I look forward every year to the Hardy Plant Study Weekend, a total orgy of seminars, garden tours, and plant conversations.  This year it was held in Bellevue, WA with trips into Seattle and Whidbey Island, and I think I visited every garden, taking over 800 photos (oops!).  As I curate my images, I’ll give you all a brief tour of the gardens I visited.

Baja Warmth

The Old-Town Bellevue garden of Susie Marglin is jam-packed with things to see.  The influence of many trips to Baja, Mexico, is apparent with the warm stucco details, and exotic planting.  Despite the exotics like date-palms, and bananas, plants are well chosen to survive in our climate.  We were greeted with this wonderful stucco wall, draped with grape and clematis.

As always, we were greeted with details of lizards and geckos,

Inside the wall, lushly painted, the courtyard had hot corners for the exotics, and cool flagstone path. It was just as much fun photographing photographers, nearly all of them using camera-phones and iPads.

Tropical Details

Everywhere, the stucco structures, seating areas and attention to detail evoke a sense of tropical Mexico warmth.  Notice the painted pillows that match the real ones.

Cool Corners

Every hot garden needs some place to rest the eye.  I loved the cooling blues, both inside and out.