Garden Trends

Forget all those doomsday predictions about 2012. From the garden world's perspective, life will continue to be good – with gardeners saving themselves water, hassles and misspent money. At least that's according to several savvy garden experts and a leading garden trends survey.  
 

Water-wise plants
Most on the minds of green-industry professionals right now are issues surrounding gardening and water, "whether it's the use of water or the cleaning of water," said Sharon Coates, co-owner of Zaretsky and Associates, a landscape design and build firm in Rochester, N.Y.

In light of recent droughts in places like Georgia, Texas and the Carolinas, people are trying to use the water they do have more frugally, she said. "People are making sure they're watering responsibly, choosing plants that aren't water hogs and putting rain sensors on their irrigation systems. They're also making sure the irrigation is monitored so it's not watering the driveway and sidewalk."

Water-wise plants will also make the Mediterranean garden style hot in 2012, said Genevieve Schmidt, a northern coastal California landscape designer and author of the North Coast Gardening blog. Mediterranean landscape design often features open and airy courtyards, light-colored, textured hardscaping such as mosaic walls, gravel beds or unglazed terra cotta pots and low-growing, drought-tolerant plants, hedges, topiary trees and vines (i.e. olive, bay and lemon trees, succulents, lavender, palms, roses and grasses), Schmidt said. "Of course, the vivid colors also help make this a winning style."
 

Flower Carpet Amber

Rain gardens
Also, when it comes to cleaning the water, especially stormwater carrying pollutants like fertilizers and motor oil into local waterways, many people are turning to rain gardens.

"These shallow depressions are filled with deep-rooted plants and grasses — all of them noninvasive, native or locally adapted — that can handle being inundated with water and also don't mind being dry," Coates said.

Many gardeners are catching their own rainwater in rain barrels and cleaning or recycling grey water (wastewater from domestic activities like laundry, dishwashing and bathing). In fact, in many municipalities now, saving water is not only "in," but mandatory.
 

Black and amber
Black and amber shades in plants continue to be a hot color trend, Schmidt said. "People have already been bewitched by the dark drama of black plants, and as they learn to design with them more effectively, they'll only become more popular," she said.

Amber shades are also extremely popular – amber heucheras, the amber Flower Carpet roses and other plants with amber tones are going to be big in nurseries in 2012.
 

Mediterranean garden with water-wise Festival Burgundy cordyline.

Low-risk, high-value plants
Just as consumers are being more careful with their water usage, they're also shopping smarter. In particular, they're looking for low-risk, high-value plants that not only look good in the garden center, but have a tried-and-true reputation.

Plants bred to withstand attacks from pests and diseases that are also tolerant of climate and soil extremes provide a better value. Gardeners are more aware than ever that choosing the right plant for the right situation is imperative if you want to help save the planet — let alone your bank balance.

For as little as $15 to $25, for instance, you can have long-term color without a lot of expense by using continuously flowering shrubs like Flower Carpet roses, hydrangeas, potentilla and spirea.
 

Seasonal interest
In colder areas, where the blooms are gone and deciduous leaves have fallen, Coates is seeing more people keep their ornamental grasses instead of cutting them back, so they can provide winter interest. For the same reason, they're looking for plants with winter berries, evergreens, barks of different colors and textures or deciduous trees and shrubs with dramatic forms. But they're also adding plants that change with the seasons, offering new interest with each.

Customers have grown tired of the stark, all-season gardens that were so fashionable a decade ago. Every garden needs its backbone of plants that look great year round, but that doesn't have to be at the expense of seasonal interest and color.
 

Espalier tree

Gardening up
Vertical gardening is also on the rise, as documented in the new, popular book Garden Up! Smart Vertical Gardening for Small and Large Spaces by California garden designers Susan Morrison and Rebecca Sweet. The practice of growing plants up from the ground instead of out, or of planting them off the ground to start with—on trellises, arbors, balconies and walls—has become especially popular among those with small spaces, landscape eyesores or an awkward "skinny spot" in their garden.

But Coates also notes the growth of a different kind of "gardening up" with green roofs.

"Green roofs have definitely seen more of a commercial application and have been done in mostly urban areas, but they're still a huge trend," Coates said. "Green roofs help save on heating and cooling costs and actually protect the roof underneath from the degrading effects of the elements, so cities have received tax incentives for green roof installations."

Some cities, like Toronto and Chicago, are starting to require green roofs on some new buildings, based on the square footage.

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