More new plants

Here are some featured items that we have new in the garden right now:



Chocolate cosmos - always a favorite, great color, a fun, low growing perennial. Lots of blooms!



Hollyhocks are always a favorite! We have them in color packs right now: pink, yellow, and the awesome black!



Million Bells provide great perennial color to pots, borders and hanging baskets. These things are almost always blooming!



These nasturtiums are very cool - a red flower, and darker colored leaf than you normally see. They are displayed here next to some very cool new echeveria we got in that are just about to bloom!



Duranta Geisha Girl is another favorite - we are big fans of Duranta in general, and this particular variety has a stunning bloom to it!



Cordyline Ruby - SUCH cool red/pink color! This is a must have!



We are down to our last few Brugsmania - don't worry, we will get more soon! - but the white bloom on this is truly stunning! Pictured in the background is Imperata Red Baron, one of our all time favorite ornamental grasses!

Come in and see us soon! We have all sorts of fun stuff available to make your summer gardening fun, and we'll be gearing up on our fall inventory real soon as well!

More design work...

I finally uploaded some photos from another recent design project. This residence is in Corona Del Mar; the homeowner, Jenny, is a long time client - we first worked with her sometime back in '03 or '04, we think, but the years get a little blurry!

For Jenny's home, we provide a maintenance, going in about two or three times a year with new, fresh plants, helping with pruning and planting and sprucing things up in general. Her landscape is one that is fairly mature - again, some of the plantings we brought in are six or seven years old now - but a little 'fluff' a few times a year keeps a garden interesting and looking its best.

Jenny's landscape started out very English/traditional cottage when we first planted it. In the years since, we've incorporated more and more drought tolerant succulents, some fun tropical specimens, and a small veggie and herb garden for her four year old son.

These type of landscape projects are always fun for us. It's really rewarding to get to see a garden design mature and age and to be able to maintain and tweak it over time, not to mention the fun in keeping long lasting relationships with clients!

If your yard need a 'fluff' or a makeover, please don't hesitate to contact us. And don't forget, we also have a Garden Design Special this month, so if you have been thinking about recruiting some help planning your garden, now is the time to do it!


Our garden helper Harrison. The garden itself is about twice as old as this four year old!



Front walk way headed to the front door, which is planted with a mix of perennials, succulents, annual color and background height such as phormiums, cestrum and acacia.



Close up of some plantings - echeveria, sedums, euphorbia and a varigated iris in the background.



Another close up: geum, lavender, aeoniums, rosemary, euphorbia and loropetulum all live happily together!



One of my favorite spots in the garden: a semi-shady area where ferns, grasses, anemones and hydrangeas fill up the landscape!

Need some help?

We've been super busy out in the garden lately - it's been a great summer so far! We are excited to offer a design special this month. In addition to having great plants available, Johnnye Merle's also offers some great garden design services. Check out what we have available for this summer...

JOHNNYE MERLE’S
SUMMER DESIGN SPECIAL!
Feeling overwhelmed by all the different cool plants to choose from?

Let us help!

Johnnye Merle’s Gardens is offering a design special this August!



For plant orders of $250 or more, we can do the following:

1. Visit your home/project site to help you design your garden*
2. Select the plants you need for your project and make soil recommendations
3. Sell you our awesome plants at our discounted design rate to save you $
4. Deliver them to your home & set them up exactly where they go
5. You plant them and live happily ever after with an awesome garden**
*limited to a 30 mile radius of Orange; for projects outside of that range, a small fee applies
**or, for an additional cost, we can plant them for you!

Interested?
Working with a garden designer can save you time and money, and help you finally get your dream garden.

We are here to help you, with over ten years of garden design experience and excellent plant knowledge! We can put your project together quickly, are reliable, and focused on helping you create a garden you’ll enjoy!


CONTACT US:
Email Us!
Or call and leave us a message: 562.296.5700

New stuff...

So, we got LOTS of new plants in this Friday. As in, seriously, a LOT. I wasn't in when the trucks arrived late Friday, so you can imagine my surprise (dismay?) when I got the nursery Saturday AM and discovered this waiting for my attention:



All those plants on the ground for as far as the eye can see? All new. Five hours later, I finished pricing and displaying everything...but it was worth the effort, as we have some intensely cool stuff out in our gardens right now. I'll post some specifics later, but trust me, it's well worth your time to pay us a visit soon!

We've been doing a lot of garden design lately too. If you feel overwhelmed about what to get for your garden and how to set it up, shoot us an EMAIL and we can help. We have a special going on this month, for plant orders over $250, we'll come out to your house to see what you need, pick out plants for you, give you a discount on the cost of plants, deliver them, and set them up/place them exactly where they should be planted. You pay for the cost of the (discounted!) plants and take care of planting them, we take care of the design, delivery and placement.

It's the deal of the century! Well, at least the deal of this month...

Echeveria

Echeveria are one of our very favorite plant families here at Johnnye Merles. There are versatile, easy to grow, and look awesome year round and mixed into virtually any garden design style.

They are technically a succulent, though we find them to be much more hardy than the tender succulents you might be familiar with. Native to Mexico through Central American into northwester South America, they seem do do particularly well here in Southern California as well. Cool fact? They were named after an 18th century Mexican botanical artist, Atanasio Echeverría y Godoy. They are low water/drought tolerant plants, making them a perfect choice for your water conscious gardens and pots. Even better though, is that based on our experience, many of them are able to tolerate a certain amount of shade and even some frost, making them even more versatile!

When designing with Echeveria, you have a lot to work with: versatile growing conditions, an amazing array of colors and blooms, and a cool, ‘architectural’ quality to their leaves and structure. I’ve worked them into garden designs of all types, with much success: native/drought tolerant plantings, ‘minimalist’ landscapes using a lot of grasses and succulents, as well as classic cottage and English style gardens. Care is very easy; clean out dead leaves, and I like to prune back the dead stalk once they are done flowering. Even though they are drought tolerant, occasional deep watering and fertilizing will get an even better performance out of them if you are able to do so.

I took a few photos of some of the Echeveria we have in stock right now at Johnnye Merles - check out the variety and diversity of these plants, and of course, be sure to stop in and take one home!


Echeveria Pul-Oliver


Echeveria 'Topsy Turvy’


Echeveria 'Afterglow’


Echeveria 'Shaviana'


Echeveria 'Perle Von Nürnberg’


Echeveria haagai tolimanensis