And the Color of the Year Is.........No Color

Hello everyone. It ended up being a little longer than I wanted between newsletters. I had a bit more traveling to do and honestly it was a blah stretch in the garden, so the inspiration just was not there. Then I took a trip to California and the gardening bug came back to life with little sunshine and warm ocean air.

You have to love Southern California. Dead of December and they are pulling lemons off trees to drop straight into a Corona. There is a reason why our $500,000 home in the Midwest is $5.4 million in Southern California. While we are shoveling a foot of wet snow and watching the plow push it right back into the driveway, there is a gardener in La Jolla making a lemonade shakeup with fruit picked five minutes earlier. Then again, you can buy a heck of a lot of lemonade shakeups for the 5 million dollar difference. Add in that it took me 35 minutes to drive 6 miles and I will continue to vacation there and live in the Midwest. But I certainly can see why people love it there. It truly is wonderful weather.

As a houseplant lover, it was a good reminder that all of our houseplants are outdoor plants somewhere. The tiny succulents we keep on windowsills can be massive, beautiful landscape plants in warmer climates. Today I will share some of those and see if you recognize a few.

Throw Out the Color Wheel

I have been to a few talks where the speaker is a specialist in garden design. Not a landscape architect exactly, but a color specialist who really knows their plants. I will be honest, I absolutely hate the color wheel in the garden.

I have never once had someone walk into a flower garden and say, “I love the spacing and height layout, but the color combinations are bad.” Obviously, people have personal likes and dislikes when it comes to color. I always asked customers if there were colors they loved or colors they hated. That I understand. Those are personal choices.

Where I lose patience is when someone tells me what colors I like, what I do not like, or what supposedly goes together. If I do not like it, then it does not go together. If I love it, then it goes with everything. For me, color is 100 percent personal preference. There is no right or wrong.

What is right or wrong is plant selection. The plant has to be in the right light, with the right spacing, in the right zone, at the right mature size, with the right bloom timing, and the correct height for the space. Get those wrong, and no color combination is going to save you.

Color, to me, is the backdrop. A white flower against a white house disappears. Heavy variegation against a white house does the same thing. Too much of the same color gets boring fast. But telling me mauve does not go with yellow? Nah. It goes. You just do not like it 😃

Color of the Year?

With that, I was curious. I had heard they pick a “Color of the Year,” which makes me laugh. What does that even mean? Who gets to choose that? Plant of the Year confuses me too. Of all the plants in the world, how do they narrow it down?

Is it a group of plant lovers sitting around, looking at what they have a ton of extra of in the greenhouses and deciding to move that next year by making it the plant? Or maybe some breeder pays them to choose that one. It all seems so random.

Color has to be even worse. Pantone is the most famous company that designates a Color of the Year every year, so I checked to see what it was.

White? You’re telling me of the millions of colors in the world they chose WHITE. Officially it’s not white it’s “Cloud Dancer” which according to Pantone is


“serene, airy, and ethereal off-white neutral that provides a calming, blank canvas for creativity, symbolizing a break from digital noise and a search for quiet reflection, versatility, and a fresh start in design, fashion, and interiors, though it's a departure from bolder choices, sparking debate about its subtlety”

So yeah, white. They aren’t wrong. It goes with everything and it’s a blank canvas. Next time someone asks me for a garden design, I’ll be the Color Wheel Guy.

“Hey, you know what? Let’s go crazy. Let’s use the hottest new Color of the Year in the garden and design around that. It’s called Cloud Dancer, and it will let your neighbors know you need a break from all the digital noise and AI and are starting life and your garden, with a blank canvas.”

“By the way, that’ll be $250 an hour.”

I’m also going to start making up colors like the Color Wheel people.

Customer: “Hey, I love that blue Platycodon you put in the design.”

Me: “Thank you, but it’s not blue. It’s Antelope Breath. It’s a shade of blue that exudes the freedom of a wild animal that has foraged on berries all day. Glad you like it.”

Houseplants for Us, Landscaping for Others

These are all pictures I took while walking around La Jolla, California, and I noticed so many plants in the yard, which are tiny little succulents and houseplants around the nursery and in my home. See if you recognize any of them

This first one is ‘Fire Sticks” or Euphorbia tirucalli. This is the plant we tell people to wear gloves with. It’s toxic and can cause permanent eye damage if you get the sap in your eyes. Yet it’s a beautiful plant in the garden. I’d just be a little careful when trimming it up.

Speaking of poisonous. This is an amazing Brugsmansia or Angel’s Trumpet. Stunning specimen, but every single part of this is toxic. So many people at the nursery would remind me of this when we sold them in 3-gallon pots. They may go crazy if they see this as the anchor in the garden. And yes, they had a dog walking in the yard

This is most people’s dream. A Meyer Lemon stocked full a fruit in the front yard. Not going to lie, I wanted to grab a few and bring them home. They seemed to have plenty, but not sure of the etiquette in California. I imagine it’s the same “don’t steal people’s fruit off their trees” rule that most people follow. Which reminds me of this sign. I don’t want to be a proplifter for any of these plants

I saw a ton of Foxtail Ferns, which actually isn’t a fern but a member of the Asparagus fern. The reason they use it in the landscape is the same reason we like it as a houseplant. Extremely drought-tolerant and requires no maintenance.

This isn’t a plant but a stunning wall design. Given that it was on a 10 million dollar home, I feel like it’s an expensive wall,but I still want it. I noticed that it is pretty common in the older Southern California homes since the stones are native to the area. The craftsmanship and pattern make it a true work of art

Look at this Bougainvillea. I can only imagine how long it took to grow this. It’s been there so long they poured the sidewalk around it. Even with that, it’s thriving and like the wall has become a work of art. Obviously, the homeowner is dedicated to keeping it trimmed and maintained as it’s now the personality of the home.

Want to see what it would look like if we planted our entire succulent collection outside? This house is pretty much it.

And finally, this Trumpet Vine or Pyrostegia venusta. An absolute show stopper. This thing will take over the entire property and eat the home if you don’t keep it trimmed but they seem to do a great job. In the Midwest, we don’t have anything that blooms this much and year-round. At the same time, we get a break with winter, which allows us to regroup and get things trimmed up. In these climates, nothing stops growing and grows much faster. Fortunately for every Trumpet Vine is a zero-maintenance succulent you can plant and forget, other than watching the size

As always, thank you all for reading my little newsletter. I’m going to write another one before the New Year, but until then, I’d like to wish you all a Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays. I’m hoping you get the Felco pruners and gift certificates to the local garden center you asked Santa for. My gift to you was a little humor and some fun in the garden.

-Shane