbed me in each one.
Randy Case’s east Austin garden showcases a variety of bold, beautiful plants. I admired this Aloe ‘Pink Perfection,’ which looks a lot like my Aloe striata.
I could hardly tear my eyes away from this Queen Victoria agave (A. victoriae-reginae), a small, slow-growing agave whose mature form resembles an artichoke.
I caught up with Randy, who blogs at Horselips’s Horse Sense, on his back patio, where he was fielding numerous questions and generously offering seeds from his plants to anyone who expressed an interest. I want to point out his patio in particular for its generous proportions. Constructed simply of decomposed granite, the patio bows out from the rear of his house, seamlessly connecting with the rear elevation, and flows into the yard to take up between one-third and one-half of the depth of the garden.
It’s easy to make patios and other hardscaping too small, especially when you love plants and want to leave lots of room for them. But Randy’s large patio illustrates that bigger is better. I bet it seemed enormous when he was laying out the design on his lawn, but it looks just right now, with plenty of room for a table and chairs and space to move around them or just stand and talk—perfectly illustrating the lesson that it’s better to have a generous hardscape than a meager one. It gives definition to the entire garden and invites people out into it. Plus, from a green standpoint, you don’t have to water hardscaping, as opposed to a big, endless lawn.
In the garden of Lindy McGinnis in the Rollingwood neighborhood of southwest Austin, a beautiful heartleaf hibiscus (Hibiscus martianus) blooming in the front garden reminded me that I’ve been wanting to try this plant. Native to warmer parts of Texas, it’s hardy only to 20 degrees, making it perhaps a bit tender for Austin but safe in a warm microclimate.
Like other gardeners on the tour, Lindy is using cattle panel wire creatively in her garden to construct three-sided trellises. I love this idea. Cattle panel is fairly inexpensive and so versatile. It can be purchased at Callahan’s General Store in Austin, but the trick, unless you have a pickup truck, is getting it home; it comes in 10-ft. lengths that are 6-ft. tall. When you get it home you can cut it with bolt cutters to the dimensions you want. Lindy uses plastic zip ties to hold her three-sided towers together and spray-paints them in fun colors. I expect she’s anchored them to the ground somehow.
Here’s a taller orange one supporting a climbing vine. I may make a few of these to support my ‘Senorita Rosalita’ cleomes, which are susceptible to splitting.
In Jessica Winslow’s west-central Austin hillside garden, a meditation house decorated with colorful prayer flags anchors one side of the garden and enjoys a view. When I was there it was filling up with visitors who had gathered for one of the master gardeners’ talks. But for the homeowners I expect it serves as a contemplative retreat. I thought it was lovely.
I had a wonderful time visiting all the gardens on this tour. My thanks to each homeowner for generously opening their garden gates and sharing their creativity with us.
This being Austin, home of a billion garden bloggers, I did make time during the tour for lunch at Thistle Cafe (tasty!) with three of them: Diana of Sharing Nature’s Garden, Robin of Getting Grounded, and MSS of Zanthan Gardens, who were touring together. And I ran into several others while touring the gardens: Vertie of Vert, Vicki of Playin’ Outside, Jenny of Rock Rose, and Annie of The Transplantable Rose. I know others were touring also, but we missed each other. What a great gardening—and blogging—town this is!
For a look back at my visit to the garden of Eleanor Pratt, plus links to my other posts about the tour, click here.
For other bloggers’ perspectives on the tour:
Jenny of Rock Rose
Meredith of Great Stems
MSS of Zanthan Gardens
Linda of Patchwork Garden
All material © 2006-2009 by Pam Penick for Digging. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited.
This series of garden tour photos has been one of my all-time faves. Not only were your pics just super, there were those other great blogs that had the same views from just a little different perspective. It was the next best thing to being there! I do love Texas gardens.
So glad you enjoyed it, Nell Jean. Thanks for your comment! —Pam
Pam, I couldn’t make the tour Saturday (although I live close to Lindy and did a very slow drive-by..) so I am especially thankful to you (as well as other bloggers) for documenting some of the highlights. What a great job of showcasing each different space with their unique charms you have provided. Really well done!
Thanks, TexasDeb. I wish I could have taken more pics at some of the gardens to do them justice, but I had a great time on the tour. I hope you get to do the tour next year. —Pam
Pam..Thanks for the link. As usual, you got some great shots. I’m sorry we missed seeing you all ‘in person’. Did run into Jenny at Cheryl’s garden. What a great day it was for garden touring.
It was a perfect day for a garden tour. I’m glad you got to enjoy it as well. —Pam
I thoroughly enjoyed the tour too Pam. Thank you so much for your view of the tour. You are so lucky to have such an open sharing garden community.
Yes, I know. Austin is a wonderful gardening community—as generous as it is creative and enthusiastic. Thanks for your comment, Lisa. —Pam
Thank you for letting me view the garden tour from my spot in the world.
And thank you for reading and for your comment, kclily! —Pam
I really enjoyed the tour, and those are very wise words on hardscape. When I had my brick patio installed as part of the construction of my house, I thought it was “plenty big” but now I’d like to double the size of it but the cost is way more now to do that!
Thanks for backing me up, Carol, with your words of experience. —Pam
Your post has made me realize that I missed many things on the tour. I missed seeing that beautiful heart leaf hibiscus. If I am not mistaken this is the same plant in the pots outside the auditorium at the WFC. Wonder if it is still there. We may see it on Friday. Surely we can grow this from seed. One thing none of us missed was that gorgeous Agave victoriae reginae. I saw you taking the photo! Thanks for all your posts on the garden tour. What a super day we all had.
Yes, it was a marvelous day. Like you, I’m looking forward to the next gardening event, the class on Saturday (not Friday). —Pam
I am so glad you guys liked the tour. Sorry I didn’t get to chat more when I saw you guys, but the kids were pulling me in 10 different directions.
They must have been pulling you in 10 directions, Bonnie, because you and I didn’t see each other on the tour. Maybe you saw Diana, MSS, and Robin instead? I was only with them for a little while. I’m sorry I missed you though! The tour was great. —Pam
Most excellent over view of the tour. I can not believe I missed you and the others except I didn’t know what most of them look like. When I was at Cheryl’s I had to be polite and cut the conversation short as I could tell we could talk all day. So many people wanted to talk to her and she is such a great person and easy to talk to. I so hope to meet you one day. Bob
Yes, Cheryl was mobbed when I spoke with her too. Bob, we’re bound to run into each other one of these days, as we keep going to the same events. I look forward to meeting the man behind my goldfish. —Pam
Nice to take a look at these gardens. I like all the details that you’ve highlighted in your comments. It’s hard to believe all of these gardens just endured a terrible drought!
Our recent rains have brought our gardens back to life. Plus, I expect that the folks on the tour took extra-special care of their gardens over the summer in preparation. Also, I noticed that they all featured a lot of native and xeric plants. —Pam
Hello Pam,
Thank you for sharing your photos from another beautiful garden. My favorite agave is the Victoria Agave. I have one mature one and it produced 3 babies. I just love them!
Lucky you to have a mature Queen Victoria! They are so beautiful. —Pam
I just read through all of your garden walk posts, and they are delightful, each garden so different, yet so inspiring. I’m just bubbling over with ideas now, I wish I had a garden large enough to fit them all.
Me too, MMD, and a staff of undergardeners to help me implement them. —Pam