The Garden of My Dreams el. 



MARYLAND 



How it Gradually Took Shape and What I Learned by Experience that Beginners May Now Benefit by 



IT HAS taken me nine years to make my 

 garden what it now is, and as at last I 

 am just beginning to feel satisfied perhaps 

 the result of my struggles will be of some 

 use to other would-be gardeners who don't 

 know how to begin. In the beginning I did 

 not use much common sense, and made the 

 design myself, which was a great mistake at the 

 time, so different from now, when the magazines 

 are full of suggestions, and plans that may be 

 copied. Good luck was with me, however, for 

 my little design proved to be successful in 

 the long run. 



Years were wasted groping about in the 

 dark, as it were; for I did not know what to 

 plant, nor how to plant it. My idea was to 

 search the catalogues for perennials and 

 annuals both seeds and plants, and I bought 

 them all, I do believe. How often have I 

 wished my money back, and the time! it has 

 slipped away from me never to return. 



I saw pictures with the spring flowering 

 bulbs in bloom, with the herbaceous plants 

 pushing up between them, to bloom later — 

 they looked so lovely that I planted mine in 

 the same way. They were all right while 

 blooming, but what could I do with the ugly 

 yellowing stems that were left behind? 

 And in the autumn I would forget and dig 

 up the poor bulbs and sometimes cut them 

 with my spade. 



One day I stumbled across Miss Jekyl's 

 "Colour in the Flower Garden" and read 

 her suggestions that bulbs must be planted in 

 a place to themselves, a spring garden. I quite 

 agree with her about them, and about everything 

 else she has written about flowers, for hers is a 

 mastermind where gardens are concerned, and now 

 I follow her lead as much as I can. But her Eng- 

 lish climate is so different from ours, and her 

 plants blossom at such different times, that it 

 is not practical to make the same combinations 

 and I have had to work out problems for myself. 



But my all is crowded into a small space about 

 sixty by forty feet and it is a problem to keep it 

 full of color during the growing months — I have 

 not the space nor the means to have separate 

 gardens for each season. But it's fun striving to 

 reach perfection. I haven't 

 found a resting place yet 

 for my Spring Garden, but 

 I have stolen a corner 

 from my practical hus- 

 band's potato patch for a 

 nursery that was badly 

 needed; there I have my 

 baby perennials growing 

 away to be used when 

 needed, and for cut flowers, 

 and rows of annuals, and 

 Dahlias, and Roses. 



'"pHE accompanying plan 

 -*- is just one fourth of 

 the child of my brain. 

 There are four centre beds, 

 paths between and around 

 them, the corners and sides 

 form one big bed. Two 

 sides are edged with a tall 

 clipped hedge of Norway 

 Spruce, which I never 

 would have planted but it 

 was already there. An 

 arch at the entrance has a 

 Dorothy Perkins Rose at 

 the foot of each side, and 

 shrubs divide the garden 

 from the lawn. Just in- 

 side the arch is planted on 

 each side a group of Yucca 

 flaccida (also known as 



Yucca filamentosa). They are a little way 

 back from the path and the intervening space 

 is filled in with the woolly leaved Stachys lantana. 

 I am always hoping my Yuccas will bloom with 

 the Roses, but so far they haven't exerted them- 

 selves. But that is my own fault, for I 'have 

 moved them about too much. Now that they 

 have found a permanent home great things are 

 expected from them. Just back of them are some 

 Hydrangea paniculata grandiflora, trimmed back 

 each year to keep them the proper height, and two 



The arch with the Roses blooming upon it 



or three plants of Gypsophila paniculata to give 

 that misty appearance that is so bewitching. 



My beds are edged with Dwarf Box, kept 

 clipped, and behind it everything is planted in 

 lines or singly, the plants can be crowded so 

 much better in this way. Half the garden is 

 devoted to pink and red flowers, the other half 

 to blue and yellow with as much white as I can 

 squeeze in everywhere. This is the simplest 

 way to avoid color discords. I plant closely, to 

 keep the weeds down, and many of the early 

 bloomers can be pulled up to make way for the 

 others, put out in the vegetable rows, and re-set 

 in their places in the autumn. 



The Sweet Williams are very beautiful; they 

 and the Clove-scented Pinks I use in long lines 

 just back of the Box. The plants can be pulled 

 to pieces after blooming for two or three years, 

 and. each little slip that has roots to it planted 

 again. Nearly all the perennials need renewing 

 every few years either in this way or by raising 

 young plants from seeds. They will not grow on 

 indefinitely. Who can resist putting Foxgloves 

 behind the Sweet Williams, they always bloom 

 together and rarely disappoint. 



The spring comes with the Primroses, soon 

 to be covered with the great leaves of Funkia 

 Sieboldiana, and Funkia subcordata grandi- 

 flora, and then follow in quick succession 

 Irises, Sweet Williams, Foxgloves, Clove- 

 scented Pinks, Canterbury Bells, Delphin- 

 iums, Yuccas, and Yellow Day-lilies, Daisies, 

 the gorgeous Phloxes, Veronica longifolia 

 subsessilis, Asclepias tuberosa, Hollyhocks 

 and Boltonia asteroides, hardy Sunflowers, 

 hardy Asters and a few others, giving me 

 wonderful color all summer long. 



'TpHOSE who don't know the intricacies of 

 •*■ garden material should begin with the 

 old standbys just named, and never try any- 

 thing new in the garden without first be- 

 coming acquainted with it in the nursery. 

 I have banished Peonies to the nursery as 

 their season of bloom is short and really I 

 have not the room for them. All the an- 

 nuals excepting a few Nasturtiums, Sweet 

 Alyssum, Ageratum, and Petunias both the 

 pink and the white, useful for filling in any 

 bare spaces which occur are also in the nursery. 

 I have wasted much time by planting annuals 

 in the flower garden, now they grow in rows with 

 the vegetables where they can have all the room 

 they need and a weekly cultivation. 



I think too that this is the only way to plant 

 Roses, Dahlias and the Hardy Chrysanthemums 

 ■ — they must have plenty of room and be culti- 

 vated frequently. 



great delight. 



Here is the plan solved by nine years of progress and adjustment. 

 171 



TV/TAKING combinations of two kinds of 

 ■*-*-*■ flowers for bouquets for the house is a 

 These combinations are lovely: 

 Spirea Vanhouttei and 

 the early dark purple Iris; 

 the large double Sunflowers 

 and white Boltonia aster- 

 oides; Euphorbia corollata 

 with Marigolds or with 

 scarlet Zinnias; Celosia 

 plumosa and Clematis 

 paniculata; Butterfly- 

 weed and Veronica longi- 

 folia subsessilis. 



A FTER all it is not 

 ■^*- difficult to learn what 

 shrubs to use, as near the 

 large towns there is so 

 much suburban develop- 

 ment that one can go and 

 see a great variety of 

 growing shrubs that were 

 planted by experts. I have 

 no perennials in front of 

 my shrubs, for I like to see 

 their branches sweeping 

 down over the green sod, 

 and many of them are 

 beautiful in winter when 

 other planting would spoil 

 their appearance. Those 

 which bear fruits are my 

 favorites. I don't believe 

 there is a more magnificent 

 shrub growing than the 

 Japanese Berberis, in the 



It gives flowers a-plenty 



