Tag: Cebu

Popping with Color

Featured by Healing Present Nature & Wellness Center, posted in Color Combo & Design, Gardening and Landscape Design, Outdoor Classrooms, Therapeutic Garden, wildlife garden

By Michelle Domocol @inflourish_
Back to Inflourish: Cebu Blog

Budding designers and fellow gardeners often ask me, ‘How do you choose the color scheme or motif of the garden?’. Seasoned designers and avid gardeners have the joyful and sometimes daunting task of infusing their gardens with a cascade of color. A color combination in the garden is powerful. It can make a garden more attractive, uplift your mood or brighten a party’s atmosphere.

The initial phases of my design process prioritize urgent site challenges. For instance, if the client wants me to find solutions for flooding, pests, weeds, challenging soil or disruptive neighbors, I prioritize that first. Once I’ve found potential solutions for those challenges, I move onto questions of architectural form and color. And depending on the client’s style, I then formulate a pleasing and elegant color motif for the plants, outdoor furniture, landscape paths and other associated constructional materials.

But how does this translate to you and your interest in garden color combos? Whether you’re a budding designer or hesitant gardener, here are a few strategies to inspire your color design:

1) Family of Hues. For your own garden, you might have a certain color you prefer. Is it gold, sky blue, chocolate brown, or pink blush? Whatever the color, start a mood board so you can explore. Cut and paste that color from magazines, get color swatches from the home improvement store or go online. Then find plants that match that color. And if you’re open to it, choose plants with tones or shades of related to the color you chose. Then investigate if those plants in your mood board grow in your area. Don’t be distressed if none of those plants in your moodboard are in season. Call your local nursery and ask them for plants with leaves or blooms that match your color preference.

In the end of your design process, the color on your moodboard may not populate the entire garden but it may dictate the feature plants, outdoor furniture, outdoor garden fabrics, or other outdoor elements. Photo 1 shows a moodboard of Reds that I made. This moodboard of red, burgundies, pinks, and maroons gave me direction. It helped me draft a garden room sketch for a restaurant (Photo 1). The client liked bold reds because it evoked romance, celebration and vibrant mood for outdoor parties.

Photo 1. (Top) A moodboard highlighting Red and its related hues, shades and tones. (Bottom) Initial draft of restaurant’s garden room with reds in furniture and plant design.

Photo 2 shows other moodboards from past projects. If you’re interested in my e-book of custom color schemes and moodboards, email ask.inflourish@gmail.com

Photo 2. Mood board samples I created highlighting blues, silvers, and sage tones.

2) Smooth transitions. Another way to approach color design is exploring the connection between your indoor space and the outdoors. If your outdoor entertaining room or garden is right outside your living room, then maybe you want coordinate the colors, fabric patterns and textures. I’m not suggesting you use the same pillows, couches and lamps outdoors. I’m suggesting the outdoor path, pillows, outdoor chairs, plant color or outdoor construction materials can be subtlety influenced by the living room motif. The circles or swatches in Photo 3 include textile patterns that are not the same as the living room. They are inspired or derived from the textiles in the living room.

Photo 3. Living room in Healing Present center influenced fabric and textile choices for outdoor garden furniture.

Maybe you have indoor ceramics or blue-and-white porcelain you’d like to echo outdoors (Photo 4). Pairing indoor and outdoor pottery is a seamless and effective way to create a smooth transition. This mood board can offer direction when selecting outdoor furniture. Remember sometimes selecting elements for an outdoor room can be overwhelming so direction a mood board can really help you commit and narrow your choices.

Photo 4. Indoor porcelain and pottery can inspire your selection of outdoor plant containers.

3) Painterly Gardens. Do you have a favorite painting, photograph or postcard hanging in your house or apartment? Maybe your next color scheme or garden can celebrate this artwork. Focus on some of colors, textures, patterns or even plants (if any) from the painting, photograph or postcard. This may make a great color combo in you future outdoor room.

Photo 5. An old photo of a memorable vacation can initiate a great color scheme in the garden.

4) Naturally Prismatic. Are you captivated by the markings of specific fauna or flora? In Southeast Asia and particularly the Philippines, we are extremely blessed with brilliant multi-colored fauna and flora. Philippine Birds and orchids are world renowned showstoppers with unforgettable color combinations. Below are two samples of Philippines’ natural wonders that could inspire your next flower garden or outdoor furniture motif. Explore our endemic butterflies, marine life, or other species in the Animal and Plant kingdoms. These design activities can be easily incorporated to school garden lessons. The bright or prismatic colors can evoke a dynamic whimsy and playful environment. Plus vibrant flowers from a nature-based motif can attract beneficial insects, butterflies and other pollinators that help your garden flourish.

Photo 6. The amazing parade of colors on a Philippine kingfisher bird.
Photo 7. Another moodboard I created; inspired by the glowing colors of Philippine orchids.

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Raising Blooming Food & Blossoming Students!

Featured by Healing Present Nature & Wellness Center, posted in Gardening and Landscape Design, Outdoor Classrooms, Raised Beds, School Gardens

By Michelle Domocol @inflourish_
Back to Inflourish: Cebu Blog

Young visitors at Healing Present growing herbs in the Edible Buffet garden

In Healing Present’s Edible Buffet garden, children planted herbs, veggies and flowers. This interplanting method was readily used. With this type of planting scheme, you too can build simple and fun children’s gardens. If you’re a teacher in an outdoor classroom, you can have a steady harvest of edible plants for scrumptious meals with garden-based activities. Your classes’ flowers primarily attract beneficial insects that help your veggies and herbs grow. As you learn what grows well in your area, encourage students to experiment every season. Add new varieties. Ask your students to record and journal what plant varieties were bountiful. Your garden can change every season so why not keep it thriving and buzzing with engaged students and blooming food. Below are more tips and insights to building educational and productive raised bed gardens.

When I’m designing and growing raised bed gardens in outdoor classrooms, students love combining flowers and edible crops. Some projects allow a more collaborative garden planning process with students. This is a key teaching method for student involvement and project engagement. When we plan together, we invite inspiration and

  • list down student’s favorite meals,
  • browse through inspiring online art and illustration websites
  • peruse seed catalogs or
  • visit botanical gardens to brainstorm the best and most meaningful plant selection.

In this collaborative, student-centered method, students determine what grows in the garden. They help direct the artistic and scientific investigation in their outdoor classroom. Through their involvement, I want the students to care and feel connected to the garden. As they contribute planning input, they may engage more with fellow students and their lessons. If they grow vegetables and herbs they recognize from their favorite meals and snacks, they may feel more invested.

I also want them to incorporate flowers they remember from past vacations or field trips. Memories of food and exciting field trips reinforce continuity between old and new concepts.

As a teacher and designer, I sometimes wish we could grow and build everything our students want. But that’s not always possible. At best, we can grow a simple cross section of our student’s requests. Thankfully, simplicity can breed focus and innovation.

Many new garden-based teachers ask themselves what grows well together? What plants are easy to grow?

Well there are a multitude of approaches and answers to these questions. One method I favor is organic, chemical-free interplanting. It’s a safe and fun way to interplant a combo of flowers, herbs and vegetables with students.

Some planting combinations our team has planted in the Eastern US, California, and Healing Present:

  • Cluster of large wooden barrels planted with masses of bokchoy and napa cabbage were interplanted with dill. Separate raised beds of sunflowers were installed beside the bok choy and napa cabbage
  • Raised beds with Rows of broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage interplanted with marigolds. At the edge of each row, Queens’s Anne’s lace, lamb’s quarters, golden rod
  • Paths lined with dwarf vegetable varieties; every fourth dwarf bean plant was combined with zinnias and tansies
Photo 1. Raised beds and container gardens in Healing Present

Whether in class or at home, choose a raised bed that suits you or the end user. Be it students, your family, or fellow community members. Match the raised bed to the specific needs of your end users. Who’s primarily gardening in the garden? You? Taller, Adult students? Younger, shorter students? Visitors with specific mobility needs? When you’re planning, take the time to investigate raised bed products or build custom raised beds. In Healing Present, different raised beds and container gardens that serve various visitors, farmers’ needs and the requirements of our clay, rocky soil. Photo 1C shows raised beds that accommodate visitors with wheelchairs and limited mobility in their backs. Photo 2 shows my designs for seated planters. These suit gardeners who’d prefer or need to physically sit while taking care of plants.

Photo 2. Planters and Raised beds with attached seats.

Choose or design raised beds with features that accommodate the height of your students. Photo 3 displays a variety of planting combos and raised bed materials. Photo 3A shows a raised bed with a durable, plastic basket weave frame. Inside, you can plant flowers like Iris and purslane and vegetables like purple camote (sweet potato) and munggos (mung bean).

Photo 3. A) Durable, Outdoor plastic Bed with camote, eggplant, iris and purslane; B) A speckled, concrete raised bed frame with Canna and cosmos flowers interplanted with eggplant and kamatis (tomato); C) A treated hardwood raised bed with yellow and red canna flowers mixed with cabbage varieties (like napa) and bok choy; D) A corrugated aluminum raised bed with blooming coleus and cosmos; alongside delicious basil and radish.
Photo 4. Kale, Bokchoy, and Parsley growing in Healing Present’s Raised Beds

In Photo 1, Healing Present use small containers, coconut shells and green roofs to substitute our site’s ground for naturally rocky and heavy soil. So we can’t directly plant in the ground all the time. Sometimes our vegetables and herbs grow better with lighter soil with less rocks. So we give it to them in containers. In Photo 4A, you can see Healing Present bed frames are made of local fish netting in protective greenhouses. This helps our farmers increase harvest yield, improves the drainage of our rocky soil and protects the bok choy and lettuce from pests and wind. Photo 4B also shows kale thriving in a netting raised bed with lighter soil, vermicasts, and compost. Keep exploring container garden techniques and check out my other guides to container gardens and children’s gardening.

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Towering Pergolas in Children’s Gardens

Featured by Healing Present Nature & Wellness Center, posted in Gardening and Landscape Design, Outdoor Classrooms, Pergola, School Gardens

By Michelle Domocol @inflourish_
Back to Inflourish: Cebu Blog

When I designed a children’s garden for Healing Present and other schools in the Philippines, I needed an special architectural element that would impress students. One structure wowed children: Living Arches. Living arches can be rectangular pergolas, curved arbors, or archways filled with growing vines, ephiphytes, flowers, or edible flora.

Children are awed by towering structures that gently envelop a space. Arches strewn with plants can make a garden entrance, stairway or outdoor path magical. Interactive pergolas and archways can be a delightful design choice. In Healing Present’s, I designed pergolas with edible fruiting vines, berry shrubs and flowers. This design facilitates fun harvesting activities and healthy fruit snacking.

Photo 1. One of the Healing Present pergolas with herbaceous borders along the path.

I made sure the plant varieties for Healing Present’s pergolas produced eye-catching shades of red, pink, orange and yellow petals or fruit. The edible fruits were multiple passionfruit types varying from yellow, purple, red and green hues.

Other seasonal Planting Combinations included:

  • Aromatic Shrubs/Trees: Acerola Berry, Bengal Berry, Cinnamon Tree
  • Fruit Vines: Apple guava passionfruit, Cherry Passionfruit
  • Edible and Medicinal Groundcovers: Cosmos, Mitsuba, Thai basil, Holy basil, Vietnamese coriander, Lemon Grass

Overall a broad biodiversity occupied the pergolas and archways. Some of the pergolas included herbaceous borders (Photo 1) and playground features (Photo 2) beside or underneath the pergola. This gave children a visual and edible feast at their feet and above their heads. The delicious assortment of tastes, sounds, textures, aromas and tasty treats were a sensory treat.

Photo 2. A) Custom-made “monkey bars” B) Custom Slide; C & D) Swinging Rope Bridge

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Gardens in the Sky: Green roof Gardens

Featured by Healing Present Nature & Wellness Center, posted in Gardening and Landscape Design, Green Roofs, Herbs

By Michelle Domocol @inflourish_
Back to Inflourish: Cebu Blog

When Healing Present’s founder and staff asked me to design a green roof project in the Philippines, I was beyond excited. I knew a green roof would long-lasting value to the site’s environment as well as the owners themselves. Designed thoughtfully, a green roof gives people a layer of beautiful plants on their roof. Yes, a green roof can morph a plain roof into marvelous riots of floral color and soft, organic forms.

But beyond a look and feel, green roofs absorb heavy rainfall, reduce flooding, and naturally cool a building.

Plus a green roof is extra real estate! It’s more growing space for herbs, flowers, and vegetables. For Healing Present, it’s also another playground for children. All these benefits attracted Healing Present and other clients to the prospect of a green roof. Since Healing Present is in the middle of tropical, upland area of the Philippines, the plant selection was delectable and vast.

We planted (A) coleus (B) cuban oregano, (C) purple & Italian basil, (D) amaranth, and (E) purslane. A wide selection yields excellent harvests and dynamic, colorful combinations. You can install seasonally, diverse plant combos 2 or 3 times a year for fun.

Plant Mixes for Gardens in the Sky

  • Berries + Bulbs: In tropical areas, heavy duty roofs can handle dwarfed versions of acerola and calamansi (calamondin) trees contrasting tropical bulbs from the lily and onion family.
  • Native Meadow: Choose a mix of meadow flowers and grasses native to your region. In the past, I’ve chosen species that can easily grow in soil 4 to 6 inches deep.
  • Cozy, Happy Edibles: Choose edible dwarf varieties or veggies that can handle crowding and moderate soil depths like such as spinach, lettuce, and radishes. Or try herb mixes with lavenders, oregano, chives and sages.
  • Mediterranean Meadow: In regions outside the tropics, you can still mix dwarf fruit trees, native perennial succulents, flowers and berries. I had a successful design growing in a Mediterranean climate. The middle of the roof was sedum varieties with columbines, yarrows and chamomiles. Then the outer edge of the roof was planted with berry bushes like gooseberry and chokeberry. For our readers in Mediterranean climates, here’s a sample green roof concept. This is inspired by my work in the Bay Area (California). See the diagram below.

For readers and Healing Present advocates in the US or in more temperate regions, you may want to consider the following planting combinations listed above. Of course, when you consult or hire a designer the planting combination should match your specific roof angle, roof soil depth and weight capacity.

If you’re interested in gardening outside of Cebu, you may want to check out my posts at my posts at Inflourish: Around the World. There, I post gardening ideas inspired by my work in California, East Coast of US, Belize, Australia and other regions.

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Medicinal and Therapeutic Gardens

Featured by Healing Present Nature & Wellness Center, posted in Food Garden, Gardening and Landscape Design, Therapeutic Garden

By Michelle Domocol @inflourish_
Back to Inflourish: Cebu Blog

One of my first major landscape design requests was for Healing Present’s Yoga Area.

Photo 1. Healing Present’s Yoga Garden

Healing Present has many themed gardens and forest patches designated for past retreat activities. One of my first major landscape design requests was Healing Present’s Yoga Area. The Yoga Area’s landscape was a vibrant and unique outdoor garden around of Healing Present’s two-storey retreat house. After a collaborative and thoughtful design process, I proposed a calming design theme, outdoor furniture, plant selection, pergolas and other features. As requested by Healing Present’s founder, my proposals celebrated local medicinal and therapeutic plants.

Most groundcovers and shrubs I chose were ingredients from Healing Present’s menus or their health products. The proposed trees attracted local songbirds, butterflies and other beneficial wildlife. Many of the plants exuded a modest or calming aroma for visitors to enjoy. Photo 1A to 1C shows the selection of medicinal and edible plants that thrilled visitors during Healing Present’s organic product demos and botanical tours.

Photo 2. Healing Present’s Yoga garden seating was my custom design; grown with lemongrass and citronella to repel mosquitoes.

This is all well and good. Hooray for Healing Present. But the reality is Healing Present is closed to the public because of this pandemic. So can we still have a piece of therapeutic paradise close to home?

Potentially, yes! During this pandemic, many of us discovered the safest spot to travel was your backyard or a space near your home. So how do we transform a safe space into a therapeutic sanctuary? Let’s brainstorm. First, your sanctuary should be a reflection of your preferred method of relaxation. Make moodboards to investigate how you want to relax. Look at the sample moodboard.

Your moodboard can be a collection of images that help you organize relaxation ideas, color motifs, garden architecture, comfy furniture, natural flooring and other elements you envision. Make multiple moodboards to help you refine your ideas.

How do you relax, de-stress, or rejuvenate? Breathing exercises? Do you relax with yoga? Reading? Arts and crafts? Aroma therapy? Cooking? Sleeping? Then build a garden that accommodates your specific technique and enjoyment. For instance, if you enjoy naps, then maybe incorporate a hammock or cabana with flowing fabrics and mosquito nets. Or add tall hedges that act as sound barriers. If you like cooking, incorporate a simple kitchen garden with your favorite herbs. Or a firepit where you can cook or grill.

Photo 3. A Powerful Vista in Healing Present. Sometimes creating a meditative space starts with site observation.

Design ideas to create your own sanctuary or healing outdoor space:

Create A Powerful Vista. Is there are view around your house or apartment you love? Is there vista you could create with a new balcony, a renovated deck or a tree house? Observe your surroundings from different areas of your house. Change your normal eye level by using a ladder around your house. You might discover an amazingly peaceful view.

Revisit an abandoned space. Sometimes there are abandoned or neglected spaces that can transform into sanctuaries. I’ve seen this makeover happen with apartment rooftops, community gardens, or a backyard. A meditation garden in a community space or residential backyard does not have to be huge. You can create a humble, small-scale retreat to suit your preferences. With the right seating, platform and plants you can make a space of recovery and stress relief. Though the example (Photo 4) has in-ground plants, you can easily build a peaceful container garden instead. Use cheap pots, re-use buckets or buy fancy ceramic planters from a flea market. Tall or short. Just choose plants and garden elements that will make you relax. This is a time to cater to your needs. This could mean comfortable seating or tall container gardens so you don’t have to bend and strain your back. Or maybe relaxing means designing a more minimalist garden. You can choose a small amount of large, low-maintenance feature plants. Perhaps a grand agave or dwarf, sprawling fruit tree. Then add pebble or gravel flooring with gorgeous stone statuary. This reduces maintenance, provides calming beauty, and still incorporates therapeutic plants.

Photo 4. Diagram of a small, personalized, and relaxing yoga garden.

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