So even the though the SF garden show was a few weeks ago, I wanted to talk about it.

After visiting the show last year, I decided that the SF garden show would be an annual pilgrimage. Much to my dismay I heard the same rumor that many of you heard… “this would be the last year for the show”. That was the nail in the coffin, and even though I have an 8 month pregnant wife, priorities are priorities, right?

On the way up we needed to swing by Jennifer Asher’s home to drop off the beautiful sculptures we used in our display at the San Diego garden show. Her home was only 15 minutes away from Venice Beaches’ Big Red Sun. Big Red Sun is a boutique nursery and mecca for anyone interested in how landscape design can be integrated into just about any other design discipline. They truly have a unique style and cult following. The flagship Big Red Sun is located in Austin (our mid-west sister-city in my humble opinion) and is renowned for some of the most inovative landscapes, event styles, vignettes, and custom potted creations. Zach and I spent over an hour poking around, snapping photos, bugging the designers with inane questions, and generally soaking in the inspiration. Visit Big Red Sun, you won’t be disappointed.

found materials, plants, melaleuca bark, yarn, drift wood

After the SF show, which was somewhat dissapointing for several reasons, we visited another boutiqe style nursery, Flora Grubb.

Flora Grubb has received a lot of press lately. Mostly for her Tillansdia installation at a Hotel in Yountville, SF (famous for Thomas Keller’s restaraunt French Laundry), But perhaps even more for her succulent wall installations. Using ELT green wall panels, Grubb plants them liberally with an array of echeverias, sedums, and other fleshy succulents. The result is a visual roller coaster. Enjoy.

Flora Grubb's succulent wall art

Colorful chairs against reclaimed barn-wood facade

Tillandsias at the Bardessono in Yountville

I had the opportunity to meet Flora (read: accost) and she did not disappoint. After reading about her nursery and visiting the website I had my hopes up that it would an inspiring place, and it absolutely was. Located in the southern part of the city, Flora Grubb nursery wasn’t hard to find, and in fact sticks out like a small oasis compared to the industrial backdrop and nearby BART terminal. Flora keeps the nursery stocked with “high” quality plant material. She mentioned that if a plant looks slightly less than perfect, its pulled from the shelves and nursed to health somewhere else. This is done to keep the nursery looking perfect, and to validate retail costs of plant material.

But in all honesty, I didn’t come for the plants. I came to be wowed by the little vignettes, the famous “succulent wall”, local art, and to see how this business model works. Flora has created a destination for locals and visitors like me. The nursery has a coffee shop inside, an impressive stock of design books, gift ideas, pottery, and much much more. She allows her employees (all landscapers/designers) to advertise their own services to customers which creates a creative and open atmosphere, almost a collective of sorts. Flora herself only takes on about five or six clients a year. She admitted, “I need to have a connection with them, I need to be in love with the project and the clients… no not clients, they are all friends.” Wow! What a hugely different take on the normal client : designer relationship. I was so inspired by that one statement that I have changed the way I view “potential” clients and the way I view myself as a business owner and designer.

I think sometimes (ok maybe most of the time) its just a business relationship, but I had to admit after hearing her say that, that the projects I’m most proud of are with people I consider friends, not just clients. It was a great experience to say the least and exactly what I needed.