More and more home owners who care little about “gardening” as a hobby enjoy the companionship of plants. Shrubs and small trees in tubs “furnish” outdoor dining areas. Tropical plants often share a double life – part of the year indoors, part outdoors. For these and many other good reasons, home owners everywhere continue to discover new uses and new pleasures with plants.
Many Long-Loved Symbols are Still Being Grown
The changes over time in gardening has not destroyed the charm of the rose, the wisteria and the flowering tree. The growing plants we knew in grandma’s garden still speak of the indestructibility and time honored favorites of nature.
The Deep Pleasure of Growing Plants Remains Strong
The miracle of the swelling seed in warm musky soil, the unfolding tender green of the leaf in spring, the driving eagerness of the plant to bloom all thrills inadequately measured by the word “gardening.” So it’s really something old and something new that’s happening as old as creation and as new as the first day of spring.
There’s More Living in the Garden
Putting a plant in a or pot immediately gives it new character on a patio. It changes from a mere bush to at shrub of distinction. It’s like picking a person out of a miscellaneous crowd of people and placing them on a pedestal.
As a landscape friend of mine says: “When you put a plant in a pot, it’s suddenly a potential prima donna. We put a windswept pine in a squat, shiny brown glazed pottery jug and gave it a background of trees to silhouette against. Take two Eugenias grown as trees residing in Japanese fish tubs that are as self-important and prepossessing as hotel doormen now that they have a wrought iron stile between them.
A talented landscape designer who specializes small patios and container gardens gave this recommendation: “When I go down to the nursery I try to look at the most common plants with an eye to having them around in containers. When I started approaching plants in this way from a design perspective it changed our whole idea of plants. For example, a low juniper is just a grown cover when it’s hugging the ground, but it becomes a handsome piece of art when elevated, planted in a decorative container, pinched and pruned for a windswept look.
Some very surprising things can happen if you shop your local garden center or nursery for plants and accessories for the front and backyard and also the patio area in the same way you shop for accessories for your home.
Plants As Playthings…
Succulents are the playthings of the plant world. Easy to grow and many kinds do well indoors. Use them in a tea cup, a dish, a bowl, a tub, or in masses to cover the ground.
Succulents make an interesting and forever-changing patio accessory. Keep a dozen going in small clay pots of all sizes and shapes… consider using a saucer for low ones and assemble them in a dozen different ways – in a big basket, on a tray, along a bench on the patio or deck, with gravel and rocks and colored glass.
Grow succulents for Christmas gifts and while they are on the patio use them for centerpieces at your barbecues.
More Concentration… Less work
Probably the greatest effect for the least amount of time, energy, and money is to arrange a stage for a few choice plants in the part of the backyard, patio area or front entry you use most often where the plants are seen close up and become a part of the entertaining or dining area.
With nothing more than a bench and a few tubs of flowering plants, you can create the feel of an outdoor room that is both functional and gardenesque.
