the winter garden | Deborah Silver & Co.

The 2021 Winter Pots: Take Your Pick

Amassing a collection of beautiful materials for winter and holiday containers and home decor at our place usually begins at least a year in advance of the season in question. Behind the scenes, ideas are tested, and those great ideas become prototypes. Orders are placed from the prototypes, and manufacturing is based on orders taken by the manufacturer’s reps from shop owners like us. This is a highly simplified sentence describing a very complicated and labor intensive process known as commerce. The big idea is that any gardener wishing to persist gardening into our winter season will have the materials to do so. This means potted hellebores and cyclamen, and a substantial variety of amaryllis bulbs. It also means fresh cut branches, mostly dogwood and willow. But the floral picks, the likes of which are pictured above, make it possible to create winter arrangements for containers. Pots placed on a front porch or at a side door asked to be filled, no matter the season.

Rob handles all of the buying for Detroit Garden Works, and he buys beautifully. Everything he purchases for his seasonal collections bear witness to his astonishing eye for fine design, beauty, utility, and serendipity. There may be those who would suggest that seasonal containers and decor have little to nothing to do with the garden or the landscape, but I disagree. The process of designing/creating and fabricating winter and holiday containers has everything to do with a need for an individual expression of appreciation of the beauty of nature. Creating winter container gardens have their roots in the living landscape, and those who garden with a passion – no matter what materials are chosen. Rob makes sure every gardener so inclined to garden on through and past the holiday and winter season has plenty of materials available to express that inclination in beautiful detail. If you shop at Detroit Garden Works, you can take your pick.

Rob’s work as a buyer has been defined by his travel both in the US and abroad – for decades. The event of the past two years made it all but impossible to travel to shop anywhere in person. But the steady and sincere relationships that he developed over the years with suppliers, product reps and manufacturers was the saving grace of this winter season. Rob was able to shop person to person, door to door, and from one continent to the next – over the phone, and via email. Amazing, this. Most all of our materials came late, and some materials never materialized. But what we have available now is terrific. As in lots and lots. By and large, this is the most product rich winter season we have ever had.

Ordering materials for containers on line or from a print catalogue is incredibly difficult. I have tried it, and I have had plenty of materials delivered that were not great. As in, did I buy this, no kidding??? I have tried to avoid shopping on line. I shopped the holiday and winter materials in person with Rob for 5 or 6 years. I liked being able to hold a pick in my hand. I could see the color. I could assess what its durability would be in a container. I could see the finished height-and the width. I could see how it would read. I could see how the shape, mass, and color would work with other elements under consideration. I could see what picks would be investment caliber, and which would be a one season fling. My shopping days are over now. I am happy to turn over the shopping for the winter season materials to Rob and Sunne. I have confidence that their choices will work for a wide range of my projects. And I respect and am intrigued by what materials they chooses from their own individual aesthetic. It is up to me to put what they buy together in such a way that my clients feel their taste is represented. If you are thinking that my design for holiday and winter container arrangements is fueled by beautiful materials- you are right.

In person buying was not possible in January of 2021, so Rob did the next best thing. He bought very long and very wide. He bought what seemed perfect and appropriate, and he also bought unusual materials. Everything he spoke for he hoped would be great. That is how he works. He crossed his heart and hoped to die. OK, just kidding – but how he buys is a serious business. Consider this. There are numbers of blueberry picks from his buying from which to choose-each one different. Some capture the texture and the color of blueberries honestly. Other picks describe the color of blueberries in more poetic ways. Deep purple muscadine grape berries, or blue speckled bird egg berries. Some picks are spare. A few berries sparsely populate long stems. Still other blueberry picks feature berries that are short and chubby and not at all like how blueberries grow. It is astonishing how realistic some faux materials can be now. But the idea is not to attempt to reproduce nature. That is not possible. The purpose of the materials is to allow gardeners to create seasonal arrangements that represent their individual interpretation of nature and its forms. The intent is not to fool the eye, but rather to appeal to one’s love of the garden.

These chubby wine red berry stems do not replicate any plant that I know of. But they are indeed reminiscent of the bounty and largess of nature. They would be beautiful, paired with pale sage green picks. Or noble fir. They would be lovely, encircling a stand of pussy willow stems. They would provide a rich and warm addition, punctuating a fresh evergreen garland. They are the berries-ha. They represent the lush scenes in the garden of my imagination. You get the idea.

Good looking and good quality materials can suggest a scheme for an arrangement. These picks have the lush green color and texture of broccoli. The stems look good enough to eat. Some winter arrangements do indeed have the aura of a feast, at a time when the landscape provides only the barest visual sustenance.

Snowball picks on chocolate seeded stems

frosted red berry picks

brown and white picks

gold berry picks and stainless steel spheres on rods

berry picks

These pale green/gray fuzz ball picks have a distinctive glow when back lit.

Paired with fresh cut branches and greens and lights, a winter container will please the eye and the spirit all winter long.

See what I mean?

Posted on: November 24, 2021 24 Comments

Winter Ready

We finished our last winter installation this Tuesday past. A client who is out of town on holiday did not mind if her winter pots did not get done until after December 25th. Her home is now winter ready for her return. Yesterday we finished the winter pots at the store. So we are ready for winter too. The garland got done early in the season. We only have 6 or 7 to do in any given year. Buck’s fabricators at Branch make them, and install them. They do help a great deal with the winter containers, once those holiday garlands are done and hung. Once the first 6 garlands for clients were done and up, they made our shop garland. We had that garland, and not much else until 2 weeks ago, when Rob had a moment to dress this cast iron cauldron for winter. The spruce tips were a new green for us-of course he wanted to try them out. The hand wrought iron topiary form from England is wrapped with Lumineo LED string lights. Not so easy to see in this picture are a number of small scale pine cone picks that for all the world look like they are attached to those spruce tips. For weeks, a garland and a single pot were all we had to show for the winter.

So why wouldn’t I dress the store for winter early in the season? Lots of our shop clients would like to see what we have a mind for the season. Some of them might be inclined to take some aspect of our idea into consideration for their own winter holiday. There are plenty of good answers to that question. The strongest answer is that our clients come first. We did just shy of 60 projects between November 10 and December 24. Just about 200 containers. And two holiday parties. This is a lot of of work to do in a very short amount of time. Not every client can be first, but it is easy to do the shop last.

There is another reason why we dress the shop for the winter last. I consider it a personal challenge to design and install from the left over materials. If you were raised as I was, the meals featuring leftovers were not my favorite. Some were downright unappealing. But as a designer, I have always been intrigued by the possibility that good design can take a rag tag group of the last of the materials, and make something worth looking at from them. I cannot really explain this, but metaphorically speaking, making a beautiful meal from a group of leftovers is a challenge that is satisfying.

The greens in the window boxes at the shop were the leftover scraps from a busy season. Even those scraps proved to be not enough. The day after Christmas we bought 6 Frazier fir Christmas trees at a tree lot for one dollar each. It took four trees to produce enough greens for the window boxes at the shop. These were trees that were moments from being discarded- I was happy to rescue them from the discard heap. The labor to cut up the branches was considerable. But the end result was worth it. The window boxes do not look like they were stuffed with a material that no one wanted. The spruce tips in the centerpiece came to us late in the season, so we had those left over as well. I was more inclined to try to put them to use, than pitch them.

It is impossible to tell in advance which twigs will be left over. Every year the twig overage is different. This year, we had curly willow left, and just about nothing of any other type of twig. So curly willow was destined to play a part in the shop winter pots. The sage eucalyptus was not so popular this year, but the color is striking with the curly willow, and the red berries.

I will admit we never have any bleached pine cones left over, no matter how many we buy. So I did purchase 2 cases of them, just for my clients and the shop winter display. We put them in the garland, and in all of the pots and window boxes. At the close of the season, we had 2 bags left. Detroit Garden Works has their only sale of the year between December 25 and January 7. One of those bags of cones was sold yesterday, and I am sure the last one will find a home soon.

We also manufacture the most stunning lighted rings for winter gardens; I have posted pictures of them plenty of times. Both the hanging and spiked versions are just about gone now. But we did have 4 steel rings that had not had lights put on them, so we used those rings as a base for a collection of curly willow wreaths that sit at the back of each window box. Those three foot diameter wreaths are properly scaled to our industrial sized windows, and that vibrant color reads even at a distance.

Lighting is such an essential part of any Michigan winter display. They gray days will vastly outnumber the sunny ones from now until April. We did use left over incandescent garland light strings in the window boxes and pots, as we are transitioning over to stocking only LED lights. The light strings on the garland are attached to the grapevine portion of that garland. Those light strings are LED lights. One string is 110 feet long, which eliminates the need to string light sets together. As the LED lights have a 10 year lifespan, we can store the grapevine with the lights still attached for next year’s garland, and maybe the year after that. The grapevine is a durable material.

I will enjoy being able to walk past all my leftovers every day all winter long.

That pot at the end of the driveway has some company now.

Save

Posted on: December 29, 2016 18 Comments

Filed Under: Detroit Garden Works, Winter Tagged With: lighted containers for winter, the winter garden

Freezing Weather

Our recent weather has been much more like January than November. Day time temperatures the the 20’s, and night temperatures in the low teens does not mean we postpone our winter container work. Even if we could, there isn’t any need. If the prospect of doing winter container arrangements is leaving you cold, perhaps some of our techniques might help make it more satisfying. Trying to create is tough when one’s fingers and toes are numb. Most of our construction is done indoors-in our garage. Any enclosed space will be a more comfortable environment in which to to work, even if it isn’t heated much. When we do go outdoors, it is for active work-the installation part.

Some of our centerpieces are constructed ahead of the installation time. A very stout bamboo stake is at the center of every centerpiece. All of the other materials are arranged around that stake. Sometimes a good quality rubber band helps to keep the materials in place until you get everything arranged exactly as you wish. For large and heavy materials, a loose zip tie will do the trick. For very heavy materials, another pair of hands is best. Once all of the materials are arranged to suit, we tighten the zip ties with a pair of piers. Very bulky and heavy materials are secured with concrete wire. A centerpiece may have multiple components or layers.

We construct forms for our greens from dry floral foam. We glue two layers together for added strength. All of our premium greens are in the range of 18″ long, and are fairly weighty. Large scale pots may ask for that entire width over the edge in order to look properly proportioned. We can get 2 lengths of greens from one long bough for smaller pots. For pots larger than 36″ in diameter, we usually glue the foam form to a piece of 1/2 inch thick exterior plywood for added support. The winter pots need to look good over a long period of time in which the weather can bring high winds and heavy snow. Nothing is more miserable than trying to repair a winter container arrangement gone over in mid January or February. The foam form is secured to the soil in the pot in two ways. We remove the top 4 inches of soil, so the lower level of foam fits down into the container. The upper level holds all of the boughs. We sharpen the stems of the greens, for a tight fit. We then drive rebar through the foam and greens into the soil, and wire the steel posts together. The hole you see in the center of the foam-a place for the centerpiece. Foam forms do not have to be exact. They are an armature giving support and flexibility to the finished arrangement.

All that remains to add to the centerpieces on site are those finishing materials that gives each winter container a distinct and unique look. Very contemporary winter pots may be as simple as a mass of twigs set into cut greens. There are plenty of other materials available, should you want a softer look. These winter pots have sinamay (also known as poly mesh), bleached pine cones, pale gold holiday picks, and mini vine rolls. Rob does a great job of sourcing a wide variety of materials that can find their way into winter pots. He likes giving every gardener lots of choices. We have a long winter ahead.All of these accessory materials are either wired to the greens, or wedged into the stick stack. All of these materials will be fine outdoors over a winter. Does this process seem like much too much work? It isn’t really-as the process from raw materials to finished container is not only fun, but doable. Any gardener can do winter pots for themselves.

In composing a winter pot, keep in mind that you are without that miracle we know as growing. The winter pots are the same size and scale on the last day of winter as they are on the first. Eucalyptus is bulky-a single bunch will go a long way. If your container is large, consider 2. If you want to feature this material, go to three bunches, and use fewer fresh cut twigs. Sinamay is a synthetic mesh that when rouched like smocking, will occupy lots of space. No amount of snow will distort the shape you create from the beginning. I brush the snow off my sinamay at home when the snow threatens to bury it. Curly Grapevine rolls create a lot of volume from not much material. These mini vine rolls are perfect for adding an airy layer of interest to this pot.

The materials in these pots are subtly colored, but are of a volume proportional to the size of the pot. The centerpieces is red bud pussy willow, in a 5-6 foot height. Some pots need a tall element. Branches are graded by height, so the height you need is the height you get. The fresh cut natural branch sets the stage for the character of all of the other elements.

Though the pots are 36″ tall, and 36″ in diameter, the arrangement is graceful. Each pot is different, as they are done by hand. Done by hand can endow anything you with a certain feeling. Containers imagined and arranged by gardeners have that hand made look. The evidence of the human hand is always attracts my attention and interest.

These pots could stand as is until the spring. I don’t mind a little sparkle during the winter. Alternately, they would work just as well, if the sinamay and pale gold sparkle picks came out after New Years.
These very large containers have enough variation in materials to provide some interest, even though the color palette is subdued.

The steel gray color of the pots was an important consideration in the selection of the materials.

Few things pain me more than pots sitting empty over the winter. Pots full of this or that, enduring over the course of the winter, speak to the hope that grounds every gardener. The garden goes on all year round, does it not? Some seasons, the forms and available materials are different. No reason not to celebrate, whatever the weather.

Posted on: November 22, 2014 24 Comments

Filed Under: Winter, container planting, Good Design Tagged With: materials for winter pots, the winter garden, winter container arrangements, winter containers, winter pots

Boxwood Obliteration Warning

My friend Michael wrote me yesterday that the National Weather Service should have issued a “boxwood obliteration warning” along with all of their other communiques on our endless string of winter storms. I perfectly understand his irritation. We have had storm after storm, layered between bouts of very cold temperatures. This means the snow is piling up. The piles along my sidewalks are easily 6′ tall. Thick layers of snow are extremely heavy. My boxwood hedges are very densely twiggy, and seemed to be handling the weight with relative ease. But some select spots of those boxwood hedges are beginning to look alarmingly splayed open from the weight of the snow. Am I worrying-oh yes. Other shrubby plants are beginning to get that smothered and half strangled look. This observation having been made, I have always been a member of the do not touch group. Am I recommending that you do not touch a shrub going down from a load of snow? No. How you handle your garden is your business. What is to follow is a discussion of my experience. Do with that what you will.

My PJM rhododendrons have broad leaves, arranged in tufts atop slender branches. Heavy wet snow in 28 degree weather that sticks to those tufts usually slides off. But if the temps take a sudden dive, those wet greasy snowballs can harden and stick. A weighty iceball on the end of a long slender branch can prove very destructive. Every gardener in a northerly climate has seen damage to trees and shrubs from ice. I have a substantial dogwood branch that broke close to the main trunk last spring. The weight of the ice on the branches was enough to snap the branch, almost through. As for these PJMs, warmer weather will tell the tale. I feel quite sure if I were to try to dislodge this caked icy snow, I would damage the plants.

When snow buries both evergreen and deciduous shrubs, I have no worries. Snow is an insulator, a winter packing material of sorts. Most snow is light, and infills all of the spaces between the branches. But when heavy snow collects, freezes hard, and glues itself to the ends of branches that are not so hefty, an alarm goes off. Shall I brush the heavy snow off of the tips of my shrubs, or leave that snow be? Plants are tough, but maybe not tough enough in their already stressed circumstances to withstand a broom.

I do not plant even arborvitaes when the weather is right around freezing. The needles will surely brown wherever I touch them. I do not brush the snow off of any plant-especially when the temperature is really cold. I have always thought that my efforts to clear snow from my plants may do more harm than good. I am more inclined to back off, and wring my hands in private. Plants have an incredible will to live. I have a substantial broken dogwood branch that has been hanging on by a one inch wide piece of bark for better than a year. It is loaded with buds for spring. No matter how terrible the winter weather is, my inclination is to not intervene.

Snow cover which is frozen through and through is a tough coating to remove. Just tonight I was chopping ice on my deck with a shovel. I do not want to slip and fall-nor do I want my corgis to slip and strain a muscle. I am not a fan of ice anywhere in the travelled landscape, except as a last resort. Chopping the ice on a deck is a vastly different issue that brooming wet frozen snow from my yews. The densiformis yews pictured above have arms bent to the ground. I have no idea if those branches are bent to the breaking point. Branches are subject to all manner of insults from weather. Wind, sun scald-the scraping from my staking, the scale-branches endure assault year round. Should I broom the snow off of them? Could I damage the branches even more, if I interfere?

Most of my boxwoods are buried in snow. Once a too heavy snow load falls to one side, and splits open a shrub, I am alarmed. Snow can be heavy enough to crack branches open. There can be fresh hell to pay in the spring. Cracked branches are an invitation to disease. A beloved boxwood hedge with a big dead section is enough to make any gardener weep. My advice? Do not intervene in the natural order of events, unless the need for intervention wakes you up in the middle of the night. If you must intervene, use a long bamboo pole-gently. Wait until the weather is close to, or above freezing. A branch frozen through and through is brittle. If you must remove excessive snow, tickle it off.

There are those that favor removing snow from shrubs. There are those that favor letting nature take its course. For the moment, I am standing pat. A good bit of my reason-I cannot really reach them anymore.

No matter the work that I do in my garden, I feel sure that each and every plant comes equipped with all the survival gear it needs. Nature has never needed much from me. I am believing these densiformis yews will spring back, once we have a decent melt. But there are those moments in a garden that warrant intervention. The trick is to judge the right time and circumstance.

Though I am not entertaining, planting, weeding, or watering right now, my garden is on my mind. Like the corgis, my garden cannot tell me where it hurts. I observe, and make my best call.

My winter weary shrubs – it is a worry. And we have more snow on the way.

Posted on: February 4, 2014 23 Comments

Filed Under: Winter Tagged With: the winter garden, snow removal, snow load on evergreens, snow load, heavy snow

The 2021 Winter Pots: Take Your Pick

Winter Ready

Freezing Weather

Boxwood Obliteration Warning

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