Today’s photos come from Criss in northeastern Ohio, whose garden we have seen before (Criss’s Ohio Garden).

This and the next two pictures are in the west yard. I have two separate yards to garden in; the west yard is a deep and wide space, whereas the east is long and narrow. This picture is behind the house, and the fenced-in area here has a pond in the middle of it. I have ‘Endless Summer’ hydrangeas (Hydrangea macrophylla ‘Endless Summer’, Zones 5–9) and hostas (Hosta hybrids, Zones 3–8) and coneflowers (Echinacea purpurea, Zones 4–9), and the tall yellow flowers are cup plants (Silphium perfoliatum, Zones 4–8). If you look toward the back you can see the old outhouse that is original to the property. There are woods behind all the gardens in this west yard.

The log cabin is from the 1830s and is attached to the house. We acquired it in northern North Carolina in 1995. There are lots of ‘Endless Summer’ hydrangeas and some daylilies (Hemerocallis hybrids, Zones 4–9) behind it.

This bed in the west yard is one of the longest beds I have, but it’s hidden, so it can’t be seen until you come right up upon it. A secret little alcove with an old stone trough with a spirea (Spirea japonica, Zones 4–8) hangs over it. The tree above is a tricolored beech (Fagus sylvatica ‘Tricolor’, Zones 4–7). In front are some roses (Rosa hybrid) and lambs’ ears (Stachys byzantina, Zones 4–8). If you look to the far right you will see the red flowers of a Carolina allspice bush (Calycanthus floridus, Zones 4–9).

This is what you first see as you walk into the east yard under an arbor. There is a bench with a walkway going to it. The bushes above the bench are winterberries (Ilex verticillata, Zones 3–9), so they give the illusion of an arbor, and there is a very tall smoke tree (Cotinus coggygria, Zones 4–8) to the right. The walkway is a stone circle with several grinding stones placed here and there.

This is an area I’ve been reworking. It is part of the greenhouse bed. I put in the stone circle and made the fence gate, and this year I added the fencing on the sides of it. There are a table and chairs under the arbor.

This gate opens to the back of the garage, which is an old farm building. This area is new. This has been an existing garden bed that winds all the way around the greenhouse in the front and down around the old corn crib. I wanted to change it up, so I added some stone and put in two standard dapple willows (Salix integra ‘Hakuro-nishiki’, Zones 5–7), chartreuse Aralia ‘Sun King’ (Zones 3–9) chartreuse bushes, and some hydrangeas.

This is in the big garden by the greenhouse. It is a bishop’s hat finial that stood atop an old railroad crossing post. My brother gave this to me, and I had two stone pillars given to me, so I put this finial on one of them. It makes a really nice feature in the garden.

Here is part of the vegetable garden showing two 8-foot raised beds on each side of the arbor, which is made with locust tree branches. There is wattle fencing around the four outer gardens, which I put away every fall.

The fenced area behind the veggie garden

I put in this triangle star design and added a topiary garden last year. I had the weeping spruce (Picea abies ‘Pendula’, Zones 3–7) already, so I worked around it. I will keep the new shrubs trimmed as topiaries.

This is the middle of my west yard, a garden area I installed in 2006. The round cobblestone circle leads to a fenced area. Outside the fence are Japanese maples (Acer palmatum, Zones 5–9), and there is a long winding garden to the left of the fence. I bring the two pots of rosemary on each side of the gate in the house every winter. Inside the fence is a small pond and lots of herbs.

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