Garden Design

Most gardeners are familiar with garden phlox (Phlox paniculata and cvs., Zones 4–8), woodland phlox (P. divaricata and cvs., Zones 3–8), and the two common species referred to as creeping phlox (P. subulata and cvs., Zones 3–9 and P. stolonifera and cvs., Zones 5–9). The annual phlox (P. drummondii and cvs., annual) has taken on

When late May and June hits, we can’t help wandering out into the garden with a pair of shears in hand. Bringing fresh flowers into the house seems like a seasonal rite of passage for most gardeners (at least those that don’t have allergies). But it can be a hard to cut those precious blooms

Today Kevin Kelly is taking us along to visit a fantastic public garden. I recently took a trip to Mt. Cuba Center, which is located in Delaware. It opened to the public in 2013, but its roots began about 80 years ago. The center’s mission is to inspire an appreciation for the beauty and value

Hello, my name is Helena Mahoney. I am 87 years old and live in Vero Beach, Florida. I have been reading Fine Gardening ever since I became a certified Master Gardener, almost 30 years ago. I live in Zone 10 on a suburban lot that is less than half an acre. Most of my beds

Hi, I’m Kristi and I live in Raleigh, North Carolina. When we moved into our house 10 years ago, the backyard was heavily wooded. We loved it at first, but over time we realized that wooded does not necessarily mean low-maintenance. Eventually, we wanted some sunlight and to be able to go outside without the

Helen Rehn is welcoming us into her garden today. I live in La Grange, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago. I used to long for a lot of sun in my garden, but I now appreciate my shade. Most of my garden lies beneath a very old English elm or a red maple. When the garden

Today we’re visiting with Erin Sweeney. Hello! We began building our house and garden in 2003 in northern New Hampshire. It is all hand-built and has expanded over the years to include a large vegetable garden, a 75-foot stone wall–backed border garden, and a terraced slope. We are in Zones 3–4, with some microclimates that

A garden and a chorus have certain similarities, with lots of different plants or lots of different voices coming together to create something beautiful. If all the plants or voices were the same, the result would be rather dull, to say the least. Each element, plant or voice, has something to contribute. Just as you

If you garden in a low-wind situation, your tall plants probably won’t need staking. However, my big, bold garden is out in the open prairie, so staking is often a necessity. Here are some of the things I’ve learned from experience. See our favorite picks for big, bold plants. Go big from the start There’s

Today friend of the GPOD Cherry Ong is taking us along to the Takata Japanese Garden at the Horticulture Center of the Pacific (HCP) in Victoria, British Columbia, which she visited in the peak of spring. A stunning camellia (Camellia japonica, Zones 7–9) is loaded down with blooms. The pavilion is finally complete! It was

Today’s post is from Barbara Martin. On May 1,  five friends and I (we’ve dubbed ourselves the Secret Magic Garden Society) staged a fundraising event to restore the long-ignored and, up until now, overgrown corner of a gem of a national park: Glen Echo Park just outside of Washington, D.C., in Glen Echo, Maryland. Built

Today’s photos come from Jonathan Harris, in Maine, who is sharing the garden around his pool, which he calls his Guster Pool Garden, because there are signs on the fence with lyrics from songs by the band Guster. The song lyrics here are tucked under a blooming hardy hibiscus (Hibiscus syriacus, Zones 4–9), next to

Today we’re in Hillsborough, North Carolina, where Terry combines beautiful plants with unusual pieces of garden art and sculpture made from repurposed materials. Money plant (Lunaria annua, Zones 5–9) is a biennial that thrives in moderately shaded spots, putting up clouds of purple flowers in the spring that transform into the silvery, coin-shaped seedpods that

We visited Tracy’s beautiful East Bay, California, garden last week, where we focused on her dry garden plantings of cacti, succulents, and other plants that thrive without supplemental water. Today we’re back to check out her beds with perennials, roses, and other plants that want a little more moisture. A wide view of this part

Today Alina is sharing photos of her mother Joanna’s garden. My mother has been working on her garden for over 20 years. When first purchased, her 1/3-acre property in Waterloo, Ontario, consisted of a house and a couple of trees scattered in a large expanse of lawn. I’m sure glad I wasn’t around to mow

Is there anything ground covers can’t do? They are useful in problem areas like steep slopes, under trees and shrubs, and in spaces that need erosion control. They also reduce maintenance by enveloping areas that would ordinarily need a boatload of mulch to keep weeds at bay. Now, not all ground covers play nice. Some

Today’s photos were sent in by Sandra Schaller. Sandra works at Wave Hill, a fantastic public garden in the Bronx in New York City. She recently took over care of the alpine house in the garden and is sharing some of the marvelous plants that grow there. Alpine houses are specialized greenhouses used for growing

Before we stopped traveling for the better part of two years, my favorite annual trip for Fine Gardening was to the Chicago Botanic Garden. Every year I’d visit Richard Hawke, director of ornamental plant research, and the massive trial gardens he oversees. My mission would be to photograph plants from one of the genera being

Hydrangeas (Hydrangea spp. and cvs., Zones 4–10) seem to be a necessary part of every Southern garden. Those big, billowy blue flowers under tall trees in shady gardens look cool even when the temperature is in the nineties. Since living in the Southeast practically requires you to plant a hydrangea, we are listing a few

Few plants can put on a spring show as elegant and impressive as wisteria (Wisteria spp. and cvs., Zones 4–9), but like many vines, this plant can be aggressive. Thankfully, wisteria can be tamed by training it into a tree form. This also has a secondary benefit of bringing the fragrant flowers down to eye