Whole Gardens

Whole Gardens Whole Gardens is a family run landscape design and construction business dedicated to creating easy access to Nature's Beauty.

⁣Do you remember being a young new homeowner? With ambition to do all the things?⁣⁣For Bryanna and Zack, I designed a la...
06/13/2026


Do you remember being a young new homeowner? With ambition to do all the things?⁣

For Bryanna and Zack, I designed a landscape they can implement over time. To prevent burn out, I emphasized plenty of low maintenance natives, and kept the heavier cultivated gardens to a manageable scale. And, of course, no lawn.⁣

This works great with their goals of attracting birds and pollinators while also growing food for themselves.⁣

I’ve met a lot of older clients over the years whose gardens are 100% intensive cultivation with fruit trees, farm scale vegetable beds, high input roses, dahlias, etc. They all say they’re tired and want to know how to make their gardens less work.⁣

Creating good native habitat plantings from the outset benefits your long term gardening energy just as much as it serves the winged and buzzing community. ⁣

More putter, less labor.⁣

Welcome to the Beak and Boca Buffet Garden.⁣


⁣“If you’re quiet, you can hear the buzz,” Marilyn said, leaning in towards me as if to share a secret. ⁣⁣The faint hum ...
06/12/2026


“If you’re quiet, you can hear the buzz,” Marilyn said, leaning in towards me as if to share a secret. ⁣

The faint hum of bees, the louder thrum of hummingbirds, and the wind swishing through grasses animate this garden. ⁣

It’s really come to life in this, it’s third year since installation. What a joy to witness!⁣

⁣Bonnie and I admired it all: an iridescent beetle on the cupped bloom of her Jude the Obscure rose, the tiny blue-polle...
05/31/2026


Bonnie and I admired it all: an iridescent beetle on the cupped bloom of her Jude the Obscure rose, the tiny blue-pollened anthers of the Collomia, a volunteer eryngium, the first yarrows to open—common white and paprika red, the last pacific coast hybrid iris fading, columbines bobbling, smoke bush glowing, baby Oregon white oak dwarfed by the massive cardoon. ⁣

Barry Lopez wrote about how “alertness to minutiae” helps foster hope in the face of despair. ⁣

The garden is like that, right out the door.⁣

⁣Two options for Bryanna and Zack! ⁣⁣Version one has no lawn, keeps the existing fountain where it is, and gets all pais...
05/18/2026


Two options for Bryanna and Zack! ⁣

Version one has no lawn, keeps the existing fountain where it is, and gets all paisley with the mounded veggie beds.⁣

Version two keeps a bit of the existing lawn in front, moves the fountain closer to the patio, and has fun with some Burle Marx inspired veggie beds edged with springbank clover.

They liked some elements of both!⁣

What about you? What would you choose?⁣

⁣I was just going to pop in, but this garden has a way of pulling you in. ⁣⁣
05/12/2026


I was just going to pop in, but this garden has a way of pulling you in. ⁣

⁣For the very kindest people, we renovated two large beds.⁣⁣Now they’re full of flowers for bees and butterflies with co...
04/23/2026


For the very kindest people, we renovated two large beds.⁣

Now they’re full of flowers for bees and butterflies with color throughout the year. ⁣

Welcome to the Wildlife Wow Garden!⁣

Swipe to see the design and a before pic.

⁣Gardening for bees and butterflies can be tricky where deer frequent. Many of our best native plants for pollinators re...
04/10/2026


Gardening for bees and butterflies can be tricky where deer frequent. Many of our best native plants for pollinators read like lunch to them.⁣

When Susie asked for more wildlife and more wow, I put together a plant palette that includes the most deer resistant natives like big leaf lupine and evergreen huckleberry, plus other stalwart bloomers that deer are known to ignore.⁣

Delivering her new plants today, I noticed so much activity on the existing patches of pulmonaria: bumblebees, bee flies, hover flies, butterflies, and even a hummingbird!⁣

Pulmonaria, also known as lungwort, completely belongs in this garden.⁣


⁣Five different friends/clients, native plant enthusiasts all, expressed awe over tulips this week: ⁣⁣the way they open ...
04/05/2026


Five different friends/clients, native plant enthusiasts all, expressed awe over tulips this week: ⁣

the way they open and close as day turns to night, ⁣

how their colors change as they mature, ⁣

the loose allure of the first petal that falls, ⁣

the tulip mania inspiration of wild species tulips,⁣

their essentialness even in a predominantly native garden,⁣

and their rounded fullness mirroring an egg.⁣

Here’s a look at the reliably perennial ‘Apricot Impression’ tulip in Bonnie and Derek’s young Weird Bird Garden. I love them spread across the beds, complimenting rose checkermallow, Western buttercups, red flowering currant, and ‘lipstick’ strawberry. ⁣

What’s your favorite tulip?⁣

⁣Healthy roots grown all winter support satisfyingly lush spring growth.⁣⁣It was just last December when we put the fini...
04/03/2026


Healthy roots grown all winter support satisfyingly lush spring growth.⁣

It was just last December when we put the finishing touches on Thea and Mike’s Peaceful Retreat Garden.⁣

Today I thrilled to see the early blue violet (𝘝𝘪𝘰𝘭𝘢 𝘢𝘥𝘶𝘯𝘤𝘢) in bloom. This is the sole larval host plant the endangered Oregon silverspot butterfly. And a really pretty spring bloomer! ⁣

All the seeds I sowed are rocking and rolling right alongside the nursery grown babies. There’s clarkia, limnanthes, gillia, and plectritis. ⁣

And the crabapple is loaded with flower buds, and, oh the dicentra is blooming, and squeee! So much to see! ⁣

⁣⁣Bent at an unflattering angle to get the blooms backgrounded by the falls, I heard Alder call from the trail above. Hi...
03/12/2026



Bent at an unflattering angle to get the blooms backgrounded by the falls, I heard Alder call from the trail above. His long legs and distance runner’s lungs were constantly carrying him two or three switchbacks ahead of me. Plus, I had to keep stopping to admire the flowers.⁣

Last spring break, my son Alder and I took the Columbia Gorge Express bus from Portland to Multnomah Falls. The trip combined three of our shared loves: public transportation, waterfalls, and wildflowers.⁣


Learn more about the plant-of-the-month on the blog. Link in bio⁣

Address

71 Madison Street
Eugene, OR
97402

Opening Hours

Monday 9am - 5pm
Tuesday 9am - 5pm
Wednesday 9am - 5pm
Thursday 9am - 5pm
Friday 9am - 5pm

Telephone

+15416896545

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