As a wildlife gardener, I feel at home with plantings that mimic natural landscapes, include a diversity of plants (often native, but not always), and provide microhabitats for all sorts of critters.
But I also love vegetable and herb gardens and their promise of productivity as well as beauty.
Eclectic and whimsical landscapes are also fun; they always seem to reflect the gardener, whether s/he is someone that I ever meet or not. Artists have especially interesting landscapes, if they're interested in using plants as part of their palette.
What's missing in so many commercial and public landscapes is any sort of expression of what the landscape is about; there's no sense of place or personality, but simply an assortment of extremely tough plants arranged in unimaginative designs.
Hooray for gardeners like this one, who have taken a conventional landscape and made it their own!Click on the photo and take a closer look: notice the carved wooden black bear to the right of the fountain.
