Dear friends and readers, I’m sure you’ve just about given up on ever seeing an fresh, new blog post, since I nearly allowed the month of July to come and go without writing anything.

July was definitely enriching – my over-filled calendar says so! And yet, I am also exhausted (see my prior post, referencing moving to a new home, garden, and pond). Possessing countless experiences in need of personal review and reflection, I had planned to share the more colorful events here in a single post – a diary of sorts from the past month. Yet, since my just-crashed computer is in hospital, complete with most of my stored photos (my external hard-drive has to be replaced, too!), I don’t have much to show you.

So the July recap will occur in stages. Phase One covers July 5th-6th when I visited a few rural towns outside of Portland, Oregon.

I rode the train from Seattle to Portland on July 4th of all things, and my 4-hour journey was lovely, relaxing, and quiet. What a nice way to skip out on the potential holiday craziness on the freeway. Upon arrival, I rented a car and drove to the hamlet of Boring, Oregon.

My friend Nancy Buley lives there and she let me stay under the eaves of her farmhouse, in a room she calls the “garret,” the window of which overlooks Treephoria, her boutique tree farm.

Nancy is a tree ambassador who works closely with landscape architects and designers to educate and excite them about awesome ornamental varieties grown by J. Frank Schmidt & Son.

As director of communications, she frequently writes and speaks about new tree introductions, landscape design and tree selection/care. I first met Nancy years ago through Garden Writers Association, but our friendship was actually forged during a fun evening in Oklahoma City in 2007, when Sally Ferguson included us both in her small dinner party. That’s often how things go: We may only see one another a few times a year, but the kinship is cemented and immediately recalled whenever we meet.

Nancy treated me to a fabulous visit, including a walk at dusk around her grounds. At Treephoria, she and her son Neil Buley grow specialty trees in small batches. Nancy possesses a keen eye for the uncommon, but she also evaluates trees for their performance in the residential landscape. She defines Treephoria as, “the rapturous feeling or state of being experienced when surrounded by remarkable trees.”

That is indeed how I felt. I didn’t want to leave! In fact, when given the choice of going out to a restaurant for dinner of staying in the garden surrounded by trees with a picnic of leftovers you can guess what I chose to do!

A highlight of our tour-at-dusk was Nancy’s flashlight-led visit to the stone barn behind the rows of trees. This two-story structure was once the headquarters for Compton’s Dahlias, a commercial dahlia bulb farm owned by Nancy’s aunt and uncle. Wooden trays, retro-style packing boxes and other vestiges of the flower farm made me almost wish she could trade trees for dahlias.

The next morning, I set out to meet photographer Laurie Black and her husband Mark King to shoot profiles of two garden artisans for a feature that will run in Country Gardens magazine next year. I’ll give you a peek about those locations in my next July recap post.

I’ve been after celebrity garden designer Jamie Durie for more than a year to let me come and do a story about his personal Los Angeles backyard. I sensed he was stalling because, like many of us who make gardens (or write about them) for a living, our own outdoor environment is the LAST thing to receive our attention!

Turns out, Jamie and his producers of “The Outdoor Room” on HGTV  were cooking up big plans for his hillside property in Los Angeles’s Laurel Canyon.

Jamie reimagined the long-neglected yard, dominated by a vintage 1950s swimming pool, into a gorgeous series of outdoor living spaces. The magical transformation occurred over a three week time, and became the debut episode of The Outdoor Room’s season three, which aired earlier this year (you can see a schedule of re-runs of this episode by following this link).

In late February, I received an out-of-the-blue phone call from Jamie, saying: “The garden is finished – you’re invited to come see it!” Wow – this guy is good to his word.

We had a narrow window of a couple week’s time in which I could get down to LA for a photo shoot and interview, since Jamie was about to fly back to Australia for several weeks to shoot another show there. Whew. That guy lives a marathon life and makes it all look effortless. But we made it work. Here is my profile of Jamie’s project, which appears in today’s print and online editions of The Los Angeles Times.

The Los Angeles Times sent one of its very best photographers, Irfan Khan, to document the beautiful landscape. You can check out his web gallery of gorgeous shots here. I also took lots of reference photos to use while writing the story, and thought I’d post some of my favorites below.

Jamie asked me to include the many great resources he used to pull together this extreme garden makeover. So in case you’re curious, here is that list:

Resources & Materials

Bath: “The Outdoor Room” craftsman Steve Zimpel created the bath using recycled cedar from Durie’s original design.

Decking: Fiberon composite decking

Doors: LaCantina bi-fold doors

Fire: Escea outdoor gas fireplace; Durie Design Fire Pit

Furniture: Walter Lamb for Brown and Jordan reproduction chairs and chaises from Design Within Reach; all-weather wicker sectional, Durie Design.

Kitchen: Fuego modular kitchen.

Plants: Monrovia

Vertical garden system: Woolly Pockets

Pool Makeover: Jamie worked with Aric Entwistle of Los Angeles-based H2o Development Inc. to replace a conventional chlorine system with Spectralight, which uses ultraviolet light to kill pathogens and waterborne bacteria. The renovated pool is solar heated with a system from Suntopia Solar. A new infinity edge was fabricated over the original coping using carbon fiberglass, resin, high-tensile adhesives and several coats of waterproofing. It’s finished with Bisazza glass mosaic tiles.  

I spent about 48 hours in New York City last week, staying at my favorite bed and breakfast at West 81st Street and Columbus Avenue on the Upper West side.

I mistakenly scheduled the visit to coincide with St. Patrick’s Day, one of the many days when people in Manhattan go crazy, whether they are Irish or not.

Yet, the weather was “pure spring” – certainly milder than we have had in Seattle lately – and my spirits were lifted just getting off the subway from JFK to the city.

My objective for stopping through NYC on my way to speak in Toronto was to meet some editors face-to-face and to spend time with some very dear friends. I had a half-day “free” and unscheduled, so last Thursday morning I hopped the downtown C Train across the street from Central Park and rode it to West 23rd Street. My destination: the nearly two-year-old public park called The High Line.

You’ve probably read about this amazing public-private endeavor – an elevated park that runs along 10 to 12 blocks on a former 1930s freight track high above Tenth Avenue between Chelsea and the Meat Packing District. I’ve read lots about it, too. But for a landscape design and horticulture observer like me, nothing compares to the first-person tour.

When I had dinner the night before with my talented NYC go-to-gals, Ellen Spector-Platt and Ellen Zachos, co-creators of the popular NYC gardening blog Gardenbytes, they gave me some tips on where to disembark from the subway (23rd Street Stop) and warned me that not much would be in bloom.

Blooms were not essential, yet I did enjoy spotting crocuses, witch hazel and a couple beautiful flowering ‘Pink Dawn’ viburnum shrubs showing off in the warm, spring sun.

The edgy, industrial setting was just as delightful to my eyes. The rails of this RR-in-the-sky last carried a train of frozen turkeys in 1980.

Over the ensuing decades nature has had her way with the long-abandoned site. According to the High Line web site, its designers selected plants to “echo the wild, self-seeded landscape that grew up on the structure after the trains stopped running.” The landscape was designed by James Corner Field Operations in partnership with Diller Scofidio + Renfro.

The origins of this reimagined public space can be traced to 1999, when community residents founded Friends of the High Line, the nonprofit public conservancy that today operates under a license agreement with the NYC Department of Parks and Recreation.

The forward-thinking citizen group fought for preservation and transformation at a time when the historic structure was under threat of demolition. Friends of the High Line now provides approximately 70 percent of its annual operating budget and is responsible for both stewardship of the park and its public programs.

Beginning my tour at the northernmost entrance on West 20th Street, I climbed the steps and arrived to see a new view of the Hudson River and surrounding buildings. Light and airy, the park’s design has retained original crisscrossing steel tracks where groves of trees, shrubs and grasses are planted. The main walkway, which is wheelchair and stroller-friendly, appears to be formed by staggered bands of granite that emulate railroad tracks and also accommodate soft vegetation.

Plenty of seating encourages people to rest, admire the scenery or eat a sandwich.

I happened upon a group of schoolchildren on a class tour near the bleacher-style amphitheatre where public performances often take place. A docent held a sign that read QUIET, and I smiled as I overheard her telling the children that the designers wanted to create a place where the noise of the city streets wasn’t so powerful. You know, quiet is one of the strongest sensations I experienced on my visit.

The juxtaposition of a park-in-the-sky with a city’s hustle-and-bustle down below seemed to amplify the silence. And I envy those folks in Manhattan who can visit The High Line whenever they want.

I first met Tina Dixon in the early 2000’s when I was asked to join her as a judge for the Washington State Nursery & Landscape Association design awards.

Her bubbly personality and welcoming nature included me in the circle of other judges, most of whom had previously served together. Our judging session took place at her home in Bothell, just north of Seattle, allowing me to gain a better sense of just who Tina is. In short, Tina is a connector. She connects colleagues, clients and friends, helping everyone feel part of the Seattle horticultural community. You can’t help but have fun when she’s in the room (or on the tour bus or in the garden).

Through Plants a la Cart, her container design business, Tina creates breathtakingly gorgeous planted pots for some of the Seattle area’s poshest addresses.

Several years ago, she turned her attention to the property she owns with her husband Paul Stredwick. Their hand-crafted garden is a vibrant, color-infused, texture-layered, art-filled spot on the map. And garden tour-goers, if they are lucky, can occasionally get beyond the denim blue-stained gate to see the surprising horticultural world inside.

The photographs shared here are ones I took in 2006 when Tina and Paul opened their Golden Trowel Award-winning garden to the Hardy Plant Study Weekend participants. I served on the event’s planning committee that year, so I knew what a treat was in store for the several hundred participants who flocked there during the Open Garden schedule.

Since then, I know that Tina and Paul have received numerous requests to add their garden to area tours. They recently decided to open the property to benefit a cause that they personally support, Hopelink. Hopelink is an United Way agency that offers an array of programs that enable families in crisis to make progress toward and achieve self-sufficiency.

You can see the garden next Sunday, August 15th, at two different events. An evening Garden Party (6-8 p.m.) includes wine, hors d’oeuvres and music by The Chromatics. Knowledgeable docents will be on hand to answer questions during the festivities. Tickets to the private garden gala are $150 with a portion tax-deductible. Register online or call 425-897-3703.

The Dixon-Stredwick garden is also open earlier in the day, Noon-5 p.m. for a $50 donation to Hopelink. You can pre-order tickets for the tour here. Or call the number above.

For some background on this garden, here is the story I wrote in April 2007, which appeared in Seattle Homes & Lifestyles magazine. Subsequently, their garden has been featured by other publications, so I feel pleased that Tina said “yes” to me first!

True Blue: Designed with a harmonious blue-hued palette, a Bothell garden shows off art, architecture and plants

Written by Debra Prinzing

Painted periwinkle, two concrete pears by Woodinville artist Judy Thomas continue the color story.

If, as color theorists say, blue has therapeutic qualities, then Tina Dixon is a very healthy woman. Whether it’s a bright or subdued blue, Tina thrives on the hue.

Owner of Plants a la Cart, a successful container-garden design service, Tina considers the serene hue her signature color. Although she doesn’t limit clients to her preferred palette, Tina is well known for filling azure- and cobalt-glazed urns with dazzling combinations of leaf shapes, textures and colors.

Her penchant for blue infuses her own landscape, giving it a cohesive theme. “Blue is my favorite color,” she proclaims.  

When they bought a one-third-acre Bothell pasture in 1983 (previously inhabited by a lone calf), Tina and her husband, Paul Stredwick, were in their late 20s and intent on building their first home, a gray, barn-shaped Dutch colonial, trimmed in blue. Landscaping was not on their minds or in their budget.

By 1987, Tina abandoned an office job for a horticultural career. She studied landscape design at Lake Washington Technical College and launched Plants a la Cart. The pasture was by then home to two rambunctious golden retrievers.

Occasionally, Tina and Paul had time to tackle their own backyard. They renovated a deck and planted an 80-foot-long mixed perennial border against the south fence. “Paul and I were trying to pick away at the landscape,” she recalls. “Wherever we stopped one year, we started there the next. It wasn’t quite flowing.”

The blue-stained arbor is supported by DIY columns.

In 2002, knowing they wanted lighting, irrigation and hardscaping in the garden, Tina and Paul agreed to ask a landscape designer for an overall plan.

It was almost inevitable that Mike Jeppesen of Sammamish Landscape would help the couple create their blue-themed dream garden, since he and Tina had collaborated earlier that year on a gold-medal “Blue Garden” for the Northwest Flower & Garden Show. With a blue-stained gate and arbor, Pennsylvania bluestone pavers, blue Asian pots and collections of blue-tinged conifers, the designers made a rare statement with this cool palette. The design also earned them the Pacific Horticulture Award.

“Like Tina, I prefer to deal with foliage—this garden is virtually a tapestry of texture and leaf color,” Jeppesen says. “I also knew that even though Tina and Paul and the dogs needed to enjoy the garden, it also had to be a space for her to show off what she does best—it’s a garden that people will visit.”   

Tina and Paul’s garden invites visitors to enter along a charming walkway, pass through an oversize blue gate and pause at a dramatic “foyer” where one of eight ochre-stained concrete columns appears as a focal point.

From here, a 4-foot-wide strolling path meanders clockwise around the garden’s perimeter. An irregular section of lawn is reserved at the center for playing ball with the dogs. More free-standing columns punctuate the heavily planted borders, drawing the eye through the landscape to a four-column pergola in the distance.

A grouping of blue Asian pots presents Tina’s favorite container designs, incorporating bear’s breech (Acanthus mollis), golden smoke bush (Cotinus coggygria ‘Golden Spirit’) and Canna ‘Tropicanna’.

“Columns were on my wish list but were killing the budget,” Tina admits. Jeppesen suggested using concrete waste-water pipes, set on end, to serve as columns. At $80 each, the 8-foot-long pipes were a perfect solution. Tina asked artist Johnny Ward to transform the ordinary concrete with a rich gold-brown patina. Blue-stained lattice boards and rafters form the pergola, complementing a Pennsylvania bluestone terrace beneath.

To give the landscape the feeling of maturity, Jeppesen and his crew placed boulders, large rocks and stone steps throughout the landscape. He also encouraged Tina and Paul to incorporate large trees and shrubs into the design. “Even though Tina deals more with perennial-style plants, I wanted her to use trees and shrubs to provide interest when there are no flowers in bloom,” he says. “They give substance to this landscape.”

Tina and Paul agreed and headed to Oregon, where they used Tina’s wholesale connections with a tree farm. They selected trees to complement the scale of their house, including several hinoki false cypress (Chamaecyparis obtusa>‘Gracilis’), plume cryptomeria (Cryptomeria japonica ‘Elegans’), weeping copper European beech (Fagus sylvatica ‘Purpurea Pendula’) and a flowering dogwood (Cornus x rutgersensis ‘Constellation’).

Wine, burgundy and maroon foliage are great complements to blue tones.

One-color gardens are appealing because of their simplicity, allowing plants and constructed elements to speak a common design language. Tina recognized that gold, lime, wine and silver foliage plants gain a visual boost when placed near blue pots and architecture.

She adapted container design techniques when planting the landscape. “Because I work on such a small scale, it was an overwhelming thought at first,” she says, “but you just have to take the principles of putting the right leaf shapes and textures together and use them in the larger context.”

Blue-glazed Vietnamese pots hold everything from gold-leafed ornamental trees and striped tropical plants to exuberant vines and silvery succulents. Tina’s adventurous designs rely on attention-grabbing plants that look even better when paired with blue. “I’ve been really tempted to use other container colors,” she says. “But that would feel like a mixed jar of jelly beans. Instead, I decided to be bold and consistent. The blue pots make sense and tell a story.”

Landscape designer-contractor: Mike Jeppesen, Sammamish Landscape, (360) 435-3769 or amjeppesen@earthlink.net

Container designer: Tina Dixon, Plants a la Cart, (425) 481-2194 or stredson@aol.com

Carpenter (pergola, entry arbor and fence): Cliff Chatel, Woodmark Construction, (425) 827-5242

More photos to delight – and tempt you to attend next Sunday’s tour and garden party:

Garden Scouting: It sounds so luxurious, doesn’t it?

Spending four days scouting some of the most beautiful and unique residential landscapes in and around Los Angeles! 

I do it all the time – visit and tour gardens that might just make it onto the pages of the magazines and newspapers to which I contribute. And yet, achieving the “get” is not always that luxurious. It’s fun and rewarding. But also hard work. 

Successful garden scouting requires lots of telephone calls to set up appointments. It means I have to lean on my personal connections to cajole invitations from reclusive garden owners or rock star designers. And it demands that I put way too many miles on my Volvo odometer. A lot! (Thank goodness for NPR.) 

Most of all, this job means being extremely open to everything I see, while also keeping out a discerning eye for that magical glimpse of a perfect story. 

It’s alot like being on a treasure hunt when you don’t know the ending, but I wouldn’t have it any other way! 

Jenny Andrews, executive editor for Garden Design, one of the magazines for which I am contributing editor, was in Los Angeles a few weeks ago for a four-day scouting marathon. As she put it, it felt like we were college roommates for four days . . . probably because Jenny ended up staying with me for most of the time. She got to experience the craziness of the Prinzing-Brooks household with kids, dog, schedules, and more. And, we put 700 miles on my car in four days. We were both exhausted by the end. 

READ MORE…

In the July 2010 issue of Better Homes & Gardens, I wrote a short item for my “Debra’s Garden” column called “Curves Ahead.” It could also have been titled “Three Cheers for the Circle.”

I am obsessed with round shapes — balls, spheres and orbs — and I love to dot the garden with these forms. This design trick relates to one of those basic lessons anyone who studies the art of landscape design is taught: Choose an idea and repeat it frequently.

My eye is naturally drawn to orbs and globes. They are so pleasing to me – in fact, I wrote about this passion previously – in an earlier blog post, “Zen of the Circle.”

Ornamental globes, obelisks and balls have taken up residence here in my Southern California backyard — check out the photograph below.

And it’s not just the three-dimensional geometry that puts a smile on my face. Curved outlines, such as the edge of a perennial border, patch of lawn or a turn in the path echo the orbs and reappear as arcs or crescents in the garden.

My interest in the sexy, organic globe shape has come “full circle” (pun intended) from a single idea to a cohesive design theme and a nice way to use ornamentation. Look around your own garden. Wherever you see a bare spot, perhaps it’s calling out for an orb or two.

I included a post-script note in my BH&G piece, promising to share my gallery of rounded and curved design ideas with our readers. Here it is – enjoy! Please send me your own photos and I’ll include the best ideas here, too. Check the bottom of this post for some of my favorite shopping resources.

Best resources for spherical garden ornamentation:

Pot-ted Store: Three graduated sizes of balls made from steel strapping will lend a lovely moment of architecture to the landscape. I have the medium-sized one in weathered steel (my preferred material). Annette and Mary, owners of Los Angeles-based Pot-ted, now sell a series finished with bright orange and turquoise powder-coating – their fav hues. Oops – I mean “aqua” and “tangerine.” Inquire about custom colors! Prices: $98 (18-inches); $139 (24-inches); and $169 (30 inches). Shipping available.

Bauer Pottery Garden Orbs: My friend Janek Boniecki has revived the classic California earthenware known as Bauer Pottery. In addition to making reproduction urns, dishes and serving pieces (in that awesome, sun-drenched palette), Janek and crew also create ceramic garden orbs glazed in Bauer colors. Yellow, dove gray, French blue, Federal blue, chartreuse, lime green, midnight blue, parrot green, turquoise, white, black and aqua (for some reason, the Bauer orange pieces are slightly more expensive, perhaps because of the glazing involved).

I am a bit addicted to these “globally admired” orbs, thanks to the company’s occasional factory outlet sales in Los Angeles. I have five or six of these gumball-shaped objects, which look tres-bien in and among foliage, flowers, blades and stems. Prices: $75-$82 (8-inch); $100-$110 (12-inch); and $150-$165 (15-inch). If you think you’ll be in the Los Angeles area sometime, make sure to check the Bauer web site to see the warehouse sale schedule. You will definitely find great prices and maybe even an orb or two (if I don’t get there first!).

Clare Dohna, Mosaic Artist:  Based on Vashon Island, Wash., artist Clare Dohna makes vibrant mosaic tiles in dazzling botanical shapes (flowers, bugs, leaves and more). She uses these tiles to adorn the surfaces of all sorts of wonderful garden sculpture and art, such as bird baths, bird houses, egg shapes and — my favorite – mosaic spheres. You can see one of her pieces at the top of this page; it plays nicely with the solid-colored Bauer orbs. Contact Clare directly (from her web site) to inquire about color schemes and prices.

If you pick up the June issue of Sunset magazine – the one with skewers of salmon on a cobalt blue plate on the cover – turn to pages 51 and 52.

There, you will see a short (and I mean short!) story by moi. It started out much longer, but is now not much more than the length of a photo caption.

As these things go, I can’t complain. Thanks to the way we communicate these days, full-length magazine articles now read like Cliff Notes versions of themselves. The photo tells most of the story and then a few captions and call-outs do the rest of the heavy lifting.

In this case, the story called “Lush Look, Low Water” was inspired by a rooftop garden owned by Mike McDonald and Jill Martenson, a visionary young couple who built Margarido House, the first LEED-H Platinum home in Northern California.

The “green” home and its eco-friendly landscape have received a lot of press, but the Sunset story really gives readers the specifics on designer Lauren Schneider’s approach to the roof garden. A special thank you goes to Sunset’s Julie Chai for shepherding this story from our initial conversation to the final publication.

Surprisingly dreamy, soft and fluid, despite its exposure to the harshest of elements (wind, sun, saltwater, for example), Lauren Schneider’s design can be replicated in similar rooftop or in-ground conditions. The photos you see here are mine. I included the original full-length story in my articles section.

Eight hardworking native and Mediterranean plants create the central elements of Lauren’s design:

Echinocactus grusonii, Golden barrel cactus

Lewisia cotyledon ‘Sunset Strain’

Nassella tenuissima, Mexican feather grass

Sedum spathulifolium ‘Cape Blanco’

Lavandula multifida, Fernleaf lavender

Libertia perigrinans

Sedum rupestre ‘Angelina’

Sedum spurium ‘Voodoo’

When I take on the tough job of interviewing celebrities, I always hold my breath, wondering whether we’ll move past the PR-speak and begin to discover more about the person behind the famous face and name.  

So when HGTV’s publicity department arranged for me to meet Australian media celebrity Jamie Durie, I was ready for the spin. And the good news is that he surprised me with his abundant knowledge and heartfelt passion for his landscape design projects. It was a very fun assignment.  

Earlier this year I spoke by telephone with Jamie for an mini-profile that appears in the April 2010 issue of Garden Design magazine. Now that he is Los Angeles-based, we decided to try and meet in person so I could interview him for a Q&A to appear in the Los Angeles Times HOME section. 

An edited version of my full interview with Jamie appears in today’s paper, but I wanted to share our extended conversation here.  

A big THANK YOU goes to Eddie Ward of DRC Public Relations in New York. He did all of the legwork to set up my lunch appointment with Jamie on March 28th. Read on for the full transcript of my interview with Jamie:

READ MORE…

The cover story of today’s Los Angeles Times HOME section features “Finally back in its prime,” my profile of the Daily House, a beautifully restored, circa 1954 “mod pad” in the LA suburbs of Glendale. Straight out of “Mad Men,” the house has been a decade-long project of its young owner, Christophe Burusco. Check out the Times’ web gallery here, with images by staff photographer Al Seib.

I had hoped to include a sidebar on the garden, but space limitations got in the way. My interview with Kathleen Ferguson of Los Angeles-based Kathleen Ferguson Landscapes reveals her excellent ideas and tips for approaching the exterior design of a retro home.

Here it is, along with my photographs from visiting Chris and touring his home and garden.

As I write in the Times’ story:

“The house – designed by Glendale architect Clair Earl, thoughtfully renovated by Burusco and since added to the Glendale Register of Historic Resources – sits on a 14,000-square-foot lot that feels like a rustic retreat, far from the city. Not a single neighbor is visible from the living room or master bedroom. Rather, Burusco’s eyes are drawn to the vibrant new succulent and cactus garden designed by Kathleen Ferguson, who incorporated mature specimens raised by the late Jean Daily Russom.”

According to Ferguson, as with all her projects, “I really look to the architecture and what my clients’ interests are.” With Chris Burusco’s project, she didn’t want the landscape to take away from the marvelous period architecture; rather, “I wanted to enhance it.”

Ferguson set out to mimic the architecture’s clean lines with “bold plantings in the landscape.”

Three major trees were saved, including a huge magnolia beyond the home’s glass-walled corner (which serves to enhance and frame the views of the San Gabriels).

Near the front entry, Ferguson was able to save an evergreen pear (Prunus caroliniana) and a Japanese maple. The beautiful forms of these two trees had been difficult to appreciate, due to a greenhouse that was plunked down between them by the original owner of the home.

Chris removed the greenhouse and its concrete foundation, giving the scene much-needed negative space.

In its place, Ferguson added geometric poured-in-place concrete pavers that echo the lines of the home and lead visitors to the garden’s side entrance. “We really wanted the pavers to look like something that had been there already, which is why we did a random pattern,” she says.

The level front yard slopes down to the street, creating a dramatic perspective as you approach the house.

There, Ferguson staggered agaves on the low hillside. Mass planted, the scale and form of the agaves is ideally suited to the rugged texture of the Palos Verde stone-clad house. Between the agaves, ornamental grasses appear as a softening device.

“Together, the native succulents and ornamental grasses mimic the native surrounding plant palette,” Ferguson says.

As you walk along the side towards the home’s back garden, you can’t help but appreciate architect Clair Earl’s artisitic detailing. He punched a trio of “windows” in a stone accent wall, which invites you to view the San Gabriels through these carefully framed scenes.

On the ground at the foot of the accent wall, Ferguson planted softer forms of asparagus ferns, which can handle that constant shade. She “mulched” the plants with a layer of smooth, light turquoise stones “for a little bit of contrast.” (This stone echoes dark blue-green flagstone on the home’s entry hallway.)

The garden’s piece de resistance is a cactus-and-succulent border that arcs around the edge of the small lawn and patio area. Here, Ferguson worked with some of the mature plants installed by Mrs. Daily Russom, who Chris says was involved with the cactus garden at the Huntington.

“Jean (Daily) loved succulents — she had a lot of amazing specimens that we wanted to keep,” he says.

By blending new succulent hybrids with the established, mature varieties, the expansive border is now a spectrum of cool-to-warm tones and contrasting shapes. 

The design starts with clumps of striking, blue-gray Agave parryi, moves into purple-black rosettes of Aeonium arboreum ‘Zwartkop’ paired with sculptural paddle plants (Kalanchoe luciae) and leads to eye-pleasing multiples of golden barrel cactus (Echinocactus grusonii).

Chris loves the way the succulent palette “moves from the cool blue-grays to the reds, yellows, oranges, and then into cool again.”

The border, which runs the length of the house and can be seen from most of its rooms, is now mulched with a warm salt-and-pepper gravel (which replaced what Chris called “big ugly rocks”).

Ferguson is most inspired by the tension created between the landscape and the house; between the architecture and the wild setting beyond its domestic borders.

“Chris’s landscape has a lot of push-and-pull,” she says.

There’s the smooth against the rough; grey-greens against the rich greens. And there’s the contrast between the garden and the arid, native chaparal around the perimeter.

As you approach the house, it becomes more lush and more ornamental.”

I think it’s a pretty stunning treatment, worthy of this historic, but thoroughly modern, abode.