Parterre Garden: Embroidering with Plants

While working on my talk on ‘Herbs of Shakespeare’ presented last week, I got re-intrigued with the elaborate evergreen gardens they planted back in those days.

Formal, ornamental gardens of the French Baroque period and English Renaissance were typically laid out on level surfaces adjacent to the grand buildings or halls, par "on", terre "the ground". They were typically bilaterally symmetrical and often foursquare, divided by broad, level paths of gravel, sand, turf or swept earth. A stone or brick curb was often used to outline the design, and within, the planting beds were edged with tightly clipped evergreen hedges, often of boxwood, for four seasons of beauty.

Within the planting beds the woody ornamentals were tightly planted in clipped hedges inscribing decoratively geometric designs. The sensuous shapes of boxwood scrolls and arabesques placed within the very formal, straight lines of the garden’s basic design lent an elaborate gracefulness. The geometry could also be more angular and consist of straight lines and 90 degree angles. A Flower Parterre had a riot of colorful flowers changing with the seasons planted within the compartments of the hedges. Or the clipped parterres need not have any flowers at all. A Plain Parterre had nothing but the basic outline of the clipped evergreen hedges of the planting.

Broad pathways were part of the design, and allowed the garden to be admired by people strolling through it. However the true beauty of the parterre was best viewed from the upper windows of the mansion. This bird’s eye view displayed the design like a pattern of crewel embroidery.

Although today’s gardeners are not about to plant a formal parterre, low evergreen hedges are still useful to contain flowers or define an edge. Consider trying Green Borders Boxwood, new this year from Garden Debut®, for low, informal hedging and when dark green color is needed to provide structure and interest in the landscape.

This littleleaf boxwood displays a sturdy growth habit and dense, dark green foliage. Slow growing, Green Borders reaches a mature height of 2 – 3 feet tall and a slightly wider spread of 3 – 4 feet, making it excellent for informal garden edging and borders. Plants are profusely branched and the glossy, dark green foliage adds a distinctive rich color to the garden in winter.

Not just another green box, Green Borders Boxwood is exceptional because it is tolerant of moist soils. Other notable characteristics include deer resistance and a slight fragrance when the tiny flowers bloom in late spring. Green Borders Boxwood flourishes in conditions of sun to dappled shade. In full sun, shallow-rooted plants appreciate a little mulch to keep soils cool.

Boxwoods have been used for centuries by gardeners for small hedges, garden borders, edging, foundation plantings and as accent plants, prized for their slow rate of growth. Although pruning or shearing is never necessary with Green Borders Boxwood, littleleaf plants may be sheared into tight the geometric shapes or the formal topiary of yesteryear if desired.

Gardening Thoughts on Mother's Day

There is something to be said for celebrating Mother’s Day in the most beautiful month of the year, amidst all the spring flowers. Wikipedia has a remarkable chart listing the timing of Mother’s Day in many countries around the world, and I noticed the majority of them do fall in May. 

My darling Mother showered me with unconditional love and her many talents included watercolor, design, dressmaking and cooking, but I attribute my love of gardening to my Gardening Grandmother. Cozily seated on the sofa with the snow piled up outside Grandmother would let me choose dozens of vegetable and flower seeds from the glossy catalogs to order for the garden. When springtime rolled around, we would plant an organic garden, turning under cover crops and organic mulch, lining out seeds of leaf lettuce, hilling up the cukes, ladling out manure tea. 

Grandmother had a garden that puzzled me, with old fashioned flowers and new hybrid vegetables all thriving together under fruit trees. It was much later that I learned hers was a “cottage garden”. The branches of her plum trees were so weighted down with fruit that 2 x 4s were needed to prop them up and prevent them from breaking. I NEVER remember being asked to weed, but inhabited a privileged sphere and was allowed to pick tiny cucumbers at 3-inches, rub off their prickles and munch them up in the garden still warm from the sun, or to pop the sensitive seed pods of Balsam or Touch Me Nots at will. 

In June, we would go to the annual Community Rose Show just before closing on the last day, and Grandmother would gather up the discarded roses to take home. These were carefully rooted under quart Mason jars, and in later years people would stop their cars to get out and marvel at the display of roses planted the length of the driveway.  She had green fingers and I absorbed the best gardening practices unconsciously.  

I still have a great treasure: Grandmother’s favorite trowel and I use it only occasionally. I have her seed box and I still grow descendents of the balsam and feverfew that used to grow in her garden. I’m a mom and when my sons were small we gardened together too.  One has turned out to love gardening, but the jury’s still out on the other one. I have high hopes of hitting two for two. 

Consider Cotoneaster as a Groundcover

Groundcover plants, often overlooked in the plant pantheon, are hard workers in the landscape and solve many design challenges. Groundcovers help to define space and unify elements of the landscape; they’re used to soften hardscapes, add texture and provide transition between the lawn and taller plants. When sited correctly they can prevent soil erosion and slow weed growth.

Of course lawns are groundcovers, ubiquitously used to frame architecture. But consider that groundcovers can be woody or herbaceous, spreading, running, vining or clump-forming, evergreen or deciduous, and can range in height from an inch to four feet.

Northern Borders™ Cotoneaster is a low-maintenance groundcover choice that is tough, adaptable and requires little pruning, with no serious insect or disease problems. This Garden Debut® introduction is moderate-growing and can be massed for sunny areas in the landscape including banks and slopes where it can also provide some erosion control. A valuable woody groundcover, Northern Borders™ Variegated Cotoneaster hugs the ground, maturing at two to three feet and with a generous spread of five to eight feet! Northern Borders™ sprawls over rocks in rock gardens, cascades over stone walls and mounds at patio edges.

The leaves of Northern Borders™ Variegated Cotoneaster are edged with a shimmer of white.
As far as the beauty goes, Northern Borders™’s outstanding blue-green foliage rimmed in white produces an overall silver effect in the landscape. This beautiful, dense-growing cultivar is fine-textured and semi-evergreen, and the noteworthy leaves persist until late in autumn when they change to a lovely orange-red color. In winter the leaves fall, revealing the celebrated “fan” or “herringbone” branch pattern for which this species is known. An added bonus, this branching provides a good habitat for ground nesting birds.

In the vertical dimension, Northern Borders™ Cotoneaster is a good subject for espalier and offers four seasons of interest no matter what form. The silver-edged leaves are prominent in summer. In spring, rosy buds open to tiny white flowers along the cinnamon-colored twigs. Later, the plant is laden with shiny scarlet fruit (1/4 inch) liberally sprinkled throughout. These berries add color throughout winter, sparkling in the winter sun and providing food for songbirds and wildlife.


Learn more about Northern Borders™ Variegated Cotoneaster at Garden Debut®.

Statistics for Northern Borders™ Variegated Cotoneaster, Cotoneaster horizontalis ‘Variegatus’ Selection

Plant Category: Woody shrub
Mature Height: 2 - 3 feet
Mature Spread: 5 - 8 feet
Mature Form: Horizontal spreading groundcover
Branching: Cinnamon-brown branches with attractive fan or fishbone pattern becoming tiered over time
Growth Rate: Moderate, low maintenance, durable, no serious pests
Sun Exposure: Full sun to partial shade
Soil Type: Loam, Sand, Clay
Soil Moisture: Moist, well-drained; adaptable to drought when established
Roots: Wide-ranging
Flower Color: Tiny rosy buds open to white flowers (1/2 inch)
Bloom Season: May – June
Berries: Bright scarlet red, small (1/4 inch), persistent throughout Winter, excellent songbird food especially after frost sweetens the berries; nesting habitat
Foliage: Blue-green foliage (to 3/8 inch) is edged in white, persists through late fall
Fall Color: Lovely red-orange fall color, becoming deciduous in early winter
pH Level: 5.5 – 7.5
Zones: 5 – 8
Heredity: U.S., Greenleaf Nursery Selection, Park Hill, OK

When performance counts, use Garden Debut® introductions!

White Terrestrial Orchids now blooming in my garden!

   A gaggle of white terrestrial orchids are blooming on both sides of the path in my shady garden. My friend Mary couldn't believe they 1. grew in the ground, 2. liked rain, and 3. stayed outside all winter, and she had to be convinced. I brought her a pseudobulb and planted it in a raised bed in her garden amongst her Lilies-of-the-Valley. Perhaps they will aspire to become more like the orchid.
   I cut off the flowering stem and put it in a bud vase for her to enjoy, thus allowing the products of photosynthesis to be used to form roots rather than seeds and so grow into a strong plant. I realy like the pleated leaves which are about the same height as the flower stems.
   Bletilla striata 'Alba' flowers last quite a while, at least 4 weeks, and the graceful seed pods resemble a gooseneck-- or maybe a swan's graceful curve?-- lasting until next year's flowers.
   I ran across these orchid plants quite unexpectedly at a Big Box store, on a rolling rack pushed in the back by the bags of Nature's Helper, away from the other perennials. Who would have thought? I bought them all. They have been in the ground four years now and have multiplied quite nicely, spreading into drifts. I planted them high, and mulched with leaf litter and compost, but after that I have done nothing else. They're quite easy to look after, at least in Atlanta's Zone 7 climate.

I've got them planted beneath a couple of Pin Oaks, where the soil gets pretty dry. They gets slanting sunshine early in the morning but otherwise are shaded. They're not native, though; you can tell because they're sometimes called China Orchids or Hyacinth Orchids. Normally they do come in an orchid (purple) color, but these are the white form, and I love them! I hear there's a white-flowered, white-variegated- leaf form, but I've only seen it in photos and never for sale.
   My friend Adam of Terrestrial Landscape & Design is installing a whole garden of many types of terrestrial orchids for a client. Doesn't that sound dreamy? Do you grow any orchids in your garden?

   BTW, the vine climbing up the oak trunk is Schizophragma hydrangeoides 'Moonlight'. It has reached the same level as the second floor windows.

Earth Day 1970 to 2010

Background
Back in the day protests were de rigueur and there were Love-Ins, Sit-Ins and Laugh-Ins. The first-ever Earth Day 1970 was intended to be an Environmental Teach-In.

Rachel Carson’s consciousness raising 1962 book Silent Spring had alerted the public to possible consequences of uncontrolled pesticide use. In 1968 NASA’s (Apollo 8) first photos of the whole earth as viewed from space transformed the perception of a limitless and indestructible “Mother Earth” to the model of a beautiful blue planet, our fragile “Spaceship Earth”. People started getting it.

The First Earth Day
Marking the beginning of the Modern Environmental Movement, on April 22, 1970 thousands of local schools and universities organized protests against environmental deterioration including loss of wilderness, oil spills, pollution, toxic dumps, pesticides and wildlife extinction. Anti-littering was big that year, providing an action step people could wrap their heads around.

Founder U.S. Senator Gaylord Nelson (Wisconsin) noted “Earth Day worked because of the spontaneous response at the grassroots level. No one had the time or resources to organize 20 million demonstrators and the thousands of schools and local communities that participated. That was the remarkable thing about Earth Day. It organized itself.” In later years, when the national focus had shifted to conspicuous consumption and keeping up with the Joneses, Earth Day was relegated to the back burner, surfacing about once a decade.

Earth Day 2010
Now celebrating its 40th anniversary, this year Earth Day focuses on environmental conservation including climate change and global warming, advocacy, conservation and biodiversity, food and agriculture, recycling and waste reduction, sustainable development, energy and fossil fuel alternatives, and water. Big concepts, but take your own green step and plant a garden, or coach a child to do so. Or maybe your child can coach you, as in Allison Areiff's NYT column today: http://nyti.ms/a9Jniw My goal is to make Earth Day a daily consideration, not just an annual one. What about you?

Baby Gem Boxwood is a Valuable Addition to the Landscape

Boxwood is a versatile evergreen shrub with a broad range of forms and sizes that has long been a treasured hedging plant in the garden. Fossilized boxwood leaves and fruit have been discovered dating back approximately 22.5 million years. In Roman times, atria in affluent villas were landscaped with formal boxwood plantings used to frame garden spaces, paths, or doorways. Sculpted or 3-dimensional topiary was/is another use for boxwood, since the dense branching and small leaves supported close shearing. The shapes act as anchors, finials, and ornamentation in the garden. In the Middle Ages, parterres, rose gardens and knot gardens also employed boxwood.

"Man's Oldest Garden Ornament," was introduced to North America from Europe in the mid-1600s and reached peak popularity in the United States during the early 19th century and again during the Colonial Revival era. There are many classic plantings such as the one at Mount Vernon. When I lectured at Colonial Williamsburg I learned it boasts seven miles of boxwood hedges.

The Latin name Buxus sempervirens was given to boxwood by Swedish botanist Carolus Linnaeus in 1753. Buxus means “box” and sempervirens means “evergreen.” The wood of boxwood is highly regarded. It is firm, smooth grained, strong, uniform, has great elasticity and its shrinkage is minimal when dried. It has been used to make beautiful jewel boxes, combs, wood inlays, carved ornaments, utensils, tablets, and flutes.

Today, Baby Gem Boxwood, a new cultivar presented by Garden Debut®, is a valuable addition to the landscape. The vigorous littleleaf boxwood is an exceptionally compact plant with a dense, multi-branched habit, easy to grow and robust in the landscape overall. This broadleaf evergreen vigorously grows a little taller than it is wide, resulting in a rounded form.

Fine-textured, the tiny, lustrous leaves are abundant and add a distinctive color note, retaining their rich, emerald-green color particularly well in winter. Baby Gem Boxwood’s extremely small, lustrous leaves provide a matte effect even when formally sheared or sculpted, since the tiny leaves don’t show shearing cuts.

The brisk growth rate makes Baby Gem Boxwood ideal for carefree hedging in a wide area of the U.S. It is an emerald gem of a foundation plant, excellent for edging, and may be clipped for parterres, topiary and formal gardens. The vibrant green hue provides an exceptional backdrop for brilliant annual and perennial flowers and statuary.

Other splendid characteristics of this garden gem include deer resistance and tolerance of dry soils once established. Baby Gem Boxwood flourishes in conditions of sun to shade, and benefits from an organic mulch to keep roots cool. Look for Baby Gem Boxwood in garden centers this spring.

For more information about proper cultivation and landscape applications of boxwood, or to find fellow boxwood lovers, visit the American Boxwood Society website.

Dogwood Blossom Wedding Cake

Here's an addendum to my previous Dogwood post that goes out to all my bride-friends and their Moms.

When assembling a program entitled "20 Favorite Native Plants for Georgia Gardens", of course I included the native flowering Dogwood, Cornus florida among my picks. I came across this wonderful wedding cake image on Google Images, courtesy of Southern Living Magazine.

This also ties into a Huffington Post article I saw today on Tips for a Green Wedding.   http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lauren-elyse-matison/7-easy-ways-to-green-your_b_536063.html.

Happy trails . . .