Follow the story of our garden-in-the-making in the South of France:

  • One of my “darlings” and a somewhat misguided beginner’s purchase because Caryopteris is not really a drought-resistant plant. Filippi gives it a mere 2.5 on the drought-resistance scale. But so far it has turned out to be surprisingly tough and…

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  • Autumn is a Second Spring Most Mediterranean gardens are a feast for the eyes from April through the beginning of June. In July and August though most plants enter summer dormancy and you don’t find many flowers or even green…

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  • Having never met many of them before in real life, Tamarix always seemed rather delicate to me. Turns out they are pretty much indestructible. We have two of them in the garden. One grows with massive roots right out of…

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  • These are deceptively simple looking shrubs – until they bloom. Then they become an explosion of vivid pink to magenta or lavender violet flowers, appearing and re-appearing mostly from August through October, but the first flowers can begin as early as…

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  • Pretty (though few) flowers and tasty fruit – Ipomoea batatas or Sweet Potato work well here in this Mediterranean garden. The wild form of Ipomoea batatas is native to Central America. It was imported to Asia by the Spanish and…

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  • Another one of those plants that seemed not suited to this area but simply took a year to establish itself. In 2023 I sowed and planted Verbena bonariensis into the then still more or less empty garden. They grew and…

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