W. Gary Smith

Look up the word “numinous” and you’re well on the way to understanding what you can gain by unleashing your creativity. Landscape architect W. Gary Smith opened his recent lecture at the Toronto Botanical Garden with a detail photo of a raked gravel garden at Philadelphia’s Chanticleer. He described a magical moment when cherry blossoms fluttered to the ground, filling the patterned grooves with their gossamer white petals. As he stepped into the centre of the gravel bed, the wind whipped around him, and more blossoms swirled about, creating the magical feeling of being in the middle of a snow globe. No setting, no occasion, no moment can be numinous by design. All we can hope to achieve, Smith says, is to set up the place where these moments can take place.

From that powerful opening image, Smith proceeded to describe how, by using eight universal patterns created by various natural or human processes, we can unleash our creativity to design landscapes that are ready for their numinous moments. If I tell you what those eight universal patterns are, this post would sound like a text book, but believe me, when Smith reveals these patterns and how he uses them to inform his designs, nothing could be less like rote learning. If you can’t attend one of his lectures, then buy his award-winning book From Art to Landscape: Unleashing Creativity in Garden Design, and if it’s sold out, visit his Stooks and Punes installation this spring at the Toronto Botanical Garden, and if you can’t make it to the garden, then visit his website – but be careful; he just might unleash your creativity.

There’s a buzz in the air about local hero Clement Kent, a York University postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Biology in York’s Faculty of Science & Engineering and president of the Horticultural Societies of Parkdale and Toronto.  Kent founded the Pollinator Garden Project two years ago to teach gardeners, members of the public and school children how to create and conserve habitat for pollinators. The success of this project has garnered him the Pollinator Advocate Award of Canada from the North American Pollinator Protection Campaign (NAPPC).  Kent will accept his award at an international conference at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington in late October. Whoo-hoo!

I first met Donna at the Garden Writers Symposium in Portland Oregon — she was chattering on about soil and microbes while we sat on the bus, heading to our next garden-gazing excursion. Soil is a subject very dear to my green thumb, so this was the start of a beautiful friendship. I first met Steven at a Professional Writers Association meeting where he was chairing a panel discussion about garden writing. Well, little did I know that these two horticultural gurus would get together a few years later to collaborate on a book called No Guff Vegetable Gardening. And voila, here it is. It’s full of facts and fun, all delivered in a breezy, over-the-garden-fence kinda way. If you’re planning to attend Canada Blooms, be sure to hear them speak on Thursday, March 17 at 11 a.m. in Garden Solutions Room 105. If you can’t make it, check out the how-to videos on the Garden Coaches Chat website and get a no guff start on your veggie garden this year!

So, if you get the chance, pick up one of Theresa’s calendars — it’s a winner!

Theresa tells me her 2011 calendar will be available in September. To pre-order, email her at  theresa_forte@sympatico.ca. The price is $20 each plus taxes,  plus $5 for shipping. if required.

Photo by Brian Gassel/TVS Designs

12. Sir Walter

A few days into the 2009 Garden Writers Symposium in Raleigh, North Carolina, a fellow garden writer glanced up at the statue in front of the convention centre that we’d passed about a million times and realized it was Sir Walter Raleigh. I’m not sure what took us so long to make the connection between the city we were visiting and Q.E. I’s infamous explorer and wouldn-be colonist, but once the penny dropped, we discovered a plethora of allusions to the city’s namesake, including the surreal Sir Walter Wrap at Sam & Wally’s Eatery. But of all things Raleigh-esque, I’ll most remember walking through the historic Oakwood neighbourhood to attend the TweetUp that took place in one of the neighbourhood’s charming gardens, sampling Raleigh-style barbecue at the JC Raulston Arboretum and tasting scuppernongs at the Raleigh Farmer’s Market. Thanks, Raleigh, for hosting such a great symposium!

10. Play Checks
My family, friends and most passersby who spy the newspaper on the front porch at 9 a.m. know that I’m not a morning person. So, when I dragged myself out of bed to attend the 8 a.m. keynote speech at the 2009 Garden Writers Symposium in Raleigh, I sincerely hoped it would be worthwhile. My hopes were almost dashed when Dr. Lowell Catlett stood up on stage and started talking about Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs - yikes, I thought, did I get out of bed for a college lecture?

Mercifully, Dr. Catlett’s homespun storytelling technique made his speech on the Greening of America (or Canada?) entertaining and the messages he delivered all the more compelling. He used Maslow’s pyramid to show how we’ve gone from needing to make a living to having a lifestyle – all in just three generations. In the middle of the pyramid are the Baby Boomers: “the first mass-educated generation on the planet and the first generation with no conception of retirement.” We’re the generation who wants play checks not pay checks.

So, what does all this mean? It means we have more freedom to pursue our dreams than ever before, and those dreams may lead us to raise chickens in the city, pursue eco-adventures anywhere in the world or move into a retirement home with our cats if that’s what we cherish. For garden writers like me, Catrell’s parting message was: “Do not sell people products and services. Sell them dreams.” Well, how difficult can that be when gardening is really an expression of our personal dreams and aspirations?

The native plant garden at North Carolina Botanical Garden is the closest example I could find to demonstate Weaner's garden design philosophy which relies on plant communities to express the rich beauty of native landscapes.

6. Natural landscapes for the real world

Larry Weaner, a landscape architect based in Glenside, Pennsylviania, opened his talk on “Breaking the Rules” at the 2009 Garden Writers Symposium in Raleigh with a story about how Native Americans were this continent’s first ecologists. Among their sustainable practices was the deliberate division the carex plants growing in meadows so that what the natives took from the plants for weaving and other handicrafts never depleted the source. These First Peoples also burned leaves under oak trees to destroy acorn larvae that would otherwise mature to infest an important food source.

From these two stories, Weaner’s philosophy of natural landscape design unfolded through breathtaking photos of his company’s projects, including meadows and woodlands in country, suburban and city gardens. Based on the idea that plant design should follow the patterns of the landscape and seasonal plant cycles, Weaner uses plants that have adapted to the specific conditions of the site. Simply put, he plants wetlanders in marshy spots and prairie grasses in sunny locations with poor soils. It sounds logical, but how many garden designers are doing this? Not many, I think. And that’s because to be successful, it takes time – often more than five years – to see the results, and it takes the knowledge drawn from many disciplines – from ecology to architecture – to be successful. I hope Weaner is thinking of writing a book, I want to know more about how to create such beautifully natural landscapes.

Pitcher plants and nodding ladies tresses at North Carolina Botanical Garden

Meanwhile, maybe I’ll grow a mini-landscape using a community of plants in a large container – I’ve always loved pitcher plants, and on this trip I discovered Nodding Ladies’ Tresses, which like the same conditions as sarracenias. Hmmm, another project for next year…

And he’s not the only one at the show to have created lofty pots; several booths showcased the slimline containers in a variety of materials, including classic terra cotta and colour-washed ceramic. I like these svelt urns for their freshly elegant look. But they also do something we haven’t seen since the advent of the hanging basket: they put plants at eye level where we can appreciate their colour, texture and fragrance. Gotta try this at home…

But, for intrepid urban gardener, Gayla Trail (and her online persona You Grow Girl), ingenuity and frugality combine with a passion for plants to transform garbage cans to containers, dresser drawers to planters and rooftops into gardens filled with heirloom vegetables and unusual herbs. Recently, Gayla spoke at a Parkdale Horticultural Society meeting and showed how she does it and what she grows. Here are 12 good things she said that have inspired me to try converting a corner of my yard into a mini-veggie garden this year.

1. Shiso, or perilla, is a herb plant with wonderful purple foliage. Brew the leaves into an iced tea with a fruity, minty flavour. It’s also used to dye ginger pink (the kind served with sushi).

2. Whippersnapper is one of the earliest tomatoes to mature and grows well in containers. Gayla harvests hers in July.

3. Gayla reuses her potting soil from year to year, amending it with compost (especially vermicompost) and rotating her crops.

4. To conserve water, she grows in very large containers which don’t need watering as often as smaller ones do. She also places tall plants at the back of her rooftop garden as a wind break.

5. She hardens off seedlings by placing them in a sheltered gazebo; first for a few hours a day, and gradually increasing their exposure to the outdoors over two weeks. Although it takes extreme patience to do this, she says it really pays off in healthy plants.

6. Clear plastic takeaway containers with lids make great mini “greenhouses” for starting seeds.

7. Peppers, either sweet or hot, need deep containers to accommodate their roots. Gayla grows them in her collection of sap buckets.

8. All of her containers have holes in the bottom for drainage. To make them, she hammers a large nail through the metal bottoms of sap buckets, garbage cans and other metal containers.

9. Yes, she manages to grow strawberries in a strawberry pot! But she also recommends growing Dianthus, which can take the dry conditions.

10. Purple bush basil has tiny leaves that burst with flavour — try it!

11. Sow lettuce in “lettuce balls” constructed of two wire hanging baskets, lined with coir, filled with soil and wired together. Covered all over in leafy lettuce, they look like giant, edible green powder puffs!

12. Grow potatoes in garbage cans by placing a bit of soil in the bottom (don’t forget the drainage holes, and Gayla places the can on top of the upturned, brick-lined garbage can lid which serves as a saucer); then plant the bits of potatoes and cover with a thin layer of soil; as the potatoes sprout, add more soil until it reaches the top of the can and the potato leaves tumble over the rim.

Galya’s working on her next book, so watch for it soon!

Cabbages and kales for fall containers

With fall in the air, all gardeners’ thoughts turn to autumn planters – right? Like opening the closet to examine the state of our fall wardrobes, planning a container of autumn plants signals the change of season from the fun, but toasty days of summer, to the energizingly crisp cool days of fall.

Each year it seems that nurseries offer a greater variety of plants for autumn containers. There are myriad grasses that wave and whisper with the breezes, heathers that last well into winter, mums, pansies and asters that add splashes of colour and boldly textured ornamental kales and cabbages. Here’s a roundup of some great plants for your fall containers.

Grasses
Purple fountain grass (Pennisetum setaceum ‘Rubrum’) still seems to be the popular choice, and why not? Its beautiful burgundy foliage is perfectly complemented by graceful coppery flower tufts. But there are others, too. A green version of fountain grass, P. alopecuroides ‘Hameln’ has pale green feathery flowers flushed with red, and the nodding heads of northern sea oats (Chasmanthium letifolium) shimmer in the sunlight of bright autumn days. Although more of a grain than a grass, ornamental millet (Pennisetum glaucum ‘Purple Majesty’) is a handsome deep purple-coloured upright plant that adds much-needed height to containers.

Heather
White, pink, lavender, lilac, rose and violet – these are just some of the many pastel colours of heather that you’ll find at the nurseries this season. A semi-evergreen subshrub, heathers last well into the winter. Give them good drainage and plenty of peaty soil (they love it on the acidic side) and they’ll be happy.

Mums, pansies and asters
Stalwarts of the autumn garden, mums, pansies and asters come in a rainbow of colours from bright yellows and rusty-hued oranges to purple, white and pink. At a local nursery, I spotted some dwarf asters that are easy to tuck into containers. Look for the magenta-coloured Aster x dumosus and A. novi-belgii ‘Puff’, a frilly white aster, and its pals, the lavender-blue ‘Magic’ and ‘Dragon’. Icicle pansies have become popular both in the garden and in containers. I can’t resist their happy faces! I’ve fallen for ‘Autumn Sun’, a combination of violet with a sunset yellow blotch that looks perfect paired with purple fountain grass and ornamental millet. ‘Rosy Red Ruffle’ and ‘Fire n’ Ice’ are also good strong colours for fall.

Kales and cabbages
Traditional favourites, these cool season ornamental vegetables add texture to a fall arrangement. When visiting a friend’s garden last year, I was bowled over by a towering ornamental kale that she had grown from seed. ‘Red Bor’ is its name, and this spring I found some seedlings at the Toronto Botanical Garden’s sale of annuals, so this season it’s now towering in my garden. But lucky for you, it can be yours too. I found some pot-grown specimens at Fiesta Farms Garden Centre on Christie St. – so if you didn’t grow it from seed this spring, run, don’t walk, to pick up one of these fabulous bold plants!