Rare Plant Research 2; The Place

From the Rare Plant Research "About Us" page come these words:

"Burl Mostul founded Rare Plant Research, a specialty nursery, in 1987.  In the early years the nursery focused on plant research, collector plants and varieties new to science.  About ten years ago the nursery shifted focus to garden plants and now Burl travels the world looking for new plants as well as developing new hybrids for Northwest gardeners."

The nursery where we saw all the cool plants in yesterday's post is behind us and the driveway, house, and vineyard are before us.

"Rare Plant Research is open to the public only one or two weekends a year and [this] thas become an event attracting 1,000 or more people.  In 2008 Burl and his wife built a stone chateau modeled after a 12th century Romanesque church, surrounded by ponds and gardens featuring many rare and unusual tropical and temperate plants.  The most recent addition is a bromeliad garden filled with boulders, olive trees and landscape bromeliads."

The vintage Jaguar is on loan for the nursery open but it looks great with the house!

I beg your forgiveness for including so many pictures of this place but there were visual treats at every turn.  It was difficult to narrow this down from the many images I took.  Isn't digital photography fun?

 So, we're in the soggy pacific northwest, right?

 This is a place made for entertaining!  The gardens are available for rent for special occasions.  

I'm thinking an early evening wedding here, reception happening as dusk descended, would be very special!

The steps are wide enough to accommodate chairs.  String quartet in the gazebo?

I'd love to come back and see this combination once the Tradescantia fills in.  Stunning!

A comfortable place to relax.  I could get used to sipping my morning coffee here.  How about you?

I understand that this interior solarium has just been added. 

Note the Musa 'Ai Ai' I'm picturing that door going to a bedroom.  How amazing would it be to awaken and see the Pacific Northwest out one window and the tropics out of another?

 A little wine makes any garden visit more interesting.  This space, a wine tasting room,  is perfect for lots of people but I'd be tempted to have more space for plants.  Who am I kidding?  There's no space for people in my garden.  It works well for a curmudgeon who likes plants more than people most of the time.

 Every 12th century church needs a moat, right? 

 Loree noticed the tree on the right.  It's an Aesculus hipposcastanum 'Laciniata'  which I just got at Hortlandia earlier this year.  You may recall it from this post.

 This specimen must be quite old as I've heard that they are extremely slow growers. 

More eye candy.

This moat doesn't look deep and wide enough to drown would-be intruders. I'm imagining that modern laws don't allow for the drainage of sewage into moats anymore.  Our noses are grateful.

The dense evergreen background makes one quite aware that we're in the PNW!

Another of the ponds. 

A garden shed. 

 Those silly Romans left debris everywhere.  I guess there weren't laws about littering a few centuries ago.

Hope you enjoyed our visit and plan to see it for yourself!  

Exciting news  from RPR's website - "We are having a special one day open garden and nursery plant sale, June 21st from 11am to 4pm.  Join us for lunch with caterer Dave Clark's tasty creations, wine tasting with Villa Catalana Cellars in the garden conservatory tasting room.  Tour the gardens and enjoy a glass of pinot noir.

Rare Plant Research Part One; The Plants

Back in the middle of May, Alison and I drove down to Oregon City to attend the annual spring nursery open at  Rare Plant Research. I'd bought RPR plants from Jungle fever and Dig for years, enjoyed their tables at a couple of Portland area plant sales, and  enjoyed Danger Garden's  posts about this annual event but I wasn't prepared for how fabulous the place, plants, and prices would be!  There were too many pictures for a single post so today we'll see some of the plants and later we'll tour the grounds.

A few agaves.

Aeonium urbicum v. Rubra seems to be glowing.  I wish I'd picked up one of these.  Oh well, RPR will be open again on June 21...

More interesting than beautiful, these were great to see. 

 Gasteria glomerata

Calibanus hookeri. Do you s the face in the caudex?

An opuntia or two and a field of Lewisia.  I seriously considered adding another opuntia to the Danger Gardentte but didn't.  Some of these followed me home though as when I went to work at Jungle fever on Saturday, there were several of these that had just arrived from RPR!

 Aha!  this is one of the plants I came looking for!  I've had Aechma blanchetiana before but am convinced that I'll be more successful in wintering it over this time!

Beautiful leaf of Musa 'Ai Ai'  This is only hardy to zone 11 and I fear that it wants way more heat and humidity that  my garden has to give.

Tibouchina grandifolia certainly lives up to the name!  That foliage is pretty gorgeous.  

Hohenbergia 'Fudgde Ripple'

More bromeliads.  One of those yellow and red ones on the right came home with me.

So many treasures!

Ananus comosa was far too beautiful not to hitch a ride to Tacoma.  

Neoregelia hybrids.  Yum. 

Sorry this post is so random, I kept darting from plant to plant getting more and more excited.  I finally did go back and explore in a more orderly fashion but decided to let you share in the thrill of discovery.  Agave americana variegata.  These always look very sweet but I don't need any more!

 Kalanchoe thyrsiflora

I'm accustomed to seeing very small numbers of these plants in retail shops so the copious amounts of every plant made me swoon.  A grower has to produce in large numbers if they are supplying many retailers.

Dyckia  mariner - laposteli  is sure swell.  Almost came home with me. 

A sea of aeoniums.  Isn't that pinky, lavender, blue color nifty?

 A field of Aloe dorotheae 

Agaves AND opuntias?  No wonder Danger loves this place.  

 Does anyone know this one?

There was one semi available (It was in someone else's cart.  They were nowhere to be seen.  All's fair in love and plants, right?)  It stayed where it belonged.  Is this a flower or something made by Judi Hook?

Aeonium 'Silk'

Here are a few of my purchases trying out possible homes for the summer. 

Thank you, Loree, for encouraging us to visit this great grower of unusual plants, for being patient with us when we arrived late and for walking the grounds with us!  The day was a great deal of fun for us!