I am in awe of the resoucefulness of the creator of this tiny garden.  Armed with little space and a desire to grow as much as possible – they got a little creative.

The pallets create a potato growing heaven on one side and compost on the other.  The strawberry pot decorates the center.  The various and sundry plastic containers hang to give more planting space and even the edges of the pallets serve to hold little pots of dangling plants.  It’s rustic and resourceful and utterly charming don’t you think?

Click through to see more detail or take a visit to Catholic home to read more about how it was created.

Imagine a Water Tower turned into a hotel — I think of a ball shaped thing on legs like you see dotted across the midwest of the USA- and I scratch my head at the thought.  The Dutch however have different types of water towers.  They look like this (castles) and a few years ago, after spotting the beautiful building in an image of the town in 1930’s the creators of this amazing hotel decided to give the building new life.

No longer surrounded by water, the creation of The Hotel Augustus and it’s landscape, recreated an opportunity to  surround the premises with water and nature.  After renovation, the river Vlij now flows again, the water tower/ hotel is surrounded by gardens and the original pumping station has been converted to a restaurant and a market-café.

Sited on the spot where the water basins for Dordrecht’s water tower were located, a formal but quirky  garden was created.
They “envisaged a garden that would do justice to all the images that the thought of a garden evokes. A garden that supplies food, a garden that is a feast for the eye and delight for the nose, a garden that reflects the changes of the seasons, a garden where sun and moon, wind and water, air and rain can be felt. A garden that makes you feel uplifted and humble at the same time. A garden that reminds you of all the promises and possibilities that lie ahead. A garden that inspires the cook and that in turn is
inspired by the kitchen – the cook and the gardener, the gardener and the cook.”

There is an entrance garden, a vegetable garden for fresh produce, a garden full of berries, a hothouse for grapes and a greenhouse. A Giardino Segreto (Secret Garden)  in which you can disappear or even stay the night (there is a hotel room in the secret garden), a copse to roam about, an orchard with apples, pears, plums, cherries and last but not least an Italian garden.

I yearn for projects like this and take enormous inspiration from it.  From the quirky formal garden to the business model of creating a hotel and landmark that flows directly from the land and whose main feature is the landscape, I am contemplating how my own little slice of land can be put to better use.

As totally, epically, unachievable gardens go (at least by the common homeowner), Villandry in France might be one of the world’s best.  Regardless of its insanity, I  Nonetheless  stare in awe at the beautiful pictures collected at Fundera grönt.  There are more beautiful images if you click through to the site.

Most of these images are of the kitchen garden (potager).  Lettuces never looked so beautiful to me and I am in awe of the statistics.  Over 250,000 vegetable and flower seedlings are grown and planted every year in this garden alone.  I visited once during the winter and so, missed this collection.   I am thinking a summer visit might be in order.

I am really enjoying the Stepables website.  It it super helpful for picking the right plant for the right place.  I have a couple of projects where I am trying to resolve the best solution for a step-able material.   One is a grass replacement project for a labyrinth and other is my own patio — to use between cobblestone pavers.   I am leaning towards a couple options that I think will be great for both sites. One is Thymus praecox Albiflorus “White Creeping Thyme” and the other is Silene acaulis “Moss Campion”.  Have you ever planted either of these for a walk-on feature ? I would love to hear how they performed.

At the Stepables site, you can choose traffic level, exposure, soil type, zone, color and growth rate among other things.  It leads you directly to a list of plants that will suit your needs.  There are plants for lawn replacement, crevice filling, mulch replacement, pool, kid or pet areas and every other special need you might have.

It is a very handy garden design tool.

It is a popular trend in Corporate America to build and offer company gardens. They are places where employees can spend coffee breaks with their hands in the dirt (if they want to). Participants can observe the growth of and harvesting of produce that is often used in company cafeterias and the benefits are increasingly a way to increase morale in a trying economy where raises and cash incentives are more scarce.

I am completely intrigued by the trend — as a business opportunity , but also as an exciting trend towards cultivating more gardeners. So, for the next few days, I am going to give over the daily garden to company gardens. First up is a peek in to Google’s Mountain View Headquarters garden.

It is called the Growing Connections Garden and features heavy use of EarthBoxes which seem to appeal to the scientific minds in the company. Among other technological advances, the EarthBox uses Sub Irrigation Technology (SIP). SIP employs a reservoir at the bottom of the container that waters plants at the root for higher yields with less water.

Their campus also features some other interesting corporate planting and landscape architecture.

Click through to see more of the campus’s landscape features.

images from upward bound summ…., Never Wood High, Diane, East Tennessee Wildflowers, googlified, and Tammy Camp.

Maybe you noticed and maybe you didn’t, but I have never discussed outdoor kitchens here.  It wasn’t a planned thing, I just haven’t had the desire.  Which kind of follows my lack of desire to design such things.   I am not politically against them or anything and I am ok with building in a BBQ to make a design more interesting, cohesive or functional, but when it comes to full on outdoor kitchen planning….which seems not so  different than full on indoor kitchen planning, it all starts to veer into an area of design that I personally have little interest for.  And for me its not just about the designing but also to have it at my own home….I simply do not desire the outdoor room that has a big old kitchen in it.

Here is what I am into….Wood Fired Pizza Ovens, My own Funky Firepit/ BBQ where I can cook meat over a real flame (or others like it that provide the same use),  and functional amenities to make an outdoor party fun and functional, interesting and different than an indoor party.  But beyond that, I am happy to carry my food from my indoor kitchen outside and I can totally leave the outdoor kitchen room and all it’s expense, flash and planning alone.

So when I saw Jamie Durie’s new line for Electrolux (which is admittedly an interesting and cool looking funky modern thing – but that I still don’t want), I just started to wonder….What do you guys think of outdoor kitchens?  Are you into them?  Do you want one?  If you are a designer, is this an area you want to work in, have worked in, want to work in more?  I am just curious to take the pulse of opinion about Outdoor Kitchens… Let’s discuss…

images from Trendir via Designer Pages.