We’re back to see the garden that Kathy Sandel designed for her son in Los Angeles. She leaned into the sunny climate and embraced the design of his new home by choosing durable, drought-tolerant, architectural succulents mixed with a variety of other plants to soften and add green to the small space.

This is in the rear garden, with its beautiful paving stones. A purple Alstroemeria (Zones 8–11) adds a pop of color with very long-lasting flowers, and a trio of beautiful glazed containers house orange roses.

An oakleaf hydrangea (Hydrangea quercifolia, Zones 5–9) blooms in a pot. The container and the white wall behind it form a perfect frame to show off the hydrangea like the work of art that it is.

The beautiful aloe in the front of this raised bed looks to be fan aloe (Aloe plicatilis, Zones 10 –11). What an incredible living sculpture!

This ivy-leaved geranium (Pelargonium hybrid, Zones 9–11 or as an annual) is massive. Forms of geraniums such as this grow long, trailing stems, and look so perfect spilling over the edge of a container, raised bed, or window box.

In this corner of the front garden, yellow and orange kangaroo paw (Anigozanthos, Zones 10–11 or as an annual) bloom in front of the privacy hedge.

Silvery succulents cover the ground in a container.

A purple bougainvillea (Bougainvillea hybrid, Zones 10–11) shares a pot with succulents and a purple verbena (Verbena hybrid, Zones 10–11 or as an annual).

Two great succulents grow together in this container—a fan aloe, and at its base Echeveria gibbiflora ‘Caronculata’, which has silvery leaves topped with unusual lumpy growths that give it a very unique appearance.

Have a garden you’d like to share?

Have photos to share? We’d love to see your garden, a particular collection of plants you love, or a wonderful garden you had the chance to visit!

To submit, send 5-10 photos to [email protected] along with some information about the plants in the pictures and where you took the photos. We’d love to hear where you are located, how long you’ve been gardening, successes you are proud of, failures you learned from, hopes for the future, favorite plants, or funny stories from your garden.

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