I’ve decided to come clean–about using a pendulum and connecting with nature spirits. I like to rely on my secular, rationalist credentials, but that’s only part of who I am, and anyway, my parents are dead. So who’s really to…
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Recently, I read a blog by a disappointed purchaser of “Shenandoah” switchgrass (Panicum virgatum “Shenandoah”). Although the plant had been heralded as the native replacement for Japanese Blood Grass, he wrote, his wasn’t really red, although the plant was beautiful…
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The grass won’t grow but the moss is. The shrubs are covering the windows and blocking the light–or dying. There’s a hollow collecting water in the back and ivy has climbed the trees. Your dogs are wearing a muddy path…
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When you don’t think about defining space, lawns become troublesome. They become the leftover carpet of the yard, bounded haphazardly by driveways and sidewalks. Many contractors love lawns because they’re cheap to install and look great, at first. Contractors, moreover,…
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This first appeared as a guest column in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution on November 11, 2009, under the headline, “Atlanta’s colleges key to revitalization of its core” If Atlanta wants to revive its downtown, it needs to look at what it…
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We design space. When I first heard that, it sounded like one of those Japanese koans about drinking from an empty cup or one hand clapping, rather than how to design a garden. Most people think landscape architects or garden designers…
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