The No-Apologies Garden
First, artist Barbara Libner cultivated her personal aesthetic. Then she grew the confidence to plant it.
Barbara Libner is an artist who works with plants, color and context. Libner’s background in art history trained her to identify design elements, but she didn’t think of herself as an “actual” artist until she discovered a quote by early 20th century garden writer, Louis Beebe Wilder: “Anyone can be an artist in the garden, without apology or explanation.”
Decades of designing container plantings for Ravenna Gardens have helped Libner define a personal garden aesthetic that prioritizes the shape and form of each plant. She prefers a limited color palette—typically two colors, plus green. “I get really excited about the juxtaposition of one kind of foliage next to another,” she muses.
While a finished container looks complete and lush from the beginning, Libner is learning to cultivate patience in her home garden and has to resist the inclination to constantly rearrange plants and fill in every gap in her developing borders. Recently, Libner spent several years developing what she calls her patio garden, a sunken sitting area surrounded by retaining walls and stairs that she built herself. As the plants mature and settle into their new space, the artful gardener considers the project to be an object lesson in not getting in the way of the plants. “They’ll do lovely, unexpected things if you just let them be,” she says.
Read the entire story in the link below