Nancy Heckler’s hydrangea-colorful woodland garden

The acclaimed gardens Heronswood and Windcliff were connected the docket for Day 3 of the Puget Sound Fling, and I was excited to spot them. But archetypal we divided up onto smaller buses that could negociate the constrictive roadworthy to Windcliff, and my autobus headed to Nancy Heckler’s intimate, wooded plot successful Indianola. Nancy is the erstwhile wide manager of Heronswood, and she besides had a much-admired 2-acre garden, Oyster Point (sadly, I tin find nary photos online), earlier she downsized to her existent fractional acre.

I started exploring by walking up the gravel drive, wherever a floofy pinkish hydrangea and thenar mingle with a postulation of potted plants. It whitethorn dependable weird to absorption connected the gravel, but I person to accidental I emotion a gravel drive. It’s truthful overmuch prettier than concrete, with that pleasant crunch-crunch, and it allows rainwater to soak into the soil. It besides sets disconnected the plants nicely.

Hydrangea and palm

Pretty foliage plants successful pots loosely hug the house, solving the occupation of a hard-to-plant space.

A Little and Lewis raven plaque connected the partition coordinates with achromatic mondo writer and a terracotta fungi ornament.

That side-eye

An tremendous lacecap hydrangea partially obscures the entranceway to the backmost garden.

Nancy describes herself arsenic a works collector, with much than 100 hydrangeas alone. All those flowering shrubs during our mid-July sojourn made for a beauteous sight, and I expect they are reasonably debased attraction compared with flowering perennials. Something to see for anyone trying to marque a plot that requires little work.

As I came astir the corner, this stopped maine successful my tracks: pinkish hydrangeas and a blue-green hosta framing a constrictive path. Pastel parasols were shading 1 hydrangea, providing alleviation from the sun, which was hidden down clouds this day. The Seattle country had endured a vigor question successful the weeks earlier the tour, and plants had suffered. In Nancy’s garden, parasols supply a charming impermanent solution for susceptible plants.

Concrete pavers laid connected the diagonal constituent the mode toward an unfastened lawn, but first…

…let’s respect the crimson flowers of occurrence nasturtium, which was clambering done a shrub.

Paired with a purple fume histrion and a aureate shrub, those reddish flowers dazzled.

More purple and gold. This is each foliage color!

Scooting done the constrictive path, I emerged onto a lawn, which offers invited openness amid the densely planted garden. Spheres of pliable branches are scattered connected the tract similar a giant’s marbles.

Edging the lawn, shrubs and understory trees merge into a leafy wall.

Nancy chooses shrubs and trees with absorbing foliage, and that tin angiosperm successful the agleam shadiness of a woodland edge.

Lots of textures and foliage color

A metallic sphere tucked nether 1 shrub draws the eye.

Variegated leaves

Lots much hydrangeas

More

And more!

‘Jack Frost’ brunnera caught my oculus with its veined, “frosted” foliage, which Nancy pairs with a glass-bead butterfly.

At the backmost of the house, a platform enclosed by hydrangeas and hosta provides abstraction for a eating table…

…and much potted plants.

Quite a fewer more, successful fact

Smoldering reddish foliage

Hydrangeas were the prima of this Fling.

‘Escargot’ begonia connected the porch. I emotion its spiral-patterned leaves.

Many gardens astatine the Puget Sound Fling included works tables, and Nancy has 1 with a gabion pedestal.

Under the trees astir the lawn, a woodland way plot features this cinnamon-hued combo of rhododendron and driftwood birdhouse.

A bronze cookware connected an upturned saucer connected an aged stump plays up that woodsy theme.

Bark-textured pavers pb you in.

These handsome seedheads whitethorn beryllium rodgersia? They look large with purplish pinkish hydrangea flowers.

One more

A stunning pink-and-blue hydrangea deserves a infinitesimal of appreciation too.

And this purple-and-white one

Along the fence, a rope-and-bead lizard clings to a tree.

It’s astir apt 6 to 7 feet long.

Beyond, a peak-roofed shed draws the eye. A histrion that mislaid its apical becomes sculptural with the summation of a twiggy orb connected top.

Tree bark texture

Heading back, I gawked astatine the towering trees. They look to interaction the sky.

Foliage vignette with reddish accents

Flaky, peppery bark

More hydrangeas too

In a sunny abstraction adjacent the garage, parasols were shading a white-flowering hydrangea.

Color-matched parasol

Lilies, however, were happily soaking up the sun.

Their burnt-gold flowers harmonize with…

…another Little and Lewis raven connected the wall, guarding the space. What a treasure to person respective Little and Lewis pieces!

A chorus enactment of watering cans edges a raised bed.

Heading retired done the hydrangea gate, backmost to the driveway

What a handsome entranceway to a beauteous plot and a large kickoff to Day 3 of the Fling.

Up next: The celebrated Heronswood Garden. For a look backmost astatine the Fling banquet meal astatine Lakewold Gardens, click here.

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Explore the satellite of succulents and cacti astatine the Austin Cactus and Succulent Society’s Fall Sale connected 8/31 and 9/1, from 10 americium to 5 pm. Held astatine the Austin Area Garden Center successful Zilker Botanical Garden, it includes a works amusement with specimen cacti and succulents, handcrafted pottery, regular soundless auction and hourly works raffles, and adept advice. Entry included with the outgo of admittance astatine Zilker Botanical Garden: Adults $6 to $8, Seniors $5 to $7, Youths $3 to $4, Children nether 2 free.

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