Monday, August 18, 2014

The Ferrante Garden, our last garden from the 2014 Portland Garden Conservancy Tour

Wow I really stretched that one out didn't I? Finally we're at the last of my posts from the Garden Conservancy's Open Days here in Portland back in June.

Don't ya just love a gardened hellstrip? I do...

I must really spend a couple of hours pruning on my arctostaphylos, soon. Less leaves, more branches.

All this beauty and we still haven't entered the garden!

Anyone know what this is?

Okay, here's the official word on this garden: "A wonderful large corner lot is home to a seven-year-old garden filled with luscious plants and quirky art. Foliage rules here, with featured areas of both shade and sun plants. I have a definite color scheme, focusing on black, chartreuse and burgundy. No pastels in this garden! Gravel hell strips frame both sides of the garden, containing plants that thrive with little water. The west-side garden is a lovely respite containing an angled deck that puts you right in the middle of all the plantings."

No pastels! I knew I felt at home here.

I love this crazy planted column.

Such restraint in the planting, I don't think I could be so good.

Great container! I wonder if it was made by the gardener herself?

She has an eye for great color/texture combinations don't you think?

I desperately need to find some pipes/columns like this, although I would prefer grey...

And I would love to have this on our fence.

Orange!

And a little rust. There's always rust.

Impatient me wants my Azara microphylla to be this size, now!

Where as I'm not sure if I'll let my Sambucus nigra 'Black Lace' get to be this size.

Look, up in the sky, it's decorated power lines.

Someone wasn't pruning when they should have been.

The deck felt a little bit like a stage, but that's probably just me.

Another great planter.

This was such a fun garden to tour, I highly recommend you look into Garden Conservancy Open Days in your community.

All material © 2009-2014 by Loree Bohl for danger garden. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited and just plain rude.

28 comments:

  1. This was my favorite garden that day! You're right, her use of color and texture combos was really masterful. I'm sure if you found some clay pipes you could paint them grey.

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    1. Back when I had a huge collection of terracotta pots I used to paint the upper rim in shades of green, they'd look great for a year or so but then the moisture the clay absorbed would start the paint flaking. Thus I'll probably hold out until I can find cement ones, or maybe I'll go the metal route.

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  2. Those clay pipes might be chimney tops, and they are very cool little planters! That galvanized gutter like planter on the fence is awesome.

    A lovely, lovely garden, for certain!

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  3. Hooray for planted parking strips! That mystery plant has gorgeous foliage! Could it be some sort of hydrangea? This garden has great plants and fun yard art all used with a great deal of restraint of which I wish I had a smidge!

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    1. Turns out it's Viburnum lantana variegatum...

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  4. Very nice! The flowers appeared as accents to the foliage rather than vice versa. I love those rusty metal elements too.

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    1. You're right, which probably has a lot to do with why I enjoyed it so much.

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  5. Those pesky pastels have a way of sneaking in, however rigorous the gardener. I see a PINK Hydrangea waiting in the wings by that stage. I'm sorry to see this group of posts come to an end...it's been fun, and a great resource for us borrowers.

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    1. Pink is the peskiest of them all!!! So many otherwise fabulous plants bloom in that shade. I've got quite the collection of garden tours to post about (it's been a busy summer) so there will be more, just not conservancy ones.

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  6. Beautiful garden. Love all the different forms of vertical planters.

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    1. I wish I would have sought out the gardener herself to compliment her, I feel bad for not having done so.

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  7. I think you may have saved the best for last? Or at least a tie with another garden for the best of the bunch. That variegated Viburnum (?) we found very attractive. Saw it on Ernst/Fuller and Bella Madrona too. Somebody from our fling bunch did say its ID but when I searched it, it was the plain green, and now I've completely forgotten that name altogether...

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    1. Anon below has the name: Viburnum lantana variegatum. Funny that I have zero memory of seeing it at the other gardens!

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  8. I believe the mystery plant is Viburnum lantana variegatum….love it!!! Mary Fisher has a beautiful specimen in her display garden at Cultus Bay Nursery on Whidbey Island

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  9. The clay pipes are drain tiles. They come in concrete also, or at least they used to. Our previous and present houses (both midcentury vintage) utilize concrete drain tiles. They might be hard to find new because, I suspect, they've been outmoded by perforated plastic pipe, but they might be available in a reuse-it type place...or maybe in an old-school type plumbing supply shop.

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    1. I need to find the concrete ones! The hunt is on...

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    2. Can make sooooooo easily :)

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  10. Your mystery Viburnum appeared in my recent Bloom Day post. I've kept it in a pot for many, many years. Even though I have probably stunted the poor thing, I love it.

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    1. Okay so why haven't you planted it in the ground?

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  11. Emily is right, those are drain tiles. My father was a building contractor and I helped install many septic tank drain fields with those clay pipes. He left behind a whole pallet of them, but since everybody was going to PVC pipes with holes drilled in them, I hauled them to the dump. Looking back I wish I still had them for myself and to sell. Probably could have gotten more than he paid for them.
    Beautiful garden, I have enjoyed your photo tour of this summer's garden tours.

    John (Aberdeen)

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    1. What were you thinking? (kidding) I remember hunting for cool planters years ago for a business I was working it. We found clay rectangle planters which were chimney pipes, they made darn good planters too.

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  12. What a superb garden. So beautifully planted and maintained. Lots of great ideas here

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    1. Glad you found some inspiration (not that you need it)...

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  13. Another fabulous hell-strip ! My shovel is poised..

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  14. That's pretty fantastic. Glad you got it well documented. Cheers

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