If you have never been to The Huntington Gardens in San Marino (near Pasadena), you must add it to your bucket list. It is one of the most beautiful public gardens I have ever seen. The gardens are HUGE, there are several different themed gardens, a Chinese garden, a Japanese garden, a famous rose garden, and quite a few other gardens that are slipping my mind at the moment. My favorite part of The Huntington–as anyone who has read Small-Space Container Gardens knows–is the Desert Garden.

You may be thinking to yourself, “what in the world does a public garden featuring cacti and succulents have to do with a book about container gardening on apartment balconies?” While it sounds like a stretch, I think there is a lot of inspiration to be gleaned from public gardens, even for those of us with teeny tiny garden spaces.

The chapter featuring The Huntington is about designing a garden on a long, narrow balcony. My inspiration for that garden was the western walkway delineating the desert garden from the rest of the gardens. It has large swaths of different succulents, all in a variety of intense colors. Deep, dark, purple aeoniums are sanwiched between silvery leaves of one clump of succulents and aloes with sunset orange flowers. It really showed me how bold colors help draw your eye from one plant to the next down the walkway. Think of how boring this same sidewalk would look if it was flanked entirely by green foliage. Everything would blend together:

Visiting public gardens also lets you see color and plant combinations you might want to recreate in your own container garden. It’s one thing to understand that blue and orange are complimentary colors. It’s a whole ‘nother thing to see it in person and really “get” how the silvery blue of Blue Chalk Fingers (Senecio vitalis) really helps the screaming orange-red of aloe flowers POP!

I also realized how many bees and hummingbirds are attracted to succulent flowers. Aloe rarely is listed as a bee-friendly plant, but anyone who has visited The Huntington Gardens during winter will see tons of bees barely able to fly they’re so loaded up with orange aloe pollen. And heaven help you if you stand too close to a hummingbird’s favorite plant in the Desert Garden. Those little birds have something beyond a Napoleon complex when it comes to protecting their territory!

What’s your favorite public garden? What tips have you gotten from a great public garden?

Thank you so much to the regular Garden Designers Round Table folks for letting me contribute this month! Check out these other great posts about garden travel and best public gardens:

• David Cristani – Southwest Native/Drought Tolerant Gardens
• Susan Morrison – Ruth Bancroft Garden in Walnut Creek, CA
• Scott Hokunson – The Garden Conservatory Open Days Program
• Rochelle Greayer – Garden Travel in North America and Europe
• Rebecca Sweet – Creative Private Garden in Northern California
• Genevieve Schmidt – Destination Nursery: Flora Grub Gardens

(I’ll update the list throughout the day as other GDRT contributors post their articles)

Isn’t this the cutest little window box? I was looking for just the tiny pot to plant some tiny succulents in…

What do you think? Any miniature gardeners out there? If you’re new to the world of microscopic gardens, Two Green Thumbs is a great resource!

I was interviewed for this fun article in the Chicago Tribune. It’s all about beautifying container gardens on patios and balconies:

In theory, containers overflowing with flowers, herbs, grasses and vegetables can transform balconies and porches into green and leafy garden retreats.

In reality, the effect is often closer to “Patio dotted with random plants.”

We asked Fern Richardson, author of the new book, “Small-Space Container Gardens: Transform Your Balcony, Porch or Patio With Fruits, Flowers, Foliage & Herbs” (Timber Press), how to bridge the gap.

Read the whole article on ChicagoTribune.com >>>

Have you heard of a new site called Pinterest? It is basically a virtual cork board that allows you to organize and share all the interesting things you find on the internets. Just like other social websites, you “follow” the people who have similar interests, or you can just follow particular boards. It is a fun (and beautiful) way to discover new things.

This is me on Pinterest. Right now Pinterest is only open to new members after you get on the waiting list. But I will be happy to send an invite to the first few people who respond in the comments section with their email address. If you’re already pinning away, leave me a link to your profile, I’d love to follow you there.

I do pin all sorts of things, not just gardening articles. If you’d rather not see that crafting ideas I’m infatuated with, or home decorating pins, or all my ampersands and salt and pepper sets, you can just follow these boards, where I stick to garden related links:

• Clever Garden Projects
• Fav Garden Books
• Rad Plants
• Great Gardening Articles

One board in particular that I want to draw your attention to is a group board about edible gardening with pins contributed by various garden bloggers:

When a co-worker mentioned that my friend Brenda at Thompson’s Building Materials in Fontana, CA had made some pallet gardens, I rushed (literally!) over to take a look. Don’t let Thompson’s name fool you into thinking they don’t have fantastic plants and pottery (and really awesome built in BBQs if you have the space for one). Because they do! I bought a kumquat while I was there. If you’re in Southern California, you should go check them out. The pallet gardens are hanging near the design center.

By the way, Brenda attached the pallet gardens to the wall using brackets. She said there has been no sign of damage to the wall behind the pallets, probably because she used succulents which need pretty minimal amounts of water. She did mention that since she used pallets with wide openings between the slats that when it is time to replant them, she’s going to use chicken wire to help hold the soil in better.

Oh, one last tip I learned from Brenda. If you have pallets that are colors you don’t want, you can stain them. That’s what Brenda did. She has quite a few on the wall and she wanted them to match, so they’re all stained the same.

While taking a walk around the Queen Village Neighborhood of Philadelphia I spotted this super gorgeous windowbox jam packed with interesting foliage plants perfect for fall. Black Mondo Grass and ornamental cabbages? Yes, please!

If you want to recreate this look, here’s a container plan and plant list:

1. Black Mondo Grass
2. Fern
3. Ornamental cabbage
4. Wire vine

You may have to really squeeze the plants in, but the strappy leaves of the ferns and mondo grass look best when they comingle with nearby plants. I’ve found that it’s easiest to start from back to front, putting in the larger plants first, and then following with smaller plants.

I recently came across this snapshot from last year’s winter Patchwork Festival (a must see if you live in Southern California!). I love the brightness of the lemon yellow frame, and how easy the creator made it to grow vertically. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it a million times: taking advantage of your vertical space is one of the smartest moves a space-challenged container gardener can make.

Are you growing vertically?

All of these photos were taken at restaurants in San Diego. Patio areas at trendier restaurants often incorporate interesting potted plants. Since restaurant patios are high traffic areas and it is doubtful that the restaurant staff has time to fuss over plants, you are often safe in assuming plants on local restaurant patios are tough, relatively low maintenance plants for your area.

Seems like this container could easily be recreated by someone with basic woodworking skills.