Our 25th anniversary tour is in the books!

The owner of Garden 1 likes to think of her outdoor space as a living collage in which she moves pieces (plants and structures) around until they “fit,” always paying attention to color, movement, and shape. She uses organic and cultural methods to deter deer, pests and weeds.

Being a self-professed OCD gardener, she can often be found in her garden grooming the plants and pulling weeds. She turns a benevolent blind eye, however, to unpredictable plant behavior. The serendipitous appearance of self sowers or mysterious pop-ups is welcome in this “Living Collage.”

In Garden 2, plants are placed just so to make sure every season provides visual pleasure and has blooms, berries, and seeds for the birds and the bees. Within three years of starting the garden, the owners understood that the deer didn’t get the memo on what plants they shouldn’t eat. A fence was grudgingly added to the front of the house.

Garden 3 is best described as a “plant collector’s hobby garden,” featuring more than 270 species — including 50+ native to the Pacific Northwest — representing 69 plant families. Two years ago, the owner started propagating Pacific Northwest native plants, and many of these are now thriving in the garden.

Pollinators are encouraged to visit the variety of flowering plants. Birds find the dense garden a haven for shelter and food, especially in the winter months. The garden doesn’t get cleaned up until warm weather in the spring to allow insects to overwinter.

Garden 4, an outstanding woodland garden mixing native plantings with ornamental grasses, bulbs and shrubs, boasts a high biodiversity that helps to attract songbirds, and beneficial insects. Revealing itself after the house was built in 2016, this garden truly honors what was already in place: cedars, Douglas fir and a few endemic shrubs.

The owner’s guiding principles include deer-resistant selections, no lawn, easy to maintain, welcoming to wildlife, and vegetation that conveys movement and provides year-round interest in form, texture, and color. A good view from inside the house is also high on her list.

Garden 5‘s whimsical design aesthetic is purposefully a little bit steampunk in that the owner has repurposed found and salvaged materials, including a bathtub now doing duty as a chaise lounge in the front yard.

The owner transformed the entire property which now features a front yard with a cheerful picket fence with a pattern of soldered copper plumbing pipe running above, deterring deer while intriguing human visitors.

A Victorian-themed folly in the backyard features a domed roof and leaded glass windows from salvaged materials, as well as a sleeping loft.

Garden 5 (below)