Research Garden DesignBrowse photos, get design ideas & see the hottest plants
There are place galore where you may send packing off for salvage all the unwanted piece of furniture , clothing , and toys clutter up your attic . But what do you do with the plant that no longer have a place or use in your garden ? At Dead Ends Garden , a quaint garden and landscape gardening marrow in Charlotte , North Carolina , possessor Brandon and Melissa Sleigh have set up a fresh menage for those garden betting odds and ends . dwell by more than 1,000 dissimilar mintage and cultivars collect from far and full , the garden is also home to many rare and strange plant varieties .
What makes Dead Ends Garden most unique are the type of plants that have see a home there , including the rare , the unusual , and the undesirable .
The Sleighs started Dead Ends Garden in 1993 , soon after they meet while work at a local nursery . Almost directly , they began collecting the plants that have become the bones of their garden today . Five eld after , they found the site that these industrial plant now call home — a run - down , century - older farmhouse on almost 4 acres of mixed timber . As the garden develop , the Sleighs applied the lessons they learned from the experience to eventually launch their own landscape gardening business specializing in design and interview . Here , Brandon shares the story about how the garden came about .
“ The Head ” was conceived when Brandon was appear for something to occupy a space in the garden where plant life refused to thrive . Assembled from Harlan Fiske Stone Freemasonry , the piece is a whimsical planter by day and a " wayfinder " at night , when its enormous center light up to illuminate a stone pathway .
The Sleighs like to blend unlike media in their hardscapes , as exemplified by this walk made of bottles , brick , concrete pavers , and embedded light , which light the tendril - alike blueprint at night .
Hardscaping using natural stone yield the garden structure and has transform a boring , flat grade into an undulate landscape .
GD : What were your original ambition for Dead Ends Garden?Sleigh : The plan was to make an representative garden to display our various talents to our clientele and provide a dwelling house for our wide plant collection . We also want a unequaled feel that blended all the different garden discipline and doctrine that influence us . The spring of 2003 was the real beginning for garden construction . Thanks to some help from a booster — and a tiller , shovels , and rip — we were able to transform the flat , boring grad of the front and leave side yard into the undulating landscape painting over the span of just a few days . This grade changing also created the deep soil of our raise bed in these areas , creating good planting conditions for a extensive variety of plant life material . These newly uprise areas were immediately fill up with many of the plant we had been gather up for 10 old age .
Can you tell us the narration behind the garden ’s strange name?It ’s actually word play — wewantto make plant last and thrive . It ’s our intent to get the most out of any situation . We are not flush , so many of our plants were throwaways at death ’s room access , and much of the hardscaping textile were waste and spare from jobs , as well as material demoed to create new landscapes for our clients . Over the class of our gardening career , we have take on many sick plant life from folk in the effort to rehabilitate them , if potential , and to interpret why we succeeded or give out .
The unusual layout of this staircase was intend to make a set of footfall that was less bulky and imposing .
What are some of your guiding principles?We believe in the three universal gas constant ’s : reuse , renew , and recycle . For example , we have walls made from an former sidewalk , and paseo made from mown paver pieces . We also combine plants not unremarkably planted together to display underutilized contrasts in texture , color , and pattern . Our garden blends odd combinations of materials to supply an almost surreal feel . I always attempt to create things I have never examine or come about things from a wholly different view . I also go different media to make greater interest .
Name a few of the most unusual and treasure plants in your collection . We go to all the nursery and garden center we see to rule unusual plants wherever they may be . We haveTaiwania cryptomerioides(Taiwan coffin plant ) , ordinarily list as a Zone 8 and intemperate to find . The flora was likely propagated from a sidelong cutting and grow prostrate for the first 8 yr . It created a leader 3 years ago and now is about 12 groundwork tall . We have a very largeAbies firma(Momi fir ) , more than 22 human foot tall and coning . Most mintage of true fir do ill in our dense soil and hot , humid summer butAbies firmahas given us Raulston ’s idealistic — palms and conifers in the same garden . We also have 40 - plus - yr Hinoki cypresses that are specimens without equal . Each tree takes 3 to 4 hr of heedful pruning 2 or 3 metre a year . ATrichocereus pasacana(a type of cactus from Argentina that grow a lot like a Saguaro ) has thrived in our garden for 10 geezerhood .
You use a lot of natural stone throughout your garden . How do you happen upon the right balance , and what are some of your tip for the creative employment of hardscaping in the landscape?Our garden is domicile to over 180 tons of gem that we have brought in over the last 15 years . Hardscaping put up body structure to the garden . A landscape requires more than just plant to make it double-dyed . Paths run us through the garden and furnish borders for layer of plants . terrace give us a position to roost and contemplate . Striking a balance is difficult . When the Oliver Stone is put in , the plants are little and the stone is overpowering . Patience and allowing the plants to grow provides the desired balance with time .
For more epitome , see apicture tourof Dead Ends Garden .
What were your self-aggrandising challenges in achieving your finish , and how did you persevere?In July of 2000 , our efforts got put on hold for about a year thanks to a painful showdown I had with yellow jackets and a commercial lawn mower . The injury I sustained allow for me unable to walk for a considerable time . This was credibly the most profound acquisition experience of my liveliness . It taught me a modicum of longanimity . I had time to read , say , read , and translate like I had never read before . It also gave me an chance to begin planning .
At the garden ’s attack , our area was under severe weewee restrictions . We harvested all the rainfall water we could . The designing of the garden and beds relied on swale and brook beds to check and convey runoff around the garden to pass out it to the plant in need . Many plants were selected for their miserable water needs . In 2004 , we realized that our plantings on the west side of the house would postulate to be altered on a underlying stage , due to our lack of rainfall and dry dirt . Our experimentation with xeriscapic works evolved quickly into a love involvement that go forward on through today . We found wood lily and cacti to be our friends in those hostile produce conditions that take more than a few of our choice , accumulate plants .
Melissa and Brandon Sleigh , owners of Dead Ends Garden .
When did you lastly plunge your landscape gardening business , and what is your primary feather focus?In July of 2006 , Dead Ends Garden was formally sprung . bombastic companies with big theme and budgets get launched but small companies with short capital letter get sprung , like criminals from jail . We focus our efforts on produce good plant health through fostering grime life and landscape installations that are considerate to the environment around us . I retrieve it odd that so much of the horticulture industry is driven by many old ideas that are not the least turn “ dark-green , ” but that is a depicted object for another clip .
Here are some of Dead Ends Garden ’s Favorite Plants :
