Garden Design | Deborah Silver & Co.

The 11th Garden Cruise Club

Our tenth garden cruise to benefit the Greening of Detroit was this past Sunday. As usual, I spent the day at home. My garden is on tour every year as I so enjoy meeting and talking to everyone who stops by. And I enjoy talking to those people who have taken our tour year after year, now a decade old. It is satisfying that people who have toured for years do not tire of visiting my garden. This year my garden had a few surprises. A new pair of arbors, a new fence, and 72 linear feet of planter boxes across the front, planted with summer blooming annuals. For someone who likes to plant containers as much as I do, that 72 feet worth of planting space is a treat. What fun it was to plant those! The weather forecast was perfect – 72 degrees and partly cloudy skies with a slight chance of a brief shower. Hovering over the event was my decision that this would be our last tour.

Ten years ago, encouraged and sponsored by board member and noted architect Michael Willoughby, I joined the board of the Greening of Detroit. I went to one board meeting. It would be my last; I was completely out of my depth. While I was familiar with their mission, I did not understand the issues the board had before them well enough to have anything to contribute. The next day I decided that the best contribution I could make to them would be an effort to raise money on their behalf. Putting together a tour of landscapes of my design or influenced by our group, and a dinner reception, was a commitment we were ready to make. We charged more than most tours for tickets, and all of that ticket money would go to the Greening. I do truly believe in the work done by the Greening of Detroit, so I persisted. We have kept the tour going a long time.

Detroit Garden Works and Deborah Silver and Company put their weight behind this tour. The shop rearranges and cleans. Rob designs the reception party. The Detroit Garden Works staff sets up tables and chairs and the bar, spanning the entire length of our driveway. They gracefully handle request for tour tickets for weeks before, and that Sunday morning beginning at 8am. They design tours for people who only have a few hours to attend. They put on a dinner reception with live music that is a perfect summer evening for those who have toured. Rob obligingly mixes up his latest version of the classic gin and tonic, and also mixes an array of unusual summer drinks. The line at his station is always long. Christine has long retired from the shop, but she does work the cruise. She handles the wine bar, as she has for the past 10 years.

Deborah Silver and Company weeds and rakes the shop out for company. All the gardens and pots get groomed and watered. They also lend a hand to every garden on tour the week before. We weed, haul away debris and brush, water, attend to a fountain which is not working right, or any other issue that needs to be righted in time for the cruise. They prune and fluff- so every landscape and garden looks its very best. A beautiful landscape and garden is a pleasure for those who make them, and for those who experience them. The Greening of Detroit does important work – making and sustaining landscapes in our city, and teaching people how to make plants grow.

Tour day this year was a very emotional experience for me. My original goal in 2008 was to raise 100,000 for the Greening. We went over that mark on our 9th tour, but so many friends of ours and the Greening asked if I would do a 10th tour, I said yes. The tenth year and tour would be the last. Why our last? I had done for the Greening what I had set out to do. I did not want to overstay my welcome. All things run their course, do they not? I did not want to risk people losing enthusiasm. I was not expecting what was to come.

All day long, people attending the tour came up to me, and talked to me about how much the tour meant to them. About how much they learned from a conversation and exchange of ideas with garden owners. One person in particular articulated how she was able to take what she saw in other people’s gardens that she liked, and express them in her own garden. So many made a point to tell me they regretted that this would be the last tour. Many asked if I would consider continuing the tour. Some said it was the best tour of all, and they were sure next year’s tour would even be better. I was not expecting such an impassioned response.

Would I consider continuing the tour? Sunne has always thrown her entire weight behind this tour. Everyone who shops at Detroit Garden Works knows her. She turned out to be the founder of the 11th Garden Cruise Club. She made a point of explaining that this was the last tour, and anyone who was not happy with that should let me know. I got to the tour reception about 5:15. The first person I saw was Jennifer T, who had flown in from Seattle with her daughter to take the tour. She is a long time reader and supporter of this blog. How incredible that she took the time and handled the expense to come out for our event. Though I have read and responded to many comments she has made on these pages, it was such a treat to meet her in person. How charming that her daughter was all on board to take that trip with her Mom. Though we were only face to face for two days, I will never forget her. This tour made possible a meeting with a passionate gardener halfway across the country from me. Grateful does not express how happy I was to meet her.

More than 125 people attended our reception. Between our companies and the Greening, we sold 385 tickets. We raised 15,650.00 for the Greening. Garden Design Magazine had some 40 new subscriptions, from which they would donate 12.00 from each to the Greening. The new President of the Greening, Lionel Bradford, attended our reception, and gave a short and heartfelt speech about his appreciation for what the tour has done for his organization. For me, a basket full of things to eat and drink-made in Detroit. Touching, this.

That moment was a moment I will not soon forget. Sunne has the idea that tour was just hitting its stride, and I was considering the possibility.

Michael on tour. For those of you too far away to have toured, to follow are more pictures of my landscape and garden from that day.

tour morning

the deck

Milo and Howard were both home for the tour this year.

pots planted for summer

a little one on tour

upper deck

planters

planter detail

deck pots

fountain landscape

fountain

front yard

landscape

the opposite view

new planter boxes and original cast iron pots

new planter boxes in the other direction

tour landscape

Bringing the tour to an end is tougher now, considering all of what we heard that day. Yesterday I heard from Monica Tabares at the Greening that a donor who took the tour for the first time this year regretted this was our tenth and final tour. In a meeting with her, they pledged that if I would continue the tour for 5 more years, they would match the funds we raise every one of those five years. That offer gives me great pause. It could be that what we thought was the end is not quite the end yet.

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Posted on: July 21, 2017 53 Comments

Filed Under: Deborah Silver and Co Inc, flowers, Parties and Events, Detroit Garden Works, Garden Design, Landscape Design, Garden Stories Tagged With: the Garden Cruise 2017, garden tours, The Greening of Detroit

The Garden Cruise, 2017

This coming July 16th will be the 10th year that Detroit Garden Works and Deborah Silver and Co have sponsored a tour of our landscapes and gardens to benefit The Greening of Detroit. The tour is a fund raiser for an organization behind which we put all of our weight. The Greening of Detroit? From their website: “Between 1950 and 1980, around 500,000 trees were lost in Detroit to Dutch elm disease, urban expansion and attrition. Troubled by this deforestation of a great city, Elizabeth Gordon Sachs devoted herself to reforesting the city. She played a key role in the 1989 founding of The Greening of Detroit. During that same time, economic constraints prohibited the city from replacing those trees. The Greening of Detroit was founded in 1989 with a single focus in mind – restore the city’s tree infrastructure.” Their goal was big and bold. In the past 28 years, they have made a mission of nurturing a stewardship of the land that the City of Detroit occupies. We are very interested in what they do. If you are too, read on. The Greening Of Detroit Pictured above is Rob, manning his summer drink bar at the cruise afterglow dinner and drinks in 2008. We try to make it interesting and fun for gardeners to contribute to The Greening.

They describe their mission loud and clear. “Our focus at The Greening of Detroit is to enhance the quality of life for Detroiters by planting trees, repurposing the land to create beautiful and productive green spaces and helping communities rebuild their neighborhoods one lot at a time. We involve Detroiters in the process through community engagement, education and jobs.” This is a simple and succinct description of what they do, although the reality is much more complicated and labor intensive. I know first hand how hard each and every one of them works to create green spaces, and how they teach that a respect and an association with nature makes for a better life. I have participated in their events at the Eastern market in Detroit, specifically geared towards growing vegetables at home. I was knocked out by the numbers of people who attended my talk. Every vegetable pot I planted had a Detroiter willing to take it home, and grow it on. That experience will always be with me. Putting on a garden tour is the least I could do to help make my city more leafy. I am pictured on the far right of the picture above, sitting close to my good friend, extraordinary gardener and supporter of everything green, Judy C. She has attended 9 years of cruises, just like me. Gardening can be a fairly solitary occupation. But over the garden, we are close. A love of nature makes it possible for The Greening of Detroit to carry on their work.

I sit on the board of the Greening, although I do not attend their board meetings. I am much more effective as a doer, than a discusser. So I made a commitment to raise money for them. To date, we have raised over 107,500.00 in support of their programs. A tour ticket is 35.00 per person. A 50.00 ticket gets any tour attendee a swell supper, and summer cocktails mixed up by Rob at Detroit Garden Works after the tour. Be advised that his signature gin and tonic this year will feature The Botanist Gin. Every cent of the money raised from ticket sales goes to the Greening of Detroit. Whatever it costs us to put on the tour is at our expense. This is our donation to a cause we believe in. What you spend for a ticket to tour goes to fund their employment, educational and planting projects. This year’s tour will be terrific, I promise. 6 landscapes and gardens that are well worth seeing. For more information about the tour, visit our website: the 2017 Garden Cruise Our treasured client Jane C has brought as many members of her family to the cruise every year as she can. This picture taken in my yard in 2014 still makes me smile. Thanks so much, Jane!

I have another good reason to smile. I am very pleased to announce that Garden Design Magazine has agreed to co-sponsor our garden tour in support of the Greening of Detroit. Thank you, Garden Design! Their quarterly publication features the best that American gardening and landscape design has to offer. They deliver an ad free publication that you will savor and save. Chock full of anything and everything that would interest a gardener, article after article are accompanied by astonishingly beautiful photographs. Should you not be familiar with their quarterly ad free magazine, I would urge you to become acquainted, here: Garden Design Magazine Any reader who subscribes to Garden Design via this Greening Of Detroit tour special offer will get their first issue the summer issue which has just come out, absolutely free. In addition, Garden Design Magazine will donate 12.00 from your paid subscription to the Greening of Detroit. This is an opportunity for any gardener and reader of this journal to enrich their gardening life, and donate to a cause very close to my heart.For subscription information regarding this special offer, click on the cover picture above, or

click on this link: special subscription offer Subscribe and support, yes please.

Sunday, July 16. 9am to 4:30 pm, rain or shine. The afterglow light supper and Rob’s garden bar begins at 4:30 pm.

From the cruise last year, a bowl full of zinnias and snapdragons.

From the current summer issue from Garden Design, one of many gorgeous gardens.

From the Greening of Detroit website, a group of volunteer citizen foresters, planting trees. This is a very good look. Tickets to the cruise are available now at Detroit Garden Works, or we can take payment for tickets or donations to the Greening by phone: 248 335 8089. We can mail or email your ticket to you. Many thanks.

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Posted on: June 26, 2017 16 Comments

Filed Under: Deborah Silver and Co Inc, Detroit Garden Works, Garden Design Tagged With: Garden Design Magazine, Deborah Silver and Co, the garden cruise, The Greening of Detroit, Detroit Garden Works

Ornament In The Winter Landscape

Though a landscape that is striking in all of the seasons largely depends on the confluence of a great design, interesting hard scape and thoughtful choices of plant material, I would venture to say that ornament in the landscape plays an especially vital role in our winter. The plants are welcome to be the star of the show every season of the year, as they should be. The walkways, driveways, and terraces facilitate flow, and provide places for people to be a part of it all. The 4th season in northern landscapes have a regional set of challenges. All the deciduous plants sulk in the advancing cold, shed their leaves, and go dormant for the winter. The trees stand firm and skeletal in the winter; the trunks and branches are indeed very sculptural. The branchy remains of shrubs and perennials rattle in the wind. This seasonal plant sculpture is not by choice. A gardener might say there is no meat in this scene. The evergreens are indeed green, but they can have a stiff and stoic look in their glazed over and embattled winter state, quite unlike their lively spring to fall life. The walks, terraces and driveways meant to welcome people into the landscape disappear under scarcely an inch of snow. The ground plane is at best obscured, and at worst, buried in our winters. Winter in Michigan is not so easy a season for gardeners. Long suffering is a phrase that applies. But there are ways to help mitigate that grief. Garden ornament? By this I mean any object with a distinct profile that has a year round home in a landscape. Any object placed in the landscape that is marked by shape, mass, personality, memory, and persistence endows the winter landscape. I am talking about those garden ornaments that have both a physical and emotional presence that cannot be snowed in, or grayed out. They are all the better for a coating of ice, or a hat of snow. Pots, fencing, arbors, statuary, furniture, sculptures, fountains, architectural fragments, fire pits, bird baths, armillary spheres – all of these garden ornaments have a surprisingly lively and welcome life in the winter.

Those of you who put your garden furniture in the basement for the winter might consider this. The heat and relentless sun common in the summer season is much harder on garden furniture than anything the winter season might dish out. I leave my garden furniture out all winter. Though it is unlikely I will sit out in the winter, garden furniture is ornamental in the winter. That furniture can organize a view, even though the terrace upon which it sits is snowed under. The memory of the summer season warms the winter landscape. It may be that how I visually react to my summer furniture out in the winter landscape is stronger than my summer view. In the summer, my terrace furniture is about its use. In the winter, that furniture is a sculpture that speaks to the future.

This pergola with a wood roof and stone pillars was built to shrug off off anything the Michigan winter has to deliver. It is successful in that regard. The winter pots dusted with snow are landscape ornaments set at eye level that warm both that pergola, and this landscape. They counter the winter with the evidence of the gardening hand. An ornament selected for a garden or landscape is first and foremost a personal choice. Though I dressed these pots for winter for a client, it is her aura that enlivens this winter landscape.

To follow are a group of pictures of what I call ornament in the winter landscape. They that tell a story far better than I ever could. I rarely have cause to visit a client’s landscape in the winter. But when I go, I am struck by how garden ornament can improve, organize and energize the look of a landscape gone dormant.

A container, and an arrangement to go with for winter, can provide a focal point for the landscape that might be more welcome and more striking than that same container planted for summer. The winter season can be a good gardening season. It just asks for more. I would not want to be gardening in any other place than where I am gardening. Even in the winter.

Window boxes mounted outside a sun room, and dressed for winter.

a terrace in winter

a Branch fountain in winter

a bench and pots in the winter season

birdbath in winter

sculpture in the winter landscape

urn dressed for winter

bench with snow pillow

winter containers loaded with snow

pots dressed for winter with a dusting of snow

Ornament in the winter landscape can be supremely satisfying. I was right behind Milo this winter day. We both liked what was there to see.

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Posted on: February 9, 2017 21 Comments

Filed Under: Winter, Garden Design, Landscape Design

The Gift Of Shade

Large growing trees, commonly known as shade trees, take a lot of time and space to achieve a mature size. They need to be carefully sited, as they will eventually tower over a good bit of the square footage around them. The maples that many cities planted at one time or another in the tree lawn – that space between the sidewalk and the street – eventually suffer. Their roots dislike being confined as much as their canopies. Many of those badly placed trees are gone, or in a serious state of decline. Parks are a better place for the biggest growing trees to grow and thrive. But shady streets in the heat of the summer are welcomed by all.

The shade that trees provide in the landscape is a topic of great interest right now. We have had week after week of glaringly sunny skies and searing heat. Most lawns have turned a parched shade of beige. The temperature at 6am is too hot. Added to that mix – no rain, and no breeze. Our planting taking place in sunny locations is miserable for both the planters and the plantees. Keeping a new planting watered is a next to full time job. Even work that was done weeks ago needs to be monitored closely. A new plant not yet rooted into the surrounding soil can perish quickly if not kept watered. High heat means that water is evaporating from the soil at a rapid rate. A hedge of DeGroot Spire arborvitaes we planted recently is on a drip irrigation system that runs twice a day. The soil was dead dry and dusty down 36″ when we planted. It took over 2 weeks of this irrigation program for moisture to reach down to the bottom of those root balls. I have spent a lot of time on the business end of a hose, both at work and at home. Last but not least, if I am outside for any length of time, I am looking for a shady spot to land.

The Princeton Gold maples in my yard, pictured above, were originally planted to screen the neighboring properties. This maple is a medium sized tree, meaning that it tops out at about 35 feet. There are lots of smaller growing trees suitable for smaller properties that can endow your landscape with shade. My maples have done a great job of making this part of my yard private. But with that privacy came a lot of shade. At first, that annoyed me. This summer in particular I am enjoying the shade they cast. After work, this shady part of the garden, and the fountain spraying water into the air makes a 90 degree day tolerable. A summer day when I cannot get out into the garden after work is a miserable day indeed. Though I like the freedom of choice that a sunny site provides, there are plenty of reasons to value a shady spot. There are not so many shrubs and perennials that will thrive in shade to this degree. I grow hellebores, sweet woodruff, Japanese Beech ferns, European ginger, pachysandra and yews in this tree dominated garden. It is subdued, and mostly green. It is a fine place to meet and relax on a hot summer day.

Dogwoods are usually open growing, but this particular tree in my yard is dense in leaf. From the vantage point of my upper deck, the cupped and curling leaves are an expression of distaste for the heat. There is nothing I can do to mitigate the temperature, but I do keep this tree well watered. My decks face east, which means they are shaded by the house in the late afternoon and evening. A terrace you intend to use located on the south or west side of a garden will need a shade scheme. No doubt a canopy of leaves is cooler than an umbrella. To paraphrase from Wikipedia, only 2 or 3 percent of the water plants take up from the soil is used for growth and metabolism. Transpiration or the evaporation of water from stems and leaves is associated with the process of photosynthesis. “Transpiration also cools plants, changes osmotic pressure of cells, and enables mass flow of mineral nutrients and water from roots to shoots”. The transpiration process that governs the life of leaves in the heat of the summer will cool you, too.

A pair of magnolia planted on either side of my driveway have grown together overhead, and shade this spot in the drive. If I park my car here on a hot sunny day, the time it takes to cool off is vastly less that if I had parked it in the sun. Though it was 95 degrees the day I took this picture, it even looks cooler. Extreme and long standing heat is a deterrent to gardening, but it can also be a call to provide shelter.

A staircase going to the kitchen door has a less dense canopy of shade, cast by a pair of dogwoods. There are plenty of plants that tolerate this level of light. In addition to the usual hostas and ferns, I am also able to grow campanulas, lady’s mantle, and acanthus.

A shade garden holds its moisture much longer than a garden in full sun. A thorough soaking once in a while is all it needs. An established garden sheltered by trees can take advantage of moisture in the soil around it. An irrigation system or sprinkler is fine for maintaining an adequate level of moisture in the soil. This is not to say that the most established of trees do not suffer during periods of no rain. The interior leaves of many shade trees will turn yellow, and drop, when the soil is too dry. The tree will jettison interior leaves in an effort to conserve what precious little water there is for those outer leaves that actively photosynthesize. Our little leaf lindens at the shop drop interior leaves the moment they are dissatisfied with our sandy too well draining soil. We water them with a small rotating sprinkler called a poppy, made by Nelson. Our version is every bit of 20 years old. Poppy Sprinkler It can be turned down such that all of the water your tree needs will soak in. London Plane trees are notorious for dropping their leaves in hot and dry weather. Their larger than life leaves have more opportunities to transpire.

We have been in the process of planting a large shade garden for a client. The area is large enough for kerria japonica pleniflora, aralia cordata Sun King, thalictrums, and dwarf oak leaf hydrangeas. The dappled light means we have a wide range of plants that will thrive here. No small amount of the installation has been the watering in. We watered again today. And celebrated a few hours of rain this afternoon.

Not only will this garden be lovely when it has some age, it was a relief to have some shade during the planting. Though the irrigation for this garden will be installed this Tuesday next, every plant will need water directly to their root balls until they have had time to grow roots into the surrounding soil. New plants need lots of hand watering. The old spruce are a huge help. They take the brunt of the sun and heat, and protect the new plants underneath them.

Milo’s long black fur coat looks hot as blazes. He is not a fan of this heat. He is much happier when we have 28 degree weather. Though I know that fur to a point insulates him from the heat, he has a considerable appreciation for a shady place. Wherever he can get it. The gardener in me is taking a cue from him.

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Posted on: July 30, 2016 11 Comments

Filed Under: Landscape Design, Deborah Silver and Co Inc, Garden Design

The 11th Garden Cruise Club

The Garden Cruise, 2017

Ornament In The Winter Landscape

The Gift Of Shade

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