Forsythia (Forsythia x intermedia ‘Lynwood’) is somehow underappreciated and overused. How does that even happen? The first yellow blooms you see in Virginia, often as early as February, are Winter Jasmine (Jasminum nudiflorum). They’re a pale, sort of washed-out yellow.…

I just started planting Ruby Falls redbuds two years ago. We were working on a pond and landscape installation in Sperryville and I needed some special trees. I was walking the wholesale nursery with my sales rep when, in the…

I love Forest Pansy redbuds (Cercis canadensis ‘Forest Pansy’). It’s as if someone was admiring an Eastern redbud and thought “this is a great tree, but you know what would make it better? PURPLE LEAVES BABY!” The leaves are what…

Eastern redbud (Cercis canadensis) is a sign to start getting excited, another winter is ending! My work as a Virginia landscape designer takes me all over Virginia, and I love seeing those flashes of bright pinkish-purple blooms lighting up the…

There are a few trees that most people can readily identify. Birch trees are one, no doubt about it. The graceful, multi-trunk form and light, peeling bark are pretty much iconic. Here in Virginia, the birches that do really well…

Common names for plants are a funny thing. They run the gamut from evocative – Queen Anne’s lace, butterfly weed – to kind of horrifying. Black chokeberry is so named because the fruit is so overwhelmingly bitter and astringent that…