Edible Eclectic: My "Form AND Function" Design Aesthetic

Usually, form and function are thought of as being mutually exclusive in the garden--unless you're talking about one of those gorgeous, elaborately planned kitchen potager gardens that the French do so well. But a few things came together this week to make me think more about form and function working together.

The first puzzle piece was a photo I took of this part of the garden:

Looking at the photos while I was posting, I realized that the reason I don't love this little part of the garden more is that it needs some chunky texture at the entrance (above) to liven it up.  Maybe the 'Sagae' hosta that is now all but hidden behind the salvia and underneath the blackberry at left.  Maybe the trashpicked soon-to-be gazing ball.  I don't know, but it needs something.

Once you get into that area, the view gets better.  'Sum & Substance adds some chunky relief.  "Probably Jackman" clematis pops in some beautiful purple color as it hangs off the cherry tree...

... and rambles along the ground, amid the blackberries and plumbago:

It even keeps the stubbly (recently cutback) oregano look okay against the similarly textured 'Purple Emporer' sedum:

Inside the arbor are flat, spaced stones that provide some good textural contrast with ghost ferns, and even with the self-sown ruby orach.  But the entrance garden has no such relief.  Here's the ultimate proof of its boring-ness, the photo turned black and white:

Enough said!

As I was thinking about how to make this area of fruit production a little bit more friendly in the eye-candy department, I opened my quotes of the day email and found some gems from Frank Lloyd Wright.  (Van does a nice job of selecting a daily theme, and emailing out appropriate quotes--you can check it out and sign up here if you're a fellow quote fiend.)  One quote in particular stood up and smacked me in the face:

"Form follows function - that has been misunderstood. Form and function should be one, joined in a spiritual union." 

- Frank Lloyd Wright, 1867 - 1959

If Frank says so... who am I to argue, right?!  So I guess that mixing herbs and veggies into my landscaping isn't really so crazy after all?

Elsewhere in the garden, I think that I do okay with combining form and function while working my veggies into the landscaping.  Here, a tomato ('Great White') starts growing up past the chunky-textured 'Othello' ligularia, with a dark purple heuchera at its feet:

'Gretel' eggplant is just starting to settle in and take off, but you can see that she's going to be a nice bit of chunky relief to the grassy drumstick allium and the golden thyme that you can barely see behind the soon-to-be-harvested ruby orach:

It adds little textural difference, but there is going to be a huge color and height difference once the 'Black Krim' tomato (lower left in the space--and as of yet without its cage) grows tall and starts to bear fruit:

The chimney tiles themselves provide a chunk of solid color in the mostly-vegetable garden, as does the lady's mantle that appears in the oft-shaded area behind the one I'm showing below.  To the right is my recently thinned peach tree, and to the left you can barely make out the red tomato cage that I showed in the photo above:

This year, it's planted with a hot red salvia, 'Scarlet' Yubi portulaca, and various other portulaca.  (chuck b., I'm with you--and I did NOT intentionally plant that yellow portulaca in there with the red! I thought I had grabbed all reds and oranges.  Boo!)

As I was pondering the above, I also came across an old blog post of mine in which I tried to find a cool terminology to describe my garden's design aesthetic.  And I thought about how, when asked this week, Steve described my garden as, "Eclectic... just like your house, and their owner!"  (I know, he says sweet things, no?)  Anyway, the phrase "Edible Eclectic" popped into my head, and it was one of those things that finally felt just right.

So from now on, any time that someone asks me what my garden design aesthetic is (because you know it comes up all the time in polite conversation--ha!) I am going to say:  "Edible Eclectic!"  And yes, I'll be prepared to explain...  :)

A Berry Fruitful Year

I know, bad pun... but it got stuck in my head while walking around the garden this weekend.  I've been picking (everbearing) strawberries for a couple of weeks now, and they're about to hit one of their lulls.  Good thing there is an AMAZING amount of fruit in my backyard, in some stage of ripeness!

When I walk out my back door in the morning, the first thing I notice are the jewel-like currants:

Next door (across the artemisia, passionflower vine, hosta, etc.) the 'Canby Red' raspberries--a favorite of my four-legged Garden Assistant--have been giving me handfuls of ripe fruit for the past few days:

At the far end of the yard, 'Concord' has overgrown the grape arbor and its unripe clusters spill along all sides of the structure.  This pic shows the cascade of vines at the end of the arbor:

Next door (just past the clematis-and Bing cherry combo from this month's Bloom Day post) the thornless blackberry is so laden with fruit that some of its canes have drooped down into the 'Newe Ya'ar' culinary sage:

Nearby, past the fence-espaliered apple, 'Himrod White' grape has finally taken off on its smaller arbor.  I'm really excited to see green clusters here, because I haven't tasted any of these grapes yet:

The cherries have no viable fruit this year, and the peach tree did not want to be disturbed at the moment (still pouting from my thinning of its fruit, no doubt) so we'll conclude this post with a photo of almost-ripe blueberries, taken yesterday:

Which reminds me, it's almost time for a mid-morning snack.  I think I'll go see whether some of those blueberries aren't finally ready, before the birds beat me to them!  Happy Saturday...  :)

And a Cool Foliage Follow-Up

I had planned to continue the purple theme today (I definitely have enough of it in my garden!) but while strolling around with the camera near nightfall, the blues caught my eye instead:

Powdery blue sea kale leaves, cozying up to my blooming oakleaf hydrangea

The bluish silver of an unnamed artemisia (similar to a 'Powis Castle') that will soon grow to meet the hosta leaves over the peachy heuchera. (That's a lettuce to the left, "behind" in terms of sunshine, that will be harvested before the artemisia gets much bigger.)

Silvery and fuzzy, the kalanchoe brings out the cooler tones in the achillea and heuchera leaves, and plays off of the achillea buds, too.  I had left the pot in this spot last year, but this summer I just went ahead and planted it here, to see what would happen over the growing season.

This time, it's the silvery leaves of 'Frosted Violet' heuchera that are bringing out the blue tones in the nearby, unnamed hosta.

Bronze fennel makes for a cooling, intriguing background to the red coleus, sweet potato vine, blue eucalyptus, and bright yellow lysimachia.

When can gold take on shades of blue?  When you surround a 'Sum and Substance' (I believe--but this is unconfirmed) hosta with ruby orach, silvery painted ferns, Greek oregano, and top it all off by painting the nearby arbor with a blue-hued burgundy stain!

Hope you enjoyed my Foliage Follow-up for June 2010!  To see what's catching the eye of fellow foliage freaks around the world, visit Pam's Bloom Day & Foliage Follow Up post, and click through the comments.