Where do you rate on the garden style continuum? Pundits recommend you select the right style for you and then follow a "recipe" for garden success. I'm not sure it's that simple. We so rarely garden by the book!
Some folks go slapdash and hell for leather, sticking in any old thing any old place, the more the better, the flashier the better, the more expensive the better. Poodle bushes! Wild foliage! This is a bold and brash, shoot from the hip style -- if one is good a bunch more will be better!
Then there are the careful ladies' gardens, full of the sweet and gentle and romantic. Exquisite tiny details, quaint ornaments, delicate flowers, lilacs and lots of pastels. Scented roses, lavender and sweet violets. Perhaps a touch of lace and ribbon. Perfect for afternoon tea!
The country gardens swirl in a tangle of nasturtiums and prairie flowers, lots of vines and other gangly things. Weeds are beloved for their decorative seed heads come winter and for the cover and feed they provide butterflies and other wildlife. Veggies and herbs intermingle with the old-timey flowers here, shoulder to shoulder with the ever dependable flowering shrubs -- forsythia, mock orange and spirea for sure!
Urbane city gardens create respite in a postage stamp: so often sternly symmetrical, relying on somber evergreens, classic forms and immaculate hardscape to create beauty. A jewel box of repose and serenity, pure elegance!
The committed collector's garden: all so full, ever in motion. Always struggling to fit in "just one more." This is where the passionate treasure their finest, cosset their frailest and generally delight in the discovery of the newest. The hunt is on! Not only for the latest addition to the collection, but also for a spot to put it!
The eccentric gardener follows no rules and adds whatever pleases at the moment. The back yard given over to the activity of choice, the front yard given over to an oversized sculpture, the side yard turned potting shed cum workshop -- and staging for tacky yard art in progress! These gardens are by definition inimitable. And indescribable by commonalities with one exception: they are the gardener's own creation, without nod to any accepted idea or definition of garden style.
The eclectic garden -- what we probably all end up with! A little bit of everything, in proportions to fit our personalities and resources. These are my favorites. These are the gardens we live in and with from day to day, season to season.
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