7 Aug

Sunflowers Shine on a Brooklyn Stoop Garden

Posted by Chris P in Summer 2009. Tagged: , , , .

brownstone_sunflower_garden_brooklyn

Sunflowers don’t immediately strike me as city flowers. Don’t they seem like they’d be happier out in a field somewhere?

And yet, check out this Brooklyn brownstone stoop garden. These sunflowers look amazing there — a little bit country, a little bit rock ‘n roll with some bohemian thrown in for good measure. The yellow and brown bring great contrast against the worn brownstone red. Many people plant dark maroon foliage to match the brownstone, but where’s the contrast and the joy?

These sunflowers stretch up to the parlor floor, bringing the viewers eye up to the front of the house. And the sedum Autumn Joy looks great at the foot of the sunflowers where things could be a bit leggy-ugly.  I wonder if sunflowers could grow this tall on a roof garden. Would they snap in the wind?

Speaking of sunflowers and Brooklyn, don’t miss the New York Times article about Kirstin Tobiasson’s guerrilla garden on the Gowanus canal

6 Aug

Rest in Peace Willem Kwist, Roof Gardener

Posted by Chris P in Summer 2009.

Check out The Villager for Willem Kwist’s obituary. He sounds like a fascinating man.

“Kwist would plant 400 tulips in April, irises in May and an azalea tree and numerous flowers and plants from all over the world throughout the spring, summer and fall. He also built apartment shelving, several photographic darkrooms and many wooden furnishings for friends,” says The Village.

Does anyone have any photos of his garden?

29 Jul

Best Roof Garden Plants: Miscanthus sinensis Cabaret

Posted by Chris P in Summer 2009. Tagged: , , , , .

miscanthus_sinensis_cabaret_gerranium_petunia_verigated_rooftopgarden

Miscanthus sinensis Cabaret wins the most valuable player award in our Brooklyn roof garden. As first year roof gardeners, we didn’t want to sink a lot of money on trees. We were also worried that trees might be too heavy for the roof or need too much water.So we’re using this grass to play a tree like role.

This large pots of a tall grass anchor the corners of our garden space, similar to what a tree would do. Earlier this season the Miscanthus sinensis Cabaret grass was a gracious background for perennials and some sedum. Now it is anchoring the corner with our petunias and geraniums.

This Miscanthus sinensis Cabaret doesn’t mind being whipped around by the wind and it makes a great sound as it shimmies in the wind. It’s our version of a wind chime. Also, this variegated grass has been most tolerant of roof garden’s extreme weather: the super rainy June and steamy July days haven’t bothered this plant. A few blades get brown and we trim them out in a quick monthly haircut.

We bought this beachy grass at the Liberty Sunset Garden Center after hearing that it wouldn’t need too much water and  it is “great for containers.” It has more than doubled in height since we bought it and is now about five feet tall. It is supposed to “send up coppery pink flower plumes in fall.” Something to look forward to.

We’re planning to overwinter this plant right on the roof. Come spring, we’ll cut off last years growth and fertilize it. We haven’t decided if we’ll try to split it into two 16″ pots or leave it as is. We want to do all we can to make sure this grass is with us again next summer.

More on Miscanthus sinensis Cabaret:
Grasses With Attitude – This Old House

27 Jul

Roof Garden Roses: Sale at HeirloomRoses.com

Posted by Chris P in Summer 2009. Tagged: , , , .

rose_and_herb_rooftop_garden

I gave R* two of Heirloom Roses’s tiny plants for his birthday in June. Here’s a shot of the tiny plants, co-planted with lavender, sage, and thyme — right when we potted them and put them up on the roof.

roses_lavender_rooftop_garden

In this photo from yesterday, you can see that our own root roses and herbs took off. This bush is still flowering and is starting to lean against the lavender just as we hoped. We’d heard that roses are difficult to grow and often get attacked by pests, but we’ve had no problem. Call it beginners luck or credit these great plants.

We wanted to share this update on our roses because HeirloomRoses.com is having a sale. They’re offering over 160 roses for $7.95 each from now until August 2. This is about half off the standard price.

Some things to keep in mind:
Make sure you pick roses that are suitable for your growing conditions.
Keep in mind that these plants will be small when they arrive! Some people seem to be stunned by that.
Consider that the rose needs enough time to establish itself before winter shows up. “If planted in zones 6 and below caution needs to be taken to ensure that they make it through the winter,” Heirloom Roses explains.
Pick up some pointers about the rose sale in this GardenWeb thread.

26 Jul

Our Favorite Brownstone Stoop Container Garden

Posted by Chris P in Summer 2009. Tagged: , , , , .

photo

We finally snapped a picture of my favorite Brooklyn brownstone stoop gardens this afternoon.

This brownstone planter is simple — just two plants — and elegant. The plants take advantage of their location; passers buy look up into the grass and little blue flowers. If this planting was viewed at ground level, the little flowers might get lost, but here their lacy best can be appreciated at eye level. The plants manage to show off the container without making the container the star.

Unlike some containers that peek and then loose their appeal, this planter has looked great since spring. It breaks the “thriller, spiller, filler rule” with much success. Does anyone recognize the plants in this container?

For another great container garden in the same neighborhood, check out this Brooklyn window box overflowing with petunias.

21 Jul

Butterfly Stops By Our Lantana

Posted by Chris P in Summer 2009. Tagged: , , , , .

butterfly_rooofgarden_lantana.jog

My mom visited us this weekend and got the chance to check out our roof garden. Mom noticed this butterfly enjoying our lantana hanging basket and we snapped a quick picture.

Early this summer, butterflies enjoyed our sedum. Since then, butterflies have become regulars at our roof garden and we’re hoping to plant more next year to attract them. This Butterfly’s Delight collection looks great for bringing on the butterflies.

The lantana has worked well as a hanging basket. It takes a beating from the wind and more than full sun conditions and barely wilts, thought it does require daily watering.

20 Jul

A Rooftop and Terrace Vegetable Garden in Brooklyn

Posted by Chris P in Summer 2009. Tagged: , .

terrace_vegetable_garden_brooklyn

Mapleton-Bklyn is an amazing diary of a hard working, first year Brooklyn vegetable garden. Check out the variety of things Chris is growing over there — even dino kale!

roofgarden_lettuce

Chris speaks honestly about the hassle (“it would be nice not to have the apartment look like a construction site.”) and joy of growing in Brooklyn (“my squash leaves just grew 1.2mm in the past six hours”). Check out all his hard work, aphids and all. For even more Brooklyn veggie photos, check out Chris’ Flickr site.

Images: Mapleton-Bklyn

17 Jul

Lee Valley Sale, or Why I Bought a $72 Watering Can

Posted by Chris P in Summer 2009. Tagged: , , .

hawswateringcan

Lee Valley is running free shipping sale through this weekend. Good thing too — our nasty neighbor has decided that we cannot use the hose on the roof anymore, so we ordered another large Haws’ watering can.

Without access to the hose, we’ve been making double and triple trips down to our apartment to fill up our watering cans and take them too the roof. I like to think that this is keeping us fit and making sure we don’t waste a drop of water.

Now $72 is a lot to pay for a watering can!! But when you’re taking two trips up and down three flights of stairs trying not to splash water on the co-op carpet, you might as well treat yourself. We’ve also found that the rose — aka watering can nozzle — helps to direct water to our containers, where as the plastic Home Depot cans drip and spill. Plus we’re starting to fall for the romance of hardworking, beautiful British gardening tools.

We’ll let you know if we’ve completely lost it or if the $72 Haws fetches water 10 times better than the $7 Home Depot plastic job.

Want to see where the Haws obsession started and learn more about their company? Here’s my first post about Haws.

15 Jul

Roof Garden Plant: Daylilies

Posted by Chris P in Summer 2009. Tagged: , .

rooftop_garden_brooklyn_daylily

We planted a pot of daylilies in our Brooklyn roof garden at the recommendation of the helpful team over at Liberty Sunset Garden Center. In the spring and early summer, the lilies gave us a big punch of green. And the daylily started flowering during the first week in July, just as our Ameria maritima and a few other perennials stopped flowering.It was great to have the daylily bursting into flower for our 4th of July party.

Each flower doesn’t last long (hence the “day” part of the name!), but the plant keeps pushing out more flowers.

The daylily is presenting a few problems too. When it rains, the dead flowers from the daylilly fall off and get stuck to the roof surface. The flowers aren’t as attractive as we were hoping. Did all the June rain do something to the flowers? Or should we experiment with putting it in an even sunnier spot next summer? Or is it just that this particular variety (we can’t find the tag from this plant so we don’t know the exact name of it) doesn’t produce especially beautiful flowers?

By the way, daylilies are also grown in the roof garden on Chicago’s City Hall. And here’s the daylily collection at White Flower Farm. We’re wondering if other rooftop and container gardeners have any daylily advice for us.

14 Jul

A London Rooftop Vegetable Garden

Posted by Chris P in Summer 2009. Tagged: , , .

london_vegetable_rooftop_garden_bluesonicboy

Check out Dom’s rooftop garden in Hackney, London. This is his first year in this building, so he call this vegetable garden “a big experiment.”

Dom’s tomatoes are growing in grow bags — “really just bags full of peat/compost/growing soil that are specially designed for vegetables and fruit,” he explained. “They’re great for vegetables in confined spaces but their one major drawback is that you can never tell how dry or wet they are.”

We haven’t had any problems with rodents in our garden here in NYC, but Dom’s not so lucky. “Rocket, spinach and lobelia all failed because the squirrels tampered with the soil, sending seeds everywhere. Grey squirrels are a real problem in London.”

For more pictures of Dom’s London garden, check out his Flickr page.

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