Dusky blues in the garden
While photographing the owls and beating away mosquitoes a few evenings ago, I pointed my lens at the Circle Garden for the umpteenth time. This view makes me so happy!
‘Sterntaler’ coreopsis (foreground) is beginning to flag in the near-100-degree heat we’ve had all week. Who can blame it? But there are still plenty of gold-and-oxblood flowers mingling with the Mexican feathergrass. Beyond, Verbena bonariensis continues to put on a beautiful show, dancing like ladies-in-waiting around the queenly variegated whale’s tongue agave elevated in a pot.
‘Sterntaler’ coreopsis and Mexican feathergrass
A wider view reveals structural elements like ‘Winter Gem’ boxwood balls, stone wall, and pool-pump shed. My neighbors’ colorful umbrellas, visible through the lattice of the fence, always grab my eye, but I can’t begrudge anyone their shade from the Death Star.
Blue wall, more feathergrass in a steel planter, a still-recovering artichoke agave that accidentally got solarized last fall during our pool refinishing, and purple heart (Tradescantia pallida) surfing up alongside that cobalt wall, echoing the purple of the agave pot — a happy accident!
True confession: it took me 5 years to get the monolith wall looking the way I wanted. I tried planting directly in front of it, hanging my Austin sign in front, and just leaving it blank (pitiful). Finally — how did it take me so long?! — I hit on the idea of adding a custom steel planter box in front, planted simply with bulbine and feathergrass, and that did the trick. Now I’m completely happy with it. A little Luis Barragán and Steve Martino in my garden!
Behind the wall, big sister and little sister Yucca rostrata seem to shine even as dusk fades into twilight. Man, have these two grown quickly over the past few years.
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Digging Deeper
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All material © 2024 by Pam Penick for Digging. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited.
Hi Pam,
I never tire of looking at your garden either – thanks for sharing it with those of us who are in the Pacific Northwest marine layer 350 days a year. I can’t say I would like 100 degrees, but I’d like our temps to get above 55 degrees soon. Thanks for the walk through your garden.
Jane
Thank you, Jane! Gosh, I’d love to trade with you on the temps, but the grass is always greener, isn’t it? Thank goodness I love plants that thrive in unending heat: yuccas, agaves, and the like. If only *I* liked the heat too — ha!
“This view makes me so happy!”
ME, TOO!! Congratulations on so many gorgeous garden views and your spectacular color palette…Also, could you please share your secret for keeping those damn bloodsuckers at bay long enough to take all these terrific photos? Just a run (literally) to the mailbox here turns me into WeltWorld…:(
Mosquitoes suck. That is all. 🙂 But thanks for the lovely comment! I miss seeing your garden. Won’t you start a blog or at least an Instagram account to share its daily delights with your fans?
Wow, your wall is five years old now?! I wonder why time in YOUR garden seems to move so much faster than it does in mine! I’m still looking at the equivalent of adolescent plants in my landscape because I started with the smallest possible plants, but I know they’ll get there, and adjust more rapidly for going in young. Realizing I’ve been following your blog for more than five years reminds me that it is time to thank you again for all the joy your posts bring me. I love seeing them, and really appreciate all you do!
Aw, thank you, Maggie! I’m so glad you’ve stuck with my blog for the past five years. And yes, isn’t it funny — and weird — how fast time moves in other people’s gardens and so slowly in our own? Hah!
I love the combination in your circle garden, Pam – it sings!
That’s a lovely compliment. Thanks, Kris!
I can’t believe you have had those walls for 5 years already. I do like the feather grass in front of the wall. It really pops.
I can hardly believe it either. But what I really can’t believe is that we’ve been in this house for almost 12 years!
I love those verbena… so much taller than the ones I have. And that blue color. Wow. I need to find some of those…
The whale’s tongue agave, you mean, Laurel? They are beautiful agaves. Most local nurseries (if you’re in Austin) carry them.
I can’t believe you’ve been there 12 years, either! So interesting that the thing that makes you like the wall the best is the thing that actually hides it the most! Serving as a beautiful backdrop, it’s found its purpose!
The wall needed to frame something. I always intended to grow plants in front of it because that’s what they do in the desert (where I got the inspiration for it). But the strip of soil in front of the wall is shady and super dry. I just couldn’t keep anything sculptural or grassy alive there, and the shrubby perennials I tried just looked messy. The steel planter provides more root space and gives added depth to the wall. Now it’s just right!
Blues in the garden are always a delight, especially yours. Funny to hear how hard it was for you to design about your blue wall. But you’re right, it looks just right now!
Sometimes things come together quickly and sometimes not. I’m glad to finally have hit on the right combo with the blue wall. 🙂
[…] back, oh how I’d loved the colorful blowsiness of the Circle Garden in spring and early summer! And how I hated it by midsummer, when the Verbena bonariensis had faded, its lanky stems collapsed […]