10 more Northwest indispensables to plant

SYLVIA MATLOCK has a keen eye for plants and a sophisticated way with color. So I couldn't wait to see the list of plants she calls her must-haves.

Matlock is proprietress of DIG Floral & Garden on Vashon Island, known for its stylish succulents, grasses and gabion walls. The home garden she shares with husband Ross Johnson is an eclectic mix of unusual potted treasures and workhorse shrubs and perennials. So it's no surprise that Matlock's indispensables are practical with a pronounced edge of cool.

Matlock doesn't grow typical anything, which includes her basil (Ocimum 'African Blue'), a shrubby, clove-scented herb that billows out of giant containers in fragrant waves. Unlike Italian basil, it's sufficiently cold-resistant to thrive in our tepid summers. The taste is pungent, and the flowers are pink and deep purple.

"You can only observe so many explosions of color before it becomes overwrought and numbing to your senses," says Matlock, explaining why Pacific Coast iris cultivars made her list. While these pretty little natives, with textural evergreen foliage, come in a wide variety of colors, the hues are subtle and blend into the garden rather than popping like a cartoon.

Matlock calls Papaver rupifragrum a "landscape poppy" because it tolerates shade and doesn't go dormant in summer like most poppies. Its feathery foliage is evergreen, and the delicate-looking, double tangerine flowers keep blooming until first frost. This airy little flower gently weaves its way through companions like euphorbia, hellebores and sedum.

I first saw this contorted little plant at DIG Floral & Garden, and promptly carried one home, where it's lived happily in a pot for years (never mind that it's hard to tell if these shrubs are alive or dead). Corokia cotoneaster (aka wire netting shrub) is a tough, architectural plant with a skeletal appearance and tiny yellow flowers in springtime.

"I chose this bulb for its relationship to other plants in the garden, not just for a sugary high," says Matlock. In a world of showboat lilies, the soft pink, nodding lily (Lilium cernuum ) offers outstanding beauty if you look closely. This Korean native grows only a few feet high, requires good drainage and threads itself softly through the landscape rather than dominating it.

How about a slim evergreen with fragrant flowers in winter? Matlock says that if you can only grow one tree, Azara microphylla 'Variegata' is it. The flowers smell like vanilla, the tree's shape is narrow and easy to slip into even the smallest spaces, and the creamy, variegated leaves reflect the light to brighten the garden.

"Truly a native superhero" is how Matlock describes the chartreuse version of the humble piggy-back plant. Tolmiea menziesii 'Taff's Gold' has soft leaves mottled in golden green. It grows happily in the dry shade beneath fir trees and lightens dark corners of the garden where few other plants survive. It's an adaptable little ground cover, looking equally at home draping down the sides of a hanging pot.

Mahonia nervosa is a drought-tolerant native that Matlock uses to good effect in her island garden. "Not too tall, not too short, this perfect evergreen plant fills a much needed void between tall trees and ground covers," says Matlock. The blue-green leaves play off hardy fuchsias in her garden, while providing food and shelter for birds and bugs.

A succulent that takes sun or shade, Sedum palmeri grows into a fat rosette atop a stalk. It looks almost like a tender echeveria, yet it's hardy and doesn't die over the winter like that cravable beauty. Matlock contours the ground with S. palmeri, planting enough so that it pools out like waves. Like all sedums, it's drought-tolerant, but grows more luxuriantly with a little fertilizer and water.

Arctostaphylos densiflora 'Howard McMinn' is a mid-sized manzanita. This sturdy evergreen shrub has showy, reddish bark and delicate pink-tinged flowers. "This is a shrub with the charisma of a tree," declares Matlock, who describes its mature form as reminiscent of an elegantly aged bonsai.

Valerie Easton is a Seattle freelance writer and author of "The New Low-Maintenance Garden." Check out her blog at www.valeaston.com. Whitney Stensrud is art director for graphics of The Seattle Times.