We want to change the aesthetic of what we expect to see in a garden photo in summer-dry climates. Beautiful photos of beautiful gardens inspire gardeners to mimic what they see.
Many photos in garden books and magazines are from East Coast and English style gardens, that, while are certainly lovely in those settings, are wrong in more arid and summer-dry climates. Water is especially precious in summer-dry climates, lush images from other climates mislead gardeners to try inappropriate and unsustainable gardens.
We want to inspire gardeners to choose plants that are water wise and garden styles that fit into the habitats and natural beauty nature provides. So here at Summer-Dry we celebrate plants that naturally thrive with less irrigation in the summer and receive most of their water as rain in wet winters.
We don’t like the term drought tolerant since all plants are tolerant of drought in their native habitat and no plant can survive without some water. The art and pleasure of gardening is using the right plant in the right place.
Please use this website as a source for ideas – then go have fun making your own garden.
interested in dry landscape in place of lawn.
Shirley – There are lots of resources (finally) for replacing lawn and many local water agencies have workshops and garden tours for ideas. It is hard to recommend a specific resource for you not knowing where you garden but our Resource page has some links to California agencies and you might also check with your local native plant society. They often sponsor garden tours that feature garden that have replaced lawns with native and other summer-dry plants.
If, by good luck you are in the San Francisco Bay Area, the folks at Bring Back the Natives help sponsor workshops on lawn replacement http://www.bringingbackthenatives.net/spring-2015-workshops