Chanticleer - Part 2

Earlier this week I posted about my visit to Chanticleer. I wanted to continue the tour with this follow-up post. It might be helpful to follow along with the Garden Guide map. Again, it was a really sunny day so good pictures were difficult to come by.

J and I left the Chanticleer Garden House, the main residence, and continued on to the Serpentine. This was filled completely with red and yellow sunflowers. It was a paradise for bees. Considering how worried I've been lately about bees, it made my heart happy!

From there we continued through the Bulb Meadow...

... and into the Asian Woods.

There were little seating areas like this one tucked away in many areas of Chanticleer

Stone steps leading to a stream

From there we walked on to the Pond Garden. I was admittedly a little stressed out in this area - there were so many little paths here and there and I didn't want to miss any of them! 

There were several different ponds feeding in to one another. Each had plantings all around them but ample space to step up close to the water and take it all in. This area had a very loose and wild feel, as if there was no rhyme or reason to the plantings. 

If you look closely, you can see a pond on the left of the above photo. To the right is a stone path leading over a stream and into another pond garden area. I didn't realize there were so many ponds until we'd gone up a hill and looked down below. Each set of plantings made you feel like you were enclosed in your own little universe. 

Behind the pond gardens and up a hill was an arbor. This started to set the mood for the Ruin Garden.

Arbor with intentionally overgrown plantings and stone steps

The Ruin Garden was built on the footprint of the now-razed home of Adolph Jr. (who, besides being an arborist was a decorated World War 2 spy!)  The original home was apparently too unstable to use as part of the garden so it was torn down. A new structure was built to resemble a ruined home. 

A giant stone head greets you on your way to the Ruin Garden

A fountain with heads in it. This was apparently the site of the bathroom. Get it?

If the garden designer was going for an eerie, abandoned feel here, s/he achieved it.

On from the Ruin Garden past Bell's Run Creek...

... and to a working water wheel surrounded by perennials and roses.

And with this post, we've gone two-thirds away around Chanticleer Gardens. I'll wrap it up with a final post, so stay tuned!

Chanticleer - Part 1

Thank goodness for garden blogging! Several times a year I'll drive an hour to Longwood Gardens to spend the day taking in the grandeur of their incredible space.  But it wasn't until I read another blogger's post about Chanticleer that I realized there was another majestic garden only a short drive from my house. So, a few weeks ago, J and I headed there during the late afternoon. 

Chanticleer was originally the estate of Adolph Rosengarten, whose pharmaceutical company would later become Merck. When his heir Adolph Jr. died in 1990, the estate was closed for a few years until the Chanticleer Foundation reopened it as a public garden. It's a 27-acre property that seems much, much larger. Each garden area has its own unique feel (and, as I learned, is cared for by a different staff horticulturalist). It all feels much more relaxed and carefree than Longwood. Even in September there was so much to see!

It was a really sunny and bright afternoon so it was tough to take good pictures. Plants there aren't tagged individually but you can look through on-site plant guides (found in really unique wooden boxes throughout the gardens) to try to learn what it is you're looking at (I didn't do this so most of the individual plant pictures are of unknown-to-me flowers). 

You start out at daughter Emily's home and into the walled Teacup Garden. This garden had a lot of formal lines and a nice mix of tropicals and natives. It would be the perfect place to sit, relax, and sip a cup of tea (not sure if that's why they named it as such but I can totally see this happening). 

A fountain partially hidden in the courtyard of the Teacup Garden

From the Teacup Garden, we moved on to the Tennis Court Garden. I'm just guessing, but I think it was probably the former site of the tennis court. Just a guess though.

Steps down to the Tennis Court Garden

By the way, I do recommend that you check out the plant lists on the website. They can give inspiration for planting combinations in garden beds, pots, against walls or in gravel, and so forth. 

Onward to the main house on the estate. I really loved this part.

Plantings by the driveway

More plants by the driveway

Indoor/outdoor porch. I could sit here all day.

Wading pool in the back yard

Fountain at the end of the wading pool

They even planted on top of walls

Planting bed by the swimming pool

Formal boxwoods containing dahlias and other flowers

These three gardens comprised about one-quarter of all of the gardens on the estate, so stay tuned for future posts and pictures about my visit to Chanticleer. 

Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day: September 2014

Yesterday was a glorious day to be in the garden. We had much needed rain all day Saturday but Sunday was sunny, cool, and a great day to be puttering around. I spent 7 hours outside ripping things out, planting anew, and god knows what else. So, this Bloom Day post is going to be short and sweet, mostly because the garden is putting itself slowly to bed but also because I'm Egg. Sauce. Ted.

The Pharm

Sedum 'Autumn Joy'

A butternut squash nestled in the sedum

Aster 'Alma Potschke'

A mess of Russian sage and Rudbeckia

Gaillardia

Aster 'October Skies'

The allée

My hibiscus is was  not as prolific this year compared to last year, but it's still nice
to see it in bloom.

Another hibiscus about to bloom

Coreopsis 'Mercury Rising'

Geranium 'Rozanne' in front of the remains of Nepeta 'Walkers Low'

Zinnia with Eupatorium 'Phantom' hiding behind it

The back yard

Anemone 'Queen Charlotte' tangled with Echinacea

Sedum 'Autumn Joy' with the remains of Phlox 'Blue Paradise'

Echinacea 'White Swan' hanging in much longer than the species

That wraps up my late summer/early fall garden. Thanks to May Dreams for hosting again.

Like Christmas morning

Nevermind that I was up at 4:45 in the morning yesterday because one of the dogs decided it was a great time to be awake.

Or that I was out of the house to my job by 7 am, and didn't get home from my second (teaching) job until 7:30 pm.

Though it was dark when I got home, three boxes of plants had arrived! I scarfed down some dinner and set to unpacking them outside.

Thank goodness I wrote down where each one should go when I was ordering them. My addled brain didn't even remember most of what I ordered, let alone what I intended for them.But with this big purchase of close to twenty plants, I'm trying to introduce more variegation, height, textured foliage, and colored stems in my garden. 

Get the shovels ready! I'm going to be digging all weekend!

Have you made any fall purchases to help improve your garden next year?

Looking for a few good shrubs

I need your help.

Over the past week or so, I've been putting together a list of perennials to fill in some of the holes in the garden but have realized that I'm deeply unsatisfied with the shrubs I have in most of it. They should help provide structure and definition but they've really an afterthought or just put in wherever I thought I had room. So I'm trying to remedy that with some strategic purchases.

Right now, the area that unsettles me the most is the allée for three reasons: upkeep, privacy, and blah (this is a technical term that will be explained shortly).

Upkeep

I bought three shrubs last year and they're all on one side of the allée. On the other side, the side that borders my neighbors' yard, are three other shrubs that were originally elsewhere in the yard and doing great. Once I moved them to the allée, however, everything turned to crap. Coincidence? Not sure. But the Hypericum frondosum (St. John's Wort) has root rot and two-thirds of it has already been removed. The Viburnum is making a slow recovery from its near death experience last year but still looks awful. And for unknown reasons, my bushy lilac partially died this year (one giant branch just turned brown).

St. John's Wort. It's a massive shrub but two-thirds of it has already been removed.

The writing seems to be on the wall and I'm kind of over the whole thing. I'm sick of babying these guys in the hopes that maybe in a few years they'll look good again. 

Privacy

Earlier this year, I thought my neighbors on the allée side were going to put up a fence. I envisioned structure and some more privacy via a nice wooden one. Well, I went a little too far in my imagination. They will eventually be putting up a fence but it will be a smaller iron one. In the mean time, I'd like a little more screening from their new shed or privacy from their patio when I sit at my back table. 

Craptastic Viburnum in front of neighbors' new shed

Finicky lilac in front of neighbors' new shed

Blah

I took this picture below and was thinking that I'd have to put one hell of a caption to describe where the Viburnum and lilac are, and it hit me:

Too. Much. Green. Everything blends together. There is no definition, no structure. It's all so blah! I guess there was a reason I was looking online at plants like Cotinus 'Royal Purple' and thinking about evergreen shrubs or trees. 

So you can see my dilemma. I'm ready to make changes but I don't know what to buy. Do you have any suggestions, dear internet? I'm in zone 7a. The allée gets full sun (from about 10 am until sundown). These beds are narrow - only about 3 or 4 feet wide, so unfortunately something like a Cotinus is too big. An evergreen would be nice to look at it in the winter when there's nothing else there to look at. I'd love it to help on the privacy front and be low maintenance. I don't care if it flowers (or when, if it does). The area gets more winter wind and snow than other parts of the garden because it's open to all of the other, fence-less yards of my neighbors, so whatever I put there will need to be up for the pummeling it may get in difficult winters.

If you have any suggestions, please feel free to leave them in the comments below. 

Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day - August 2014

This is a belated post but when you have company from out of town staying with you for a week, blog posts don't get written on time.

The garden is at once both vibrant and on its way out for the summer. The Pharm continues to produce tomatoes and the butternut squash vine has taken over every spare inch of space. The allée is more alive a year into its existence than I could have ever thought possible. And the back yard continues to be subtle but reliable. The weather has been cool and hardly humid which is really rare 'round these parts. I feel like I ought to take advantage of it and weed or something but it's too nice to do anything but just sit, sip some coffee, and stare at the flowers.

The Pharm

Zinnias, marigolds, and Rudbeckia complement the vegetable plants

Butternut squash growing on top of Sedum 'Autumn Joy'

Rudbeckia and Russian sage

Echinacea purpurea starting to fade

The allée

Echinacea, Hibiscus and Phlox 'Blue Paradise'

Rudbeckia and Phlox 'Blue Paradise' (which looks purple!)

Agastache 'Golden Jubilee' and Joe-Pye Weed 'Phantom'. The bees lurve it here.

More Rudbeckia, Phlox 'Blue Paradise', and zinnia. I love this color combo.

Looking from front to back

Looking from back to front

The back yard

Oh hey. More Echinacea (including 'White Swan), Rudbeckia, and Phlox 'Blue Paradise'.

A vignette of potted plants and Barbara the lime tree outside my back door.

Wide shot from the side

From the back to the front

That wraps up August. Thanks, as always, to May Dreams for hosting another Bloom Day.