Flirting with Flowers - Keeyla's Garden Blog

Painterly Pavings

2011-08-24T19:16:00.000-07:00

In answer to your questions about Painterly Pavings I'm posting some this and that.
To get going you need to have a design.
Lately working with many clients; I like to start with drawings. Sometimes inspired by paintings. Sometimes by leaves. There are a gazillion starting places for designs.
Currently cement is my main materials....with various, lots of stuff, introduced..that is smushed into the wet concrete. Again only one approach.

I have on my agenda to makes some concrete stepping stones...good place to start..take pictures...but with my busy schedule..who knows when that will happen.

In the meantime, here is a drawing for a patio that I laid out in construction chalk today.

See ya soon...

Fruiting Pears

2011-01-09T15:18:00.000-08:00

Victor at Berkeley Hort. Nursery told me to plant more flowers next to my fruit trees. Duh! "The blossoms need to be pollinated." In February and March when your fruit trees come into bloom often there are not enough flowers close by to attract bees. "Plant lots of flowers so that the blossoms will get pollinated so that you have more fruit." I'm going to take Victor's advice. He went on to say composite flowers are the best. I know that Calendulas will do the job as they bloom well even in winter.

My next note is to plant Fava Beans and Peas. I'm already on my third try after the rats and birds have mowed down two crops. 'Dust yourself off and try again.' This week replanting is on my list. As late as it is.

It's not too late to add to your New Year's Res. list to make sculpture for this year's edible garden. Follow the path of blue pears... Make a place in your edible garden for delicious looking art. Then on a rainy day make paintings...If you are practical you can laminate them for place mats.

Happy Gardening in the New Year,

Painting & Bulbs - Time to rethink and renew

2010-11-07T00:41:00.000-07:00

This is no day to plant bulbs. Nope, too hot. What I'm up to with color on a hot day like today is PAINT. One of the easiest, cheapest and most instant gratifications with color. Two benches and a door got new coats to protect them from winter wets. Over at a clients together we took paint and brush following drawings done at the kitchen table...out into the garden to draw then paint images of her dogs on pots. I will have to 'run' over and take some pics.

Yes, get out your paints. While you are at make plans for where you are going to place and plant your bulbs. One friend wanted to know which ones will come back. First we scouted out her garden naming the color combos for the different areas. No pen in hand she committed the colors to memory. Once color coded; on to bulbs. Sparaxis for a long border topped her list. "Do you like yellow and red together?" she asked. "Yes." "Yes I do like yellow and red together." Sparaxis has red petals with yellow centers. Perfect and they come back. As do the yellow ones.

Here's the list I gave her of bulbs that will return:

Muscari grape hyacinths (blue or white): the fancier ones have not returned as well.

Freesias, especially the egg yolk yellows which are also fragrant, are great hanging over the edge of a pot.

Ixia: wonderful for naturalizing; make a meadow with grasses

Ipheion: starflower or wisely blue - good in rock gardens and at edges

Peruvian Scilla: a wonderful blue

Homeria will bring the slugs and snails out, but very reliable

Tritonia: an african bulb that has a lot in common with freesias

Hoop Daffodil and most of the smaller daffodils

Crocus

Scilla

Lilies: some have a strong return; great for pots

I plant tulips and ranunculus as annual bouquets.

Bulbs are my choice for giving Spring The Wow and the Yes factor. 'Like sunshine coming up from the ground' one passerby said of the trumpeting daffodils.

In addition to painting there is a lot of cutting and pulling going on. Compost heaps heading for the green can. Soil being turned and amended.

On your garden to do list: Reminder to fertilize all acid loving plants with an organic mix to be topped with mulch. Acid loving includes blueberries.

This year I'm even cleaning out several container plantings that have been 'going' for about six years. Time to rethink and renew. Mostly I'm clearing space for the bulbs.

After planting bulbs with the soil turned over wildflower seeds will get thrown about to fill in the gaps both in the flower garden and between the climbing fava beans and peas.

The more you get done now the more you can enjoy spring unfolding in waves of color.

This year I'm returning to earlier loves. Natives both in bulbs and flowering perennials are making a comeback. Pink flower mop heads of buckwheats are bee favorites and hummers seek out the tubular orange flowers of the california fuschias...Zauscheneria or epilobium.

Happy Gardening,

Keeyla Meadows

Keeyla's article in the SF Chronicle!

2010-11-06T12:59:00.000-07:00

A quick primer all about bulbs

Keeyla Meadows, Special to The Chronicle

Friday, November 5, 2010

I open my garden in March for Show and Tell. What I have to "show" are bouquets of blooming-their-heads-off, full-of-sun-shining-light, colorful bulbs. Sadly, in March, what I have to "tell" visitors wanting to know where they can get these spring beauties for their own garden is that I planted these bulbs in November. Well, here it is November, so you are in luck. Now is the time to be fearless with the use of color in your garden by planting bulbs.
While a vast array of flowering and some edible bulbs are available, I always start with my tried-and-true favorites and branch out with a few newbies.
Color is key in how I organize both my planting zones and bulb selection. A bouquet of different types of bulbs including tulips, daffodils, ranunculus, freesias, muscari, lilies and more, are planned for each area of the garden. A favorite matching palette in shades of maroon and yellow is made up on Tango 'Honey Bee' lilies, ranunculus 'Cafe,' and tulip 'Gavota.'
I concentrate my design and plantings around what can be seen from the windows as the weather may be wet during part of the bloom season. Bulbs planted in containers of various sizes work well both in focal spots outside windows and at entries, balconies or on window sills.
After deciding where to plant the bulbs, make lists of what to plant. This is the hard part because there are just so many to choose from.
One approach to bulb selection is practicality. Which bulbs are easy, reliable, will return and even multiply? Do you want natives or edibles? The practical list is long but does not include the reigning beauty: tulips. In California, Tulipmania is a short thrill. Still, just for their sheer amount of saturated color, these beauties will find a way onto your list.
To top off your bulb display, seed the spaces over and between your planting with spring wildflowers. Poppies are my favorites; the seeds are economical and will bloom through the season, providing forage for pollinators: bees, birds and butterflies.
Whether you concentrate on color, edibles, natives or a combination, come spring, you'll have your own garden bouquet for Show and Tell.

Inside: Landscape designer Keeyla Meadows' guide to spring bulbs and wildflowers that attract pollinators and people. L4

A word on organics

This year, while searching the Internet for red tulips, I came across EcoTulips ( www.ecotulips.com). Jeroen Koeman, who calls himself "The Tulip Man," is a pioneer in organic tulip farming. His growing fields in Holland are pesticide-free and benefit by a process of crop rotation-sharing pastures with the cows of an organic dairy. He says that his red 'Ille de France' doesn't need added fertilizer, just a handful of compost dug into the soil. I'm still using organic bulb food. Koeman's EcoTulips are pre-chilled, leaving your fridge free for turkey stuffing instead of tulip stuffing (one friend cooked his wife's tulips for their Thanksgiving meal!).
- Keeyla Meadows

Bulbs for spring show and tell

Here are some of my tried-and-true spring favorites. Note: The rule of thumb when planting bulbs is to make the depth of the hole twice the width of their diameter. I've experimented and found chilling tulips four to six weeks in the fridge is necessary. I plant all my bulbs between Thanksgiving and New Year's.

Color

Tulips are the reigning beauty of spring bulbs. Here are my favorite varieties by hue:
-- Salmon: 'Menton,' 'Big Eartha,' 'Apricot Beauty'
-- Yellow: 'Big Smile,' 'Jaap Groot'
-- Purple: 'Passionale,' 'Violet Beauty,' 'Blueberry Ripple,' 'Purple Prince'
-- Magenta: 'Gypsy Love'
-- Nearly black: 'Queen of the Night,' 'Negrita'
-- Green: 'Spring Green,' 'Greenland' (green and pink )
-- White: 'Maureen'
-- Orange: 'Orange Emperor,' 'Orange Queen'
-- Orange tones: 'Princess Irene,' 'Gudoshnik'
-- Red: 'Ille de France'
Daffodils are easy and a must for those with deer and gophers, as those critters don't like them. Plant them in drifts by trenching out long furrows. With grassy foliage, 'Golden Bells' (Bulbocodium) is a container favorite.

Edibles

Crocus sativus is a savory for edibles enthusiasts. It sports those golden saffron threads so essential for Moroccan tagines. Crocus could share a pot with onion sets, garlic and grape hyacinth, topped by a seeding of borage. Share the forage with the flybys: Bees love borage. Drop blue borage flowers along with the blue "beads" of grape hyacinth spires on salads, or float in soup.

Natives

Skip from forays into color and flavor to jaunts on the wild side of gardening. Nevin Smith, founding horticulturalist of Suncrest nurseries and author of "Native Treasures," has some suggestions for planting out native bulbs. When asked about which to start with, he replied: "Many of the brodiaeas are good with the dichelostemmas being probably the easiest." You can see why they are simply called 'Blue Dicks.' But don't let the lingo stop you in your tracks: There are stunners on this path. He continued: "Brodiaea elegans, coronaria and californica are all good beginners' bulbs." To my question on how to get Mariposa lilies and Brodiaeas to return, Nevin instructs: "Plant them in well-drained soil, with little summer water and a top dressing of crushed coarse gravel." Use native seeds ( www.larnerseeds.com) for bulb cover, and you are on your way to planting a meadow. Next to my list of native bulbs, I make a note to take spring walks to see these splendors in the wild.
- K.M.

Keeyla Meadows the owner of design/buiild/landscape company Keeyla Meadows Gardens & Art andauthor of books including "Fearless Color Gardens: The Creative Gardener's Guide to Jumping Off the Color Wheel" (Timber Press, 2009). E-mail comments to home@sfchronicle.com.

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/11/05/HOB51G3GKO.DTL

This article appeared on page L - 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle

Don't miss Keeyla's talk in LA!

2010-08-23T10:36:00.000-07:00

This September, Keeyla is giving a talk about Sustaining Spirit with Color and Whimsy! Don't miss it!

Event: 2010 Pacific Horticulture Symposium

Where: Ayers Hall, L.A. County Arboretum & Botanic Garden in Arcadia/Pasadena, CA

When: Friday, September 24th at 10.15am

Sustaining Spirit with Color & Whimsy

Friday September 24th at 10:15 am
Ayers Hall, L.A. County Arboretum & Botanic Garden

How much more whimsical can you get than turning gardens into gigantic works of art you can walk into and be a part of? From adventures in a blue pear fountain, a strawberry paving, or even painted shovels, Keeyla Meadows will inspire you to transform your gardens by being wildly colorful, artistically playful, and energetically resourceful. She shares her expertise with a "try this, try that" attitude that engages the imagination - whether you are making decisions about design or selecting specific materials for your garden. Keeyla likes to focus on garden spaces as works of art to eat in, meditate, or to be colorfully sublime. There's one answer for all these gardens: "Raise it up!" For this she has developed planters and wavy cement containers to shape and create wildly imaginative garden spaces. Along with her simple principles for creating and using color in space, she will share these techniques and demonstrate with some fabulous images!

Speaker

Keeyla Meadows

Artist & author, Fearless Color Gardens

For more than 20 years, award-winning designer and artist Keeyla Meadows has been creating original, surprising and inspiring gardens. She runs a full-scale landscaping company and operates an art gallery in the San Francisco Bay area. The New Leaf and Sculpturesite galleries represent her artwork. Her garden has been featured on national television and in Sunset, Metropolitan Home and Fine Gardening. She won the Best in Show 'Golden Gate Award' at the 2001 San Francisco Flower & Garden Show. Her latest book, Fearless Color Gardens, was released by Timber Press in November, 2009. She is also the author of Making Gardens Works of Art: Creating Your Personal Paradise (Sasquatch, 2002). She holds a BA from the California Institute of the Arts, a MA in sculpture from the Univ. of California at Berkeley, and has completed post-graduate studies at the Whitney Museum of American Art. Keeyla has made extraordinary contributions to the gardening world, as she teaches how to turn a gardener into an artist, and a garden into a work of art.

www.keeylameadows.net

Please see their website for more details on how to attend and register for the event.

Hope to see you soon,

Keeyla

Park Day School Garden Tour - A Success!

2010-04-26T10:49:00.000-07:00

We started with the idea of "Figs & Flowers"...now the picture is complete!

It's another good day sunshine. While the Parkday School Garden Tour of 12 wonderful gardens still lingers and winds through your imagination, take a moment today to stop and smell the flowers.

Megan and I both had a great day in her garden. We enjoyed seeing you there, answering questions about names of plants. Polka was a favorite rose, chartreuse philadelphus a favorite show stopper, ixia a new bulb for many and cerinthe, the bluey shrimpy flower was one that a lot a people will head out to their local nurseries (If you are local, head out to Annie's Annuals or Berkeley Horticultural Nursery)to purchase and find a place in their own gardens. Please see Megan's note below about her thoughts on the Park Day Garden Tour.

Cerinthe

I want to remind you garden lovers that my home garden will be open this Sunday from one to four. Not at this moment to be compared to these show ready gardens, but still worth a visit.

Thank you to you book buyers. Mrs Dalloway's is a great place to pick up Fearless Color Gardens; as now is a good time to be planting your garden.

Paint-a-Pot: Keeyla's pots are for sale!

Please join Keeyla as she holds a pot-painting workshop at Filoli Garden show on May 8 at 1.30pm.

This morning also found me waking to an alarming note as the buzz I heard inside the Secret Shadows of the Tour on Saturday and Sunday were about not enough tickets to sustain the tour in the future. This saddened me since I've been a part of the tour for a long time: I've always loved looking forward to seeing new gardens each spring, having a space for local designers and homeowners to share their work, be a part of a gardening community, and also feel connected to a school and community where I have felt that gardens and gardening are part of the heart, soul and expression of a whole community.

Gardens are important and an important part of the education of children. Earth day this past weekend celebrated her 40th anniversary, and it made me think how great that here is a school and community so connected to the earth through her gardens. Gardens teach kids about nature, food source, the relationship between plants and insects, and between plants and animals; they are a source of art and expression, a source of crafts, a source for the study of science and the list goes on. So yes, I felt some alarm as I had these whispers of the end of the show confirmed.

Those of you who feel moved to action by contacting the school I hope you do.

In the meantime, I'm sure that there is much to take from the tour to inspire you in your own garden celebration and efforts.

Happy Gardening,

Keeyla Meadows

Note from Megan:

Wow! That was fun. What a treat to see the garden light up the faces with huge smiles of everyone that came to see it. That was a key goal for sharing our garden. Some people came back twice and many lingered for quite a awhile asking questions about plants, the process of making a garden and just expressing pure joy. Ian’s rock work was much admired as were all the flowers and color combinations and of course Keeyla’s pots!! Lucy hung out with me Sunday morning chatting to people and answering questions about the garden. She was astounded at the number of people that filled our small garden. I hope people got inspired at what you can do in a small urban garden space and get busy creating their own magical gardens!

Secret Gardens of the East Bay this weekend!

2010-04-21T08:45:00.000-07:00

It's about to happen! Tell the sun to shine, rain to stay away. Megan's made her garden completely into a show garden. All the planning, purchasing, planting has come to fruition. As we headed down the homestretch to the EAST BAY SECRET GARDEN TOUR, I sent Megan some questions about the process of preparing the garden. Here she is with a long list of answers.

I am giving a talk on color at the Park Day School on Sunday April 25 at 1pm. Mrs. Dalloway's will be selling FEARLESS COLOR GARDENS at the school. Come and get your personally signed copy.

Hope to see you Saturday (April 24) or Sunday (April 25) this week for the tour.

Happy Gardening, Keeyla

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Q & A with Megan

What are you looking forward to with the Secret Gardens Tour?

Being able to share how beautiful the garden looks right now. Hopefully people will be inspired to transform their own urban plots into a garden paradise.

What do you look for when you see other people's gardens?

Being inspired by new planting combinations.

What plants are the most satisfying to you right now in your garden?

I LOVE the heucheras. They provide all the color of flowers but in foliage form. There are new colors each year with yummy names like Crème Brulee and Peach Melba. We went crazy adding new heucheras for the tour.

Which area or color combination in your garden is the most interesting/exciting/stimulating?

The garden to the left of the fig bench is a particular favorite garden area. The shades of orange and yellow are bright and cheery all year long.

Which color combination makes you feel peaceful and serene?

I love the shade garden along the side of the house. Chartreuse, salmon, white, yellows. I love gazing out the kitchen window as I wash dishes and see the hummingbirds flittering in the abutilon.

Why do you want to grow plants that you can eat?

Cooking is a passion. Nothing is better than being able to walk out to the garden and gather ingredients for a meal.

What is most frustrating to you about your garden?

Too little space for vegetables. I’m considering replacing the blue bed with all vegetables.

In what ways have you seen the garden come into Lucy's life?

Lucy has been in the garden with me since she was a baby. At 6 months she would sit by my side as I gardened, picking up the lava that is in the soil mix. As she got older she created fairy houses made of flower petals that she laid out carefully on the “fairy rock.” Her friends call it a Cinderella garden. As a child I imagined having a flower garden and I love being able to provide such a beautiful place for her to play and imagine.

In what ways has having a garden transformed your life?

Gardening and cooking are my two passions. They are my creative outlets and as someone who spends her work life on a computer, they provide a much needed connection with what I find important in life. Spending a day gardening or cooking a meal for family and friends is my idea of the perfect day. At the end of it you have something of beauty to appreciate and share. When I’m stressed out, all I need to do is gaze outside at the garden and I’m instantly calmed.

In what ways has the garden influenced your relationship to color?

When we put our first garden in over 13 years ago, I gravitated towards paler colors: light pink, lilac, pale yellow. Think romantic impressionist colors. Orange, red, chartreuse were not colors I would have asked for. When we did the back yard a few years later, we added a lot of orange. I fell in love with orange then and it was and still is a prominent color of the backyard. It’s a feature color in our new kitchen. It was seeing what Keeyla did with her new garden that truly opened me up to hotter color combinations. The redone front yard is maroon, butterscotch, and mustard. It’s much splashier.

In preparing the garden for the upcoming tour:

What new plants are the most interesting to you?

The heucheras as I mentioned earlier are by far my most favorite additions. They are just spectacular.

New color combinations?

The hotter colors in the front yard and the maroon that was added to the dogwood garden.

Your garden has many containers. How do the containers work to improve, or express the garden? How do the containers work with the house and the space?

Containers, more than anything, are perhaps what has inspired me more than anything about working with Keeyla. They provide height and art to the garden and it's astonishing how many plants you can fit into one container. Planting up a beautiful container is something I learned from studying how Keeyla plants containers. This year for the tour I finally splurged and bought one of Keeyla's custom art ceramic containers. I love it and would like to add more to the garden as budget permits.

It's Spring...

2010-04-07T11:33:00.000-07:00

Open Gardens this Sunday, Aprill 11 at 1137 Stannage Avenue, Albany CA

How are you? It is spring. The flowers are good...between downpours that is. My garden is open this Sunday. Lilies and roses are stepping up to the plate, 'eyes' still shut -- but maybe we will have blooms by Sunday and definitely by May. You are invited.

Keeyla's Paint-a-Pot workshop at Annie's Annuals

There are planters for sale in the studio. Most of the planters from the garden show are sold and getting repositioned: new plants, new gardens. Planters do add a lot to your garden. On that note, I will be teaching a paint-a-pot workshop at Annie's Annuals Spring Extravaganza. The workshop is titled "How to Do It, How to Plant it", and it's this Saturday April 10 at 11am. Check out her website for more info.

My new book, Fearless Color Gardens, will be on sale and available for signing.

Secret Gardens of the East Bay

If you miss the Annie's Annuals event, there is always the Secret Gardens of the East Bay Tour on April 24-25 (last Sunday of April). The website is here. Megan's garden will be on the tour. The plants are looking amazing and then we are adding a truckload of Color today. Yesterday, Megan and I stopped for a picnic between nurseries to get hand-signed bottles of wine and we had a wonderful at B Winery. Our plant search for color was 100% a success story with Heucheras being the color stars. Foliage rules in shades of creme brulee and peach melba. We had fun.

You are invited to the Color party. More containers with plants to match.

Bring your cameras for all events.

Looking forward to meeting up with you on garden paths this Spring...

Be Colorful,

Keeyla

Keeyla's Upcoming Events - Don't Miss!

2010-02-08T14:30:00.000-08:00

Visit Keeyla at

SAN FRANCISCO FLOWER and GARDEN SHOW
and
OPEN GARDEN DAYS

While Keeyla is gearing up for the San Francisco Flower and Garden Show, we are also going forward with the first OPEN GARDEN DAYS this year. The garden hasn't come into season yet but we are still open for visitors in a few weeks!

OPEN GARDEN DAYS
Sunday, March 7, 1-4pm
Sunday, March 14, 1-4pm
1137 Stannage Avenue, Albany, CA 94706

Just a reminder: Please be careful when walking through Keeyla's gardens - as it has been raining, the floor is at times slippery and the ground might be uneven. Watch your step!

Don't miss Keeyla's fantastic showpiece at this year's SAN FRANCISCO FLOWER and GARDEN SHOW.

2010 San Francisco Flower and Garden Show

San Mateo Event Center

2495 South Delaware Street, San Mateo CA

March 24-28, 2010

Wed-Sat: 10am-8pm

Sun: 10am-6pm

Keeyla's Seminar:

"Fearless Color Gardens: A Guide to Jumping Off the Color Wheel"

Friday March 26, 2:15pm, Meeting Pavilion

Followed by Keeyla's Book Signing at 3pm

Get a copy of Keeyla's book at Mrs. Dalloway's Bookstore in Berkeley!

Please visit Keeyla's Garden at the Display Gardens Area!

This Year's Garden: Habitat Dance with a Red Snake

The purpose of this garden is to focus on a red-headed snake, the San Francisco (peninsula) Garter Snake, which iis on the endangered species list. San Mateo COunty is the habitate of this snake. The colors of this snake - red, turquoise, and black - inspired the material sections of this garden. I want to bring attention to the beauty of this snake as it represents a threatened habitat with all its diversity and importance. The snake feeds in the wetlands and suns itself upland. This garden points out that both we and the garter snake depend on our environment for survival. This garden is about gardening for the future to protect our habitat, teaching children about food sources, having space for mediation and social space, increasing awareness of native plants, and indeed being inspired by nature to design features that help maintain and respect the natural environment and our place in it.

See you there!

-Keeyla

SFGate / San Francisco Chronicle Features Keeyla!

2010-01-20T10:05:00.000-08:00

Artist got the blues - and put them in garden (link)

Joe Eaton,Ron Sullivan, Special to The Chronicle

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

Westerners used to go to Morocco in search of sex, drugs and Paul Bowles. Keeyla Meadows, though, was drawn by a color: the distinctive blue that artist Jacques Majorelle used for objects in his Marrakesh garden.

"I saw Majorelle blue in a magazine and totally fell in love," she writes in her new book, "Fearless Color Gardens: The Creative Gardener's Guide to Jumping Off the Color Wheel" (Timber Press; $27.95). Three years later, she flew to Marrakesh: "I had never planned to visit Morocco, but that blue really struck a cord. That blue has inspired many a garden creation for me and others."

It became the "seed color"- the color around which others are organized - for a sanctuary garden that received an award from Sunset magazine.
In Meadows' own Berkeley garden, Majorelle blue is just one fragment on a whirl of color. A sculptor and painter as well as garden designer, she's filled the space with multihued statues and mosaics, complemented with flowers and foliage that talk back to the artworks.

There's a serpent in this paradise, tightly coiled in the pavement. "I've been working with a lot of snake motifs," Meadows says. "Snakes are fitting for a garden. I love the way they move, flowing with the ground."

Her fascination goes back to her childhood in a Southern California canyon, surrounded by reptilian neighbors: "I once showed my mom - my very powerful, fearless mother - a harmless garter snake and she screamed and fainted dead away."

Trained as Sculptor

Academically trained as a sculptor, Meadows said she got her start in gardening in the 1970s from the late Lester Hawkins and Marshall Olbrich, who ran Western Hills Nursery in Sonoma County.
"I got an education on plants from Marshall and learned how to do landscape from Lester. Lester was an artist, and I basically learned how to plant out plants from him. He helped me get a trust in my intuition, follow a visual rhythm."

Whatever her design motif, her work is drenched in color. She pairs royal blue with chartreuse in one corner of her garden, and surrounds cool blues and turquoises with hot red flowers and paint.

"The whole relationship to color is to take permission from the flowers," she said. "That's part of the foundation of this color book. Allow yourself to have the same kind of attraction to flowers that birds and bees do. Use that as your authority and permission."

Meadows' book, lavishly illustrated with her own photographs, offers basic guidelines for designing with color: pick a principal color, then work with harmonious and contrasting shades. She explains how it works: "I pick a hardscape piece with a certain color palette and harmonize plants with those colors, matching it up to flowers and leaves that give me a flow."

She pointed out the purples in a ceramic planter and the burgundy leaves of ornamental sweet potato and heuchera: "You're pulling colors through an area by making a color stream."

In a playful tone, she offers readers exercises for becoming more comfortable with color: keep a color journal, experiment with paint chips, visit a museum. Instead of the traditional color wheel, she likes to work with a "color triangle" with a primary color (red, blue, yellow) at each apex.

"The strong point of my book is it shows how to apply your color palette - the seed color and harmonious and contrasting shades - to space," she said. That means setting up the garden as a series of pictures, each with a strong focal point and a visual frame - a painterly way of looking at things. (Meadows cites Monet as a primary inspiration, but says she's also influenced by Matisse, Miro, Mondrian and Gaudi.)

No Room Outdoors

She's not happy with the fashionable notion of the garden as a series of semi-enclosed rooms: "As a child I wanted to be out of the room and outside. There are a lot of ways a garden can function as rooms, but I prefer to see it as a connection to nature. We have a reciprocal relationship with plants. You give to a plant and it gives back to you."

Embracing color can have benefits beyond the garden, as Lynn Simon of Montclair discovered. When Meadows designed and installed the garden at Simon's home, Simon became involved in the process. "The experience altered my approach to colors in other spheres of my life, encouraging me to introduce color elements to my home, and even the way I dress."

Meadows is aware of the tension between design principles and intuition: "When I started the book, I was just, 'Trust your intuition.' Well, that's a stopper. I had to look for some principles to follow. Once readers start to feel their own connections and their own path, they can discard that. When you follow your intuition, surprise is part of the equation. You're going to do something you weren't planning, and you're open for surprises to come in. Mistakes are steppingstones onto a new path."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Fearless Color Gardens: The Creative Gardener's Guide to Jumping Off the Color Wheel by Keeyla Meadows

(Timber Press; 2009; $27.95).

Keeyla Meadows Gardens + Art: keeylameadows.net.
Check for spring and summer open-garden dates.

Joe Eaton and Ron Sullivan are naturalists and freelance garden writers in Berkeley. Check out their Web site at www.selbornesurveys.com or e-mail them athome@sfchronicle.com.

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/01/20/DD941ALIP1.DTL

This article appeared on page E - 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle

Read Tom's Review of Fearless Color Gardens

2010-01-13T08:52:00.000-08:00

Buy it now for $27.95. There's free shipping, as always, for orders over $30*.

If you haven't encountered Keeyla Meadows's unique approach to gardening before, prepare yourself it might come as a shock. A good shock. When I first visited her Bay Area garden, in the early 1990s, I was living in prim-and-proper Boston, where restrained good taste reigns supreme. What I saw in Keeyla's garden astounded me: color everywhere bright color, subtle color, clashing color, harmonious color, audacious color; in the plants, in the furniture, in the artwork, in the pots, even in the paving! Why, that sort of thing could get you locked up in the stocks on Boston Common! (I exaggerate, but not much.)

I was shaken to the roots of my post-Puritan being. This, I thought, was West Coast anarchy at its most anarchic, a moral and aesthetic affront to all right-thinking gardeners, a slap in the face to restrained good taste.

And then I thought, Why not? Why not yield to the heady, sensuously intoxicating pleasures of color? Why not throw off the mental shackles that keep us from straying beyond the boundaries of "safe" garden design?

Why not indeed. There's just one little problem: How do you get started? I'd like to suggest that you start with Keeyla's new book, Fearless Color Gardens: The Creative Gardener's Guide to Jumping Off the Color Wheel. Not only is it bursting with brilliant examples of exuberant color from Keeyla's own garden, it's also filled with easy exercises to help you unleash your own creativity and help you start having fun with color. Here are some examples:
Keep a Color Adventure Journal
Draw a Triangle and Practice Visualizing Colors
Write a Poem or Paragraph about Blue
Make a Color Bouquet
Have an Adventure with Paint and a Brush

If you let Keeyla lead you through her amazing world of garden color, you're bound to emerge a better, more creative, more exciting gardener. Unless, maybe, your favorite color is beige.

Tom Fischer is Editor-in-Chief at Timber Press
and former Editor of Horticulture magazine.

Event Calendar

2009-11-30T11:29:00.001-08:00

Megan's Garden Bash Update 2 - by Megan Atchley

2009-11-23T12:01:00.000-08:00

Nov 22

I’m looking out at the front garden, recently dug up and freshened up with new dirt… ready and waiting for its fall planting day. The bare dirt is blanketed by fallen red Japanese Maple leaves and actually looks quite pretty despite being emptied of most of its plants.

This front garden is getting the biggest makeover for the garden tour. Its pastel color scheme was looking tired and the plantings had morphed over the years into a hodge podge effect that just didn’t work anymore. It needed a change.

My husband, Ian, spent the better part of 3 days excavating the root bound beds and hauling in almost 2 yards of Keeyla’s special soil mix. I remember way back when I first worked with Keeyla on designing the front garden. It was the first garden we did together and the one where I learned one of Keelya’s fundamental lessons: “Excavate 6 to 8 inches or dirt and replace with organic multipurpose mix from American Soil. Continue to mulch with the same soil every year.” I remember thinking, “Why?” But we did as we were told and the results were astonishing. Our new garden grew so quickly and so happily.

When time came to do the back and then side gardens, we repeated the back breaking process. All I can say is that special mix from American Soil is magic. Plants thrive in it and it looks pretty as well. When my sister and her husband moved next door to us and started on their front garden, I passed on the dirt lesson with firm insistence. They asked the same, “Why?” as we had, but did as they were instructed and watched their newly planted banana palm quickly grow as tall as the house!

Fall Gardening Tasks Done to Date:

· Ordered Bulbs (tulips are in the fridge and lilies are in the darkest corner of our basement)

· Potted up Iris’ (they are sprouting already!)

· Dug up and replaced dirt in front and side gardens (still need to do back garden).

· Redid irrigation in front garden

· Had furniture maker, Larry Gandsey, replace rotten bench slats on fig bench (thank you Larry!)

· Started fall cut back (lots more to do).

Next Up:

· Paint bench slats and get installed.
· Paint pots
· Write description of garden with Keeyla for the garden tour brochure (first draft due just after Thanksgiving)
· Glazing day with Keelya: Lucy and I will help Keeyla glaze some of her hand made place settings to be used to decorate the back deck table on the day of the tour.
· Fall planting day (can’t wait!)

//

Fearless Color Gardens - Launch party!

2009-11-06T11:12:00.000-08:00

You are invited

to the launch party for

Fearless Color Gardens:
The Creative Gardener's Guide to Jumping Off the Color Wheel

(Timber Press, $27.95)
Coming this December 2009

Renowned garden artist Keeyla Meadows shows how to use wild, uninhibited color to connect indoor and outdoor spaces and turn a garden into a work of art

Refreshments

Friday December 4th, 7.30pm

Mrs. Dalloway's Bookstore
Literary & Garden Arts

2904 College Avenue

Berkeley CA 94705

510.704.8222

Come Join Us!

Coming Soon to a Bookstore Near You...

2009-11-06T11:11:00.000-08:00

Fearless Color Gardens

The Creative Gardener’s Guide to Jumping Off the Color Wheel

Keeyla Meadows

Pub Date: December 2009

ISBN: 978-0-88192-940-9

196 pp, 248 color photos

8 1/2 x 10", hardcover

$27.95

Renowned garden artist Keeyla Meadows sees the world in strong, saturated shades. Fearless Color Gardens brings this unique vision to life by showing how to use wild, uninhibited color to help connect indoor and outdoor spaces and turn a garden into a work of art.

Readers will learn how to pick colors that work together to enhance the relationship between their indoor and outdoor spaces; how to coordinate the colors of walls, benches, containers, and garden art; how to organize garden spaces through the use of color; and how to translate personal color preferences into tangible form in the garden.

Fearless Color Gardens also features a new way of looking at color with “Keeyla’s Color Triangle;” Keeyla’s favorite plants for specific colors; and easy-to use tips on growing edibles in color-themed gardens.

In the end, readers will learn how to reinvent the staid rules of the color wheel and turn their color preferences into intoxicatingly vibrant garden expressions.

STORY IDEAS

• Growing edibles in color-themed gardens

• Design a garden that coordinates with your indoor space

• Interview Keeyla Meadows—artist, gardener, and creative thinker

Keeyla Meadows’ garden has appeared on “Good Morning America” and “Grow It!”, and has been featured in Sunset, Metropolitan Home, Fine Gardening, and Horticulture magazines. She teaches classes and lectures on garden topics. She has published numerous articles about color and the garden in magazines and newspapers, and is the author of Making

Gardens Works of Art (Sasquatch Books, 2002).

October 14, 2009

2009-10-14T13:41:00.000-07:00

Megan and I are conjoining over plant collecting. On my list are the grasses Stipa arundinacea - a brilliant orange grass with a wide leaf and another Stipa testacea also in a greenish orange with wiry leaves making for a wiry outlook on life. These two grasses make great garden companions. We are pairing these plants up with a collection of bulbs including ranuncula cafe, tulip gavota, and lily tango series honeybee. Megan's front yard will become a garden gallery for this combo of custardy yellow-oranges and maroons. We are setting this garden tango in motion as we speak. There are two new introductions I found at local nurseries this year. One is a coreopsis, the other is a libertia. (I am going to have to run over to the nursery to complete the names.)

Here are a few "before" pictures that Megan sent over to me to post. (Between putting this blog together, fall soup is bubbling on the stove. The same colors as this garden with yellow orange carrots, shallots, and I still have purply-tinged heirloom tomatoes to chop up for garnish.)

Megan's Garden Bash - Spring Garden Tour - by Megan Atchley

2009-10-07T08:50:00.000-07:00

Last April, Keeyla stopped by the house as she often sometimes does to say hi and share what's new in her life. She walked around the garden and said, "Wow Megan, the garden looks really great. You should do the tour again next year".

As Keeyla mentioned, our garden was on the Park Day Garden Tour when I was 5 months pregnant with Lucy and Park Day was a future dream for our daughter. About two years earlier I had found my way to Keeyla through a magazine cover that featured her front yard garden. I fell in love with that garden and wanted one of my very own. I was a novice gardener at the time, having only room for potted plants and herbs in past apartments and I had desperately wanted a real garden. When we bought our little house in Temescal, putting in a garden was a top priority for me. Along came Keeyla who opened my eyes wide as far what a garden could be and created our little oasis in the heart of the city. Over the years, I would watch Keeyla work, study her plantings, and take note of everything she had to tell me about plants and gardening. I took all those "Keeyla Lessons" and did my very best to translate them into our own garden, so there was a jolt of personal pride when Keeyla voiced her thoughts about the tour. I had worked particularly hard on the garden that fall and it did look really nice, actually it looked beautiful...

...which is not how it looks now at the beginning of October and if your garden is going to be on the Park Day Garden Tour, there is a lot of work to do. I'm a Producer and I create tasks list every day at work. It's in my nature. I have lists for everything. After Keeyla and I met to discuss ideas for the garden, I put all the plans and to dos and dates into Excel for tracking.

A Partial List of Fall Tasks:

Order Bulbs (done)

Dig up the front beds and replace with new soil

Pot up Iris (Apparently if you leave this until after Oct they won't bloom as well)

Prune back everything HARD...but don't prune the roses until Jan.

November Nursery Trip (I love going to the nurseries with Keeyla)

Repaint front pots. Maybe butterscotch and cranberry.

Yes, lot's to do...but time spent in the garden is some of the best time spent anywhere...

Megan's prep for Spring garden tour

2009-10-05T08:49:00.000-07:00

What's that flower? This is Megan's question to me about a ranunculus featured on the cover of my new book coming out in December, FEARLESS COLOR GARDENS. The flower in gold tones, in burgundy, I answered, is Cafe. Why is it hard to get? I don't know. But we went online this weekend to put in an order at Willow Creek Nursery. It cost slightly more than the ranunculus-bulb-tuberlits (my word) for the spidery roots that you plant into the ground for gorgeous ranunculus flowers with their black dot centers. Megan purchased twenty; I purchased thirty.

A propagator friend of mine, Susan, asked me if I was going to plant them in the ground or start them in four-inch pots. I said both. Ranunculus' foliage is vulnerable to snails and slugs in the ground but it's easier to place them along with planting tulips, which I usually plant right after Thanksgiving right through to Christmas.

As you can see, there is a lot of detail in planting a garden for a tour. Megan told me that she's tired of her front garden's color scheme that emanated from a Felicia rose -- floriferous in a mighty bloom of gushing pinks that hangs itself out each year along her front fence. She doesn't want to get rid of Felicia but wanted to get rid of that pink. In jumps in Cafe, a modern looking flower in golds and burgundies that combines well with grasses like the golden Stipa and a new liberdia whose flat swordy leaves are thick and glistening like an eggy custard. Our color scheme will balance between these burgundies and custards, the old pinks showing through here and there. While Felicia is staying, Rosa the fairy whose pinky bower arms I still love, will come over into my garden.

Megan and I continued to chip from one section of her garden to another, reconfirming the color schemes of each section then drawing up a plant list from that. Being that it's October, our first foray into purchases was to get our bulb list ordered. One lily from the Tango series -- Halloween, a scary combo of black and orange -- delighted Megan's daughter Lucy who was born on Halloween. Lucy goes to Park Day School who sponsors a garden tour that will feature their garden during the last weekend of April. Megan and I put in her garden the year before Lucy was born, with the garden having been featured in the Park Day School garden tour when Megan was pregnant. Preparation of Megan's garden will become a regular feature of my blog with Megan making contributions.

Remember: now it's the time to purchase your Fall bulbs for Spring bloom. Bulbs bring the garden to life and welcome you into the new garden season. I purchase hundreds of bulbs each year to renew my garden. Sharing this bulb display is my reason for having Spring Open Gardens.

Here's a list of other bulbs we are gathering for Megan's garden. I recommend all of them.

Ranunculus -- Tecote Cafe, Salmon, Gold

Iris -- Rustler, Pass the Wine, Brown Lasso, Tennison Ridge

Dutch Iris -- Eye of the Tiger

Tulip -- Menton, Black Parrot, Queen of the Night, Cairo, Gavota

Lily -- Tango series, Honeybee, Halloween, Starburst, Spotted Salmon Tigerlily, Landini (the blackest lily)

Fritillaria -- Persica, Rubra (Red Crown, Yellow Crown)

Happy gardening,

Keeyla

Check out my new videos!

2009-09-28T13:29:00.000-07:00

Hello all,

Check out these new videos I made recently!

My new book, FEARLESS COLOR GARDENS is coming out in November.

Remember to pre-order on Amazon now!

Visit my website, keeylameadows.net, to learn about upcoming events and speaking engagements related to FEARLESS COLOR GARDENS.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

FEARLESS COLOR GARDENS - Book Trailer

Enjoy this "trailer" for my new book, FEARLESS COLOR GARDENS, on YouTube.

Here is the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qu2HUAy0d-M

You could also view the video directly right here:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Promo video for FEARLESS COLOR GARDENS - Here you can see me in my garden!

Link to Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zn0JRgJBbUU

View it now right here:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

KEEYLA'S COLORS - a music video

And lastly, please enjoy this music video showcasing my artwork and my garden.

Here's the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vypak3OwaC4

View it here, below:

Happy gardening,

Keeyla

What to do in betweens?

2009-09-28T12:29:00.000-07:00

Is your garden like mine? In a very in-between state? It's no longer summer; it's not quite fall. I am not quite ready to put my garden to sleep. Unfortunately, my garden does not blush with fall-colored leaves. But I am hoping to harvest one more round of lettuces, kale, and legumes. Today was my first attempt on Twitter, to say I'm double-, triple- and quadrupling, digging the dirt in my small vegetable plot. Not so much to improve the soil but to scout out oxalis bulbs and bulblettes. As irritating as slugs and snails for me. Now that that's done, along with having a new battery in my van - which has been sitting across the street for months, serving as a storage unit for earthquake supplies and old paintings - a lot to think about.

Now that I have the dirt overturned, I'll add a soil amendment before planting six packs of lettuces - bronze leaf speckled, two types of oak leaf lettuce, and two types of kale. Oak leaf lettuce and butter lettuce are my favorites. It's still a touch early to plant shelling peas but I'm gonna try to find some more string bean plants.

Tulips

Tulips are in! Cairo tulip, pictured above, is hard to find. I found mine online. They're worth it. No other tulip has this rusty, butterscotch color that matches my Mexican rocks. Look for very specific tulip colors. A color that matches your heart's desire or a garden sculpture.

Tulips come in such an array of wonderful colors. I've already cleaned out my small extra refrigerator that I keep for chilling tulips. In California, tulips need to be refrigerated from 6-8 weeks.

I usually plant tulips just around Christmas time. I like to get them out of the refrigerator by Thanksgiving but often the weather is still too warm to safely plant tulips. It is not recommended to keep tulips in the refrigerator with apples. Recently, a gardening friend asked me if I keep the tulips in the refrigerator with vegetables. My reply: I've never had a problem. I have had a problem though if the tulips aren't refrigerated long enough. All the local nurseries have tulips. You need to plan now for your spring bloom.

This sculpture is made from an actual dress and actually tulips. It's for sale. Since it's bronze, it's expensive: $15,000. For my money, I love combining plants and sculpture. Sculptures serve as great focal features, conversation starters, meditation starters, and general all-around happiness. For example, you could take this red sculpture and match it to red tulips, red ranunculas, and red anemones de Caen. Having a monochrome sculpture can give a monochrome garden more umph!

Happy Garden in the in-between zone,

{My question to myself is to plant again this year or not to plant...my garden is going to look awful bare if I need to wait for bulb season to plant again....}

Keeyla

PS. Please visit Mrs. Dalloway's Bookstore on College Avenue in Berkeley for some amazing books on gardening!

Food Fiestas

2009-08-12T11:41:00.001-07:00

Ola! Two fiestas in two weeks. Fiesta #1 was a great garden birthday party. What food we couldn't harvest from the garden, we picked up from the farmers' market to make this luscious vegetable platter – with haricots jaunes. If you thought haricots were green beans, think again. It could also mean yellow string beans as well. Vert for green, jaune for yellow. What I like about the farmers' market is that there is always a surprise encouraging you to try something new. Since I am thinking about color these days, the yellow brought a really nice constrast to the salad greens.

Lynn, a client and friend, has turned out to be a great cook. I know. For on many a day while working on her garden, she has invited me to stay for dinner. Lynn made the tomato platter as well as the tomato tart, which was part of our Fiesta #2.

Fiesta # 2 turned out to be a filling feast with a tomato tart by Lynn for a starter, poached salmon with a cucumber sauce by me and a salad with goat cheese by Lynn's sister, Marcie. If you haven't seen Julia and Julia yet why not follow our and I'm sure many other's foot food steps into a Julia Child's cook book before heading out to the highly entertaining film. Meryl Streep as Julia is a real treat. Our dessert course we saved for after the film with fromage française, figs, grapes, strawberries and hand sized tarts.

Some young women with cameras and mic in hand stop me at the local farmers' market recently to ask if I'd be willing to go on camera to say why I like shopping at the farmers' market. “Sure,” I said, then proceeded to say how much I like to see what's in season, taste all the different varieties of fruits before making a selection. I enjoy all the colorful displays of fruits and vegetables which inspire me to get out my camera and take pictures.

Sometimes, I pick up vegetable starts like the mesclun mix of lettuces that you can see planted in my garden around the skirt and shovel sculpture. Additionally, I said to the camera: “I like the carnival-like, festive atmosphere of the farmers' market where you can dip cubes of bread into different types of olive oil and flavored vinegars; sample a variety of yogurts and ice creams, made with real fruit from the farmers' market. When traveling, I always check out farmers' markets and I am glad that now we have so many here.” It turned out that the women were working on a documentary for Michael Pollan's ongoing project of researching what attracts people to eating real food.

On a fun note, I was invited into Michael Pollan's garden by his landscape designer, a tall nice man from Columbia. (If you know his name, please let me know by commenting this blog entry.) No surprise – his inner courtyard garden had a stunning display of healthy vegetables. The designer had built beautiful raised beds, filled with American Soil's vegetable mix, Local Hero. What stood out for me was how many vegetables can thrive in small spaces. I remember seeing at least three types of beans, squashes of different variety, lettuces, peppers, and towering sunflowers, along with summer herbs. This is the season for the return of the victory garden. In my opinion, adding some sculptures that make fruits and vegetables shine with glorious sun rays would make the garden even more victorious.

Happy Gardening,

Keeyla Meadows

How long have you lived in your house?

2009-07-15T10:48:00.000-07:00

"How long have you lived in your house?" is the most commonly asked question of people who come into my garden. On Sunday August 2^nd 2009, my answer will be thirty years! I was thirty-one on my first birthday in this house. You are invited to come celebrate my sixty-first birthday and thiry years of living in this house.

People ask me how long I've lived here, because the garden has so much detail -- in plants, sculpture, water features, benches, walls, planters, and paving. While this has all happened in a thirty-year period, the whole rear garden was put in with the studio which was finished in 2005. For example, the long mosaic bench, patio, and flying goddess sculpture were installed in 2007.

With a good blueprint to follow, you'd be surprised at how quickly you can turn your garden into a work of art.

In upcoming blog entries, and in my new book titled Fearless Color Gardens, there are lots of tips on how you can quickly transform your garden.

To make a mosaic-covered bench, first start by making a wood form to pour cement in. Once you have removed the forms, you are ready to mosaic the surfaces. This bench has glass tile mats that are adhered to the cement with thin set.

Flat ceramic tiles were also installed with thin set. After the thin set dried, sanded grout smoothed out the surface. The columner bases were wrapped with the glass tiles and were also grouted. Making the form is the hardest part of this process and you may need to employ a contractor to help you figure that out.

Hope to see you in my garden soon!

Keeyla

Pre-order my new book now!

2009-07-02T11:14:00.000-07:00

Hi,

The release date for my new book, FEARLESS COLOR GARDENS -- with 250 gorgeous pictures and many useful tips -- is getting closer.

You can pre-order a copy on Amazon by clicking here.

Happy gardening,

Keeyla

Dancing with Matisse video

2009-07-02T11:05:00.001-07:00

Here's a mini video of DANCING WITH MATISSE.

Nasturtium

2009-07-01T09:21:00.000-07:00

Not being able to stay in one place, running about the garden, making friends easily, wanting to get into everything at once. Not a mirror, but a nasturtium. I identify with this plant. My mother's mantra to me -- "Can't you ever just sit still?" -- rings in my ears with this plant. My answer to her mantra is: "Definitely no!"

There are so many places to go, people to meet, plants to see. Nasturtiums like me are on the run. Born on Runneymead Street. Run Keeyla Run, Run Nasturtium Run. Fits me!

I think of pulling them out as they pop up in unexpected places but then think again. Maybe a touch of orange, a touch of lion-roar yellow, might be nice here. Let's see what happens.

Here's a beautiful tiger lily crossing paths with nasturtiums in a dance of fiery oranges and reds.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Cultural requirements:

Get a seed from a friend, get a seed from a neighborhood walk, or out of a package and just plop it in somewhere. A corner of a pot, among an already orange planting of perennials or grasses.

Or get seeds from a package. Spread them in your lawn! Never did like all this lawn anyway. I've been wanting to put a color garden here for years, days or just got the idea at this very moment. "What happened to the lawn, honey? It's covered by orange flowers?!"

Well, Monet didn't mind having nasturtiums. They challenge his garden's visitors to try to find a footing on pathways. Plants first, please! Go to Giverny with your sketchbook in the late summer or early fall to sketch the scattering habits of nasturtiums.

Sometimes I purchase small starts, especially if they are labeled for definitive shades of fiery reds or icy white to bespeckle leaves or apricot frills. If I'm not looking, you can sneak some of the delightfully "Owl and the Pussy Cat went to sea in a pea-green boat" pea-green seeds into your purse to help nasturtiums be the great travelers that they are.

Happy gardening,

Keeyla

San Francisco Flower & Garden Show 2009 - Dancing with Matisse

2009-04-08T11:25:00.000-07:00

We will be dancing with Matisse all year! Starting with the San Francisco Flower & Garden Show, red figures strongly in this year's color palette. We invite you on a color journey this season, inside and outside the garden.

Here's a look at what we did with red on the leaf-shaped cement pavers.

If you are in the Bay Area during the first two Sundays of the month, come check out the reds in my home garden.

What part of your passion are you exploring in the color red this season? In my garden, red tulips are now being followed by a selection of red roses. My favorite red rose is the single-petaled Altissimo. When you come to my garden, look for it against the pumpkin-orange wall. Let's talk colors!