Inspiration at the Miller Botanical Garden

There is much to admire at the Miller Botanical Garden. Although I visit at least twice annually for Great Plant Picks meetings I doubt I would ever walk away uninspired. Each encounter is a new day and a new frame of mind. Each visit I try to see the garden a little differently. I let myself be drawn by whatever force my head and heart are cooking up, a kind of stream of consciousness of traversing through a garden, especially this trip where my mind wanted to wander. It was moss, textures, and unusual flowers this encounter. And while March is not a typically inspirational month in the garden, I think the Miller has such great bones from which the creative people caring for it are able to work, they make magic even in late winter.

Pyrrosia sheareri is a quintessential plant when I imagine the Miller. This fern inspired me to add one to my own garden last year and it gives year-round pleasure. Here in a container out on the deck it is the star lineup in a row of pots leading you out towards a view of Puget Sound beyond the fence in the background.

DESIGN

Alike, but different. Cordyline indivisa on the right and another pink foliaged cordyline on the left echo each other's shape and size but with different colors. This adds balance without being too obvious about it, though if they were both the same plant it would also add a sense of unification and perhaps tones of formality.

A subtle design element is framing the open dining room terrace with plant materials, keeping site lines clear so one can appreciate the structure. The home is made of stone and wood and blends beautifully with its surroundings, so obscuring it would be a shame. 

FLOWERS

Winter flowers are not something I expect or necessarily look for in March. Our native Mahonia aquifolium with sulphur yellow flower buds ready to open on the next sunny day. This is a lovely evergreen shrub that forms colonies in time. It's the Oregon state flower, after all, and a valuable addition to the landscape.

The fern lawn with pretty Cardamine quinquefolia blooming.

Osmanthus, probably Osmanthus x burkwoodii, a rather large evergreen shrub with flower buds just barely opening.

Rhododendron stenopetalum ‘Linearifolium’ is a quite unexpected bit of color for early March.

While Camellias are not high on my list of "must have" plants (though they are worthy, I'm simply not a fan of them in the off season and when their large flowers go brown and litter the ground with a pink/brown layer of mush), any well-grown plant deserves a moment for appreciation. This rather gigantic specimen is, undoubtedly, very old and likely one of Elisabeth Miller's original plantings. The lesson here is consider legacy plants, ones that will certainly outlive you, often improving with age. As a side note, I watched a hummingbird feed on this plant for several minutes; however, a good photo of it was not to be had.

Parrotiopsis jacquemontiana, an upright deciduous tree, currently covered in sweet little flowers with yellow stamens. I am not familiar with this plant, it was Martin, the director of the Hoyt Arboretum, who identified it for me. Thank goodness for plant nerd friends!

MOSS

Moss is certainly expected in the Pacific Northwest, particularly shady, mild weather gardens such as the Miller. Moss on trees and branches are always special to my eyes, a velvet glow decorating branches, rocks and paths.

Moss as a groundcover in the lower part of the garden. I believe that is Camassia cusickii having seen them in bloom on my first visit to the Miller, emerging from the moss lawn.

A well worn gravel path through the moss.

Adorning branches

Bringing out the interesting form of this shrub.

On many garden group forums, people ask regularly how to get rid of moss. Often with chemical warfare. What? Seriously? If it's in your lawn, it's not killing your lawn, it's there because it's a perfect environment for moss to grow. If it's on your tree branches it's not killing your tree, it's enjoying a perfect environment to thrive. I ask, why would you want to remove it? Personally, I adore it. It is not a threat to gardens or plants.

CONTAINERS

One of the most enchanting elements of this garden are the hundreds, yes easily hundreds, of containers. This trough had me imagining building one myself this year.

Near the house, fresh foliage and flower combinations are installed every year (perhaps changing each season?) in fancier pots. This grouping with hellebore, heuchera, erysimum, euphorbia and cordyline has lovely color echoes.

I noticed a few new "fern" tables this visit. I use quotations because that's the term we learned to use when describing tabletop gardens. Obviously, here, they are sun lovers. Richie used to teach classes at Joy Creek Nursery where I worked for several years how to make these. It's really quite simple, requiring a base (concrete, pavers, a sturdy piece of lumber), building mounds of soil and placing rocks, branches or whatever one fancies and tucking them in securely, then digging pockets out of the soil and tucking in plants. The whole thing gets wrapped in fishing line or something similar to help keep it in place until the plants root in and help stabilize it. Install the fishing line before the plants, though. They change over time of course and need special attention paid for watering as they dry out quickly. Also, if they are of any decent size, build them in situ so you don't have the burden of moving it. Plants do need to be replaced from time to time, but don't we do that in our gardens anyway? I love these.

A wider view of three new-to-me tables with lots of our native sedum and fescue as well as colorful sempervivums. Also that they are raised up on cement blocks allows for eye-level enjoyment.

If you would like to build one, the Miller has online instructions, you can find that here.

The dining room terrace, a container lover's paradise as far as I'm concerned with plenty of alpine troughs, pyrrosia, succulents and interesting dwarf conifers. The sky is the limit is the lesson I take away here. If you adore a plant and it can grow in a container, it's a way to add more layers to the garden.

Details

An enclosed porch area off of the dining room is filled with shady containers featuring rhododendrons, ferns and Aspidistra ssp.

While not of the decorative sort, many containers in the nursery part of the garden, some propagated on site and some purchased and awaiting planting in a holding area. It's fun to see this side of the garden.

FOLIAGE

Foliage is the most important element at the Miller. Here a restio (I don't know enough about them to properly ID this - please say so if you know) catches the light adding drama and feathery texture.

Bright hot pink and cranberry colors of a cordyline.

Matteuccia struthiopteris fertile fronds left standing after older foliage was removed. It's a weird and wonderful detail that I'm delighted to have seen.

A rhododendron, possibly R. makinoi. I adore rhododendrons with interesting foliage well above and beyond any flowering.

A rather tall rhododendron in a container by the front door provides the opportunity to see the undersides and their coppery soft indumentum.

TEXTURE

I've given a lot of thought as to what defines texture in a garden sense. It has a lot to do with how light reflects or doesn't off of foliage, stones, wood, etc. and something to do with color. Shape, too, sometimes light going through a plant makes an interesting silhouette. However you define it, the different foliage shapes, colors and luminosity show up well in winter light. Having a variety of textures keeps it vibrant and invites exploration.

Closer to the house the velvety moss juxtaposed with hard stone and tactile bark of the tree are examples of varied texture. Add the slightly shiny foliage of low-growing Saxifraga primuloides (center, bottom), smooth surface of a container and the cedar siding of the  house and this is a complete garden scene on a small scale.

Lovely branching and flowers

Tasmanian tree fern (Dicksonia antartica) wrapped in burlap on the left, contributes to textures in the lower garden. The burlap is winter protection, of course, and blends in very naturally with its surroundings. Foliage color, dark conifers with sun reflecting off of its leaves, rocks, sinuous dark lines of tree trunks, bare branches and shiny leaves are more examples of creating interest with texture.

So much to appreciate here.

DETAILS

There are so many carefully considered details in this garden, here are a couple. The transition from wood deck to stone to gravel for pathways, lots of containers along the edges of the deck in coordinating tones to a bit of evergreen presence in the stone roundel in the center, are simply a few.

A well-weathered invitation to sit for a moment. Considering how materials weather over time is worthwhile, especially when moss and lichen adorn surfaces.

Even in winter, twining vines on the deck railing are intentional and interesting.

Practical and interesting, these wood roundels used for a path through a rather shady, damp area are covered in netting to keep visitors from slipping. They blend in too and add a bit of texture.

A parting image of a gravel path morphing to stones then to lawn (the only real bit of lawn in this whole garden) to cordylines and a couple of my friends chatting all things plants and Great Plant Picks.

There and back again in a day. That's how it happens, four hours in a car up to Seattle, a few hours at the Miller then four to five hours home. It's quite tiring but inspiring. We love visiting with one another, swapping plant stories and sharing experiences and learning about new plants. It's quite stimulating, like the garden itself. I notice in these photos that some of these ideas I have incorporated into my own garden, perhaps subconsciously, but perhaps it's a coincidence. It's a love language of inspiration. The Miller and indeed every garden I have the privilege to visit make their way into my own one way or another, I suppose that's true for us all. I hope you've enjoyed a virtual visit to one of my favorite Pacific Northwest gardens in early March.

That's a wrap for this week at Chickadee Gardens. As always, thank you so much for reading and commenting, we do love hearing what you are all up to! Happy gardening!