Alison Conliffe's Garden

If you are a regular reader a garden blog called Bonnie Lassie, and you have the good fortune to be invited to it's writer's garden, you'll know you're in the right place as soon as you see these gabions and culverts beside the driveway.  The rain had been pouring down sideways on the wind a short time earlier but when I arrived, the rain and wind let up a little so we could enjoy a quick walk through the garden without getting soaked.

This part of the garden was just as I'd pictured it in my mind but I'd not realized that it was visible from the street.  The gabions are topped by cool shallow bowls of succulents in the summer.  I got to visit them in their winter digs inside.

 There were lots of great plants in the front gravel garden like this Eryngium.  Is that great foliage or what?

I'm envious of Alison's spotless Yucca gloriosa 'Walbristar.'  Her secret?  "I cut off the leaves with spots."  What a concept!

 In proximity was this one that has the gorgeous pink tinge to the leaves.  None of mine have taken on this lovely color  but that's o.k. as long as they keep growing and looking beautiful.

The color of this orange sedge is glorious.  Carex testacea I'm guessing. 

Alison made these gabion spheres and the smaller concrete sphere.  A creative and groovy use of rocks found in her beds.

Red sempervivum looking quite dapper surrounded by the wet gravel.

 I was struck by how tidy the garden looked already as mine looks like a bomb went off at a plant shop, leaves fell all over everything and the gardener died.  Alison's garden is in top shape already!  

The part about Alison's garden that surprised me most was what's behind this gate.  Rock, wood, open metal work and stained glass - ooh la la!  What a winning combination.  Someday when my garden grows up I'd like to have something similar!

The big surprise behind the gate was this water feature.  I've seen it before in many of Alison's posts but  never realized quite how large it is.  In looking at my own picture, the size seems to be lost somehow.  Perhaps the angle of the stream doesn't  read well in pictures but this is an impressive and beautiful corner of the garden. 

 The size of the entire garden behind that gate  was larger than I thought it would be.  To the left of the stream is Alison's shabby chic/vintage area.  It's quite effective when put together like this. 

Here is some of Barbara Sanderson's work (Glass Gardens Northwest.)

 At the head of the stream is this lovely waterfall.

From the walk close to the house looking back.

 A  gravel pathway wends up behind the waterfall. Notice how beautifully cleaned those beds look! 

This is a bed that Alison ripped out and re arranged a few weeks ago.  Someone who lives in my garden was looking over my shoulder at these pictures and remarked about how nice and tidy everything looks.  Fortunately we saved those crutches...  Seriously though, Alison's garden is incredible and while fairly new, it reflects the fun personality, plant knowledge/interest, and hard work of the gardener.

 Great re-use of plastic berry containers as nicely vented cloches.

Love the garden sphere! 

Dry streambed doubles as an access path - brilliant!

 I'd not seen this filipendula with purple in the leaves - very pretty!

Dicentra 'Gold Heart'  looking especially nice as it glows even in the rain.

 Again with the surprising scale.  While I've seen pictures of these before, they seemed much bigger in person and large enough to grow a lot of edibles.  (Maybe not a lot of pumpkins.)

And from the other side.

The bottle tree must be at least eight feet tall and quite at home among the firs.

 Looking back across the lawn.  Watch for next week's post about our trip to Ferney's nursery where you'll see Alison standing inside a wonderful metal gazebo that would look fantastic in her garden.  I'm thinking maybe on the part of the lawn in the lower right hand  corner of this image.  What do you think Alison?

 It's nice to know that I'm not the only one with groups of plants in pots from various nursery/plant sale excursions.  I recognized this group since Alison bought them on our previous weekend together at  Bainbridge Island and Dragonfly Farms.

Truly wonderful potting space.  There is a hose directly to the right of this making it very convenient to wash pots, hands, etc.

Clearly, Alsion also enjoys propagating plants.

Just past the bottle tree, we come to another fence whose gate we pass through to see the side garden (we are now opposite the gravel/gabion garden but this side is much larger than the other.  These are the huge trees that Alison had put in last fall after digging that whole area out.

 I love the river rock/pebble edging.  Most of these rocks were dug from the bed which they edge. 

This new garden is exciting and a joy to walk through.  I remember so many other wonderful parts of this place that I didn't show here.  To watch this garden grow, be sure to check in with Bonnie Lassie  to see what she's doing next.  Thanks, Alison, for sharing your garden with me and for another fun Saturday of plant shopping!  It's always fun to make new garden friends and to shop with the obsessed!