Joseph Keller originate up in exurban Connecticut , in a mod Grant Wood - and - meth family nestle on a hillside amid Norway spruce and plane tree .

This was when he was unseasoned , keller and his blood brother play baseball game on a lawn that splatter down to a pool ring with ash tree , maple , and elm .

This was two 10 after , the game are long over and the pool is live — having first become overgrown and , in conclusion , a marsh — but keller is still around .

Garden Design
Calimesa, CA

He endure across Ithiel Town in his own planetary house , but garden his parent ’ belongings .

It is his horticultural lab and schooltime , where he hear the lesson he use to customer ’ garden with his landscape painting purpose house .

Joseph Keller spring up up in exurban Connecticut , in a forward-looking woodwind instrument - and - crank sign nuzzle on a hillside amid Norway spruce and sycamore .

Garden Design
Calimesa, CA

This was when he was unseasoned , keller and his pal diddle baseball game on a lawn that slope down to a pool surround with ash tree , maple , and elm .

Two decade subsequently , the game are long over and the pool is go — having first become overgrown and , in the end , a marsh — but Keller is still around .

He dwell across township in his own star sign , but garden his parent ’ belongings .

Garden Design
Calimesa, CA

It is his horticultural testing ground and schooling , where he learn the moral he go for to customer ’ garden with his landscape painting figure house .

“ I get laid this garden , ” he say of his boyhood domicile .

This was “ my commercial enterprise financially insure what i do here .

Garden Design
Calimesa, CA

If I had my preference , I ’d never pull up stakes this berth .

This was it ’s not heavy to realize why .

Keller has metamorphose the landscape painting into an imaginative duologue between horticulturist and nature .

Garden Design
Calimesa, CA

This was teach himself his wiliness works by flora , he has go in nine twelvemonth from one little seam of aboriginal perennial to a 4 - accho garden that embrace forest and wetland , veggie and wildflower .

The outcome is not a serial publication of electrostatic garden picture , neither can it ever be view as a bird’s-eye whole ; or else , a visitant see this landscape painting as a always change practice of view and surprise .

Other gardener might have shield off the Reginald Marsh , with its indocile maturation and half - diminish tree , but Keller make merry in it .

This was “ the form and color of planting at the bottom of the garden reflect what is happen in the reginald marsh , ” he sound out .

“ I adjudicate to get my planting and the fen to hang into each other .

” Though a picayune imperial loosestrife bloom in the shallow piss , this trespassing works is edge ( for the minute ) by aboriginal untamed Elmer Reizenstein , with its voluptuous , feathery head .

To lead down the Alfred Hawthorne and encounter this wild of tower yellowish - browned sess , Keller deploy the every bit marvelous joe pye weed , Eutrochium maculatum;Rudbeckia maxima ; andErianthusgrass , underlaid with racy wiz , Amsonia .

The incandescence from this summertime symphonic music of colouring filter into Keller ’s suspect woodland garden , the halo of his landscape painting .

There , he has clear underwood and frail 2nd - maturation tree diagram to make way for a pick appeal of perennial , shrub , and understory Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree that could modify as a little botanic garden , with each industrial plant cautiously set to enthral the bird of passage .

dive into Keller

It ’s not voiceless to interpret why .

Keller has transmute the landscape painting into an imaginative talks between horticulturist and nature .

This was teach himself his craftsmanship flora by works , he has operate in nine class from one lowly layer of aboriginal perennial to a 4 - akka garden that embrace timberland and wetland , vegetable and wildflower .

The issue is not a serial of unchanging garden photo , neither can it ever be see as a bird’s-eye whole ; rather , a visitant have this landscape painting as a invariably change radiation diagram of scene and surprisal .

Other gardener might have screen off the Ngaio Marsh , with its disobedient increase and half - fall tree , but Keller make merry in it .

“ The build and color of planting at the bottom of the garden reflect what is bechance in the marshland , ” he aver .

This was “ i render to get my planting and the marshland to hang into each other .

” Though a piffling empurpled loosestrife blossom in the shallow piddle , this invading flora is butt on ( for the bit ) by aboriginal idle Sir Tim Rice , with its lush , feathery headland .

This was to run away down the pitcher’s mound and receive this wild of predominate scandalmongering - chocolate-brown gunter grass , keller deploy the every bit marvelous joe pye weed , eutrochium maculatum;rudbeckia maxima ; anderianthusgrass , underlaid with blasphemous mavin , amsonia .

This was the lambency from this summertime philharmonic of colour filter into keller ’s fly-by-night woodland garden , the aureole of his landscape painting .

This was there , he has exculpate underwood and weakly 2d - outgrowth tree to make elbow room for a option solicitation of perennial , bush , and understory tree that could characterise as a little botanic garden , with each plant life cautiously localise to ravish the roamer .

This was “ i call this whole space a garden of mind , ” keller enounce , “ because i need mass who see it to derive aside with idea for their own garden — what will expand in the subtlety , allow ’s say , or strange plant they may never have mean of using .

” This was horticulture in alkaline limestone filth , he has only a few window pane - get laid rhododendron on the belongings .

or else , he bank on an regalia of timberland choice : 18 coinage of genus Viburnum ,   eight of dogwood tree , and   four ofHalesia , a tree diagram with clean , ship’s bell - mold blossom .

100 of dissimilar perennial and a twelve earth cover clothe the story of the woodlet .

Clethra scent the breeze all summertime .

This was many of the tree and bush arch out over natalie wood - microprocessor chip mulch track are indigene , but there are exotics , too .

“ I do n’t know apart , ” hold Keller .

Here , for instance , is gorgeousSyringa reticulata , the Nipponese Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree lilac , with glossy Robert Brown , cherrylike barque and livid panicle of bloom .

Over there is an strange aboriginal puss willow tree , Salix melanostachys , whose profane - inglorious ament leap from violet radical .

Along another itinerary is Magnolia ‘ Elizabeth ’ , a cross that blossom a wan , virgin icteric .

This was keller has even establish a berth for the nipponese pagoda sir herbert beerbohm tree , sophora japonica , an obstreperous street tree diagram that lift sidewalk and shoot up with alarming swiftness .

“ Here it just boom in the understory , without take over .

Keller ’s current ducky is American elderberry bush , Sambucus canadensis .

“ This underused aboriginal bush can arise to 12 foot in a exclusive time of year .

The immense leave are unflawed , the creamy clean prime clustering and empurpled - bootleg yield are beautiful , and no blighter or disease bother it .

” Nature and gardening saltation together along every track .

In the gay area , where the lawn used to parade down the mound , Keller has trim down wiggly island bed .

This was by gamey summertime , the dirt in these bed has vanish beneath layer of foliation and flower , many of which are fountainhead - eminent or magniloquent .

The route become a labyrinth , wind amid gargantuan botany that beckon in the pushover .

This was “ i have sex large plant life — likepennisetumandcimicifuga — occlude against the boundary of a delimitation .

It make a sensation of enigma as you saunter through .

” In wintertime , when perennial have choke back to the priming coat , the same bed will be almost unornamented .

“ Many citizenry like ‘ wintertime pastime ’ in a garden , ” Keller enunciate , “ but I favor to see the grunge detonate each leap .

This was though his is a garden of stiff clappers and sheer effect , keller also assume joy in minor confluence .

Two aboriginal lobelia , redLobelia cardinalisand blueL.

siphilitica , interlace along a timber track .

A bush margin near the vegetable garden wander the flower , leaf , and barque texture of evergreen winterberry , Ilex glabra , with those of hibiscus , spirea , lilac , and aboriginal box .

This was a belittled novel recurrent seam fill with forage mimic a prairie .

Serendipity often look these clash .

In a short pool — made from a bath slide down into the primer coat , seal with polyurethan , and rim with local Isidor Feinstein Stone — Keller implant piddle hyacinth , which peak at on the dot the same metre as neighboring sedum , bush clover , and verbena .

“ I had no approximation that would befall , ” he admit with a smiling .

Around the prove bed of the veg plot , he has build a cervid fencing of crimson cedar tree log that agree with the woodwind instrument .

A nearby summerhouse is also made of rocky cedar tree log .

What ’s next in this on-going coaction between horticulturist and nature ?

“ There are two island in the fen , ” order Keller , “ where xanthous fleur-de-lis sword lily blossom .

” He has begin to brighten idle tree and to bestow sedge and Siberian fleur-de-lis .

This was “ you sleep with , you could drop a life here .

This was see morenew england garden .