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Plant Life Valerie Easton

Finding Focus

Simple sphere or stand of purple poles, strong visuals put all in perspective

We garden because we adore plants. Yet, a conglomeration of plants does not a good garden make. If your place is looking more like a collection of plants than a purposefully designed space, consider creating a focal point or two. Art, objects, containers or other elements with presence are especially vital this time of year when the herbaceous level of the garden dies down and leaves us looking at . . . not much.

Even when we carefully plot out walls, hedges, fences, pathways and a spot for the garbage cans, we often forget to add visual focus. Such elements need not be expensive, dominating or anything you buy at a store. How about a wall mosaic of old crockery, a bench painted brilliant violet, or a picturesque piece of driftwood that looks as if it just washed up and strategically came to rest among the ferns? An old metal bedstead makes a funky yet practical trellis, those kid-size roller skates look fetching planted full of sedums. Whatever your garden style, focal-point pieces can sharpen and center the space.

For many years, I never looked up long enough from messing about with plants to notice that my garden was an undifferentiated jumble. I learned about the importance of focal points by following photographers around other people's gardens. What so delighted my eye often ended up looking unfocused and unexciting through the camera lens — and even worse when the photos came back. The camera merely helps us see what's really in front of us, which is that all our beloved plants look so much better when their colors and shapes are emphasized with art and architectural elements.

Focal-point pieces can be used to personalize and punctuate a garden, alter the scale, add edginess, color and interest. Best of all, they lead the eye where you want it to go, whether toward something lovely or away from an eyesore. Place a bench or tea table at the end of a long path and you can be sure people will journey all the way to sit for a minute. I was once in an artist's garden where hand-blown torso lights outlining pathways drew attention down so you couldn't help but appreciate the many pretty little specialty plants growing ankle-high around the lights. An attractive screen or fence sidetracks you from paying attention to what it disguises from view.

Pots have strong architectural shapes that can be used to create mood, style and focal points, especially effective when you can restrain from stuffing them with flowers. Left unplanted, there's no need to worry about heavy soil or the need for sun or shade, so you can move the pots to fill in gaps as your garden burgeons and fades. Sleek, stainless-steel or matte-black pots lend a modern vibe, while voluptuous urns with a rough, neutral finish lend a rustic or Asian air. Grouping pots with the same or similar finishes lends even greater impact.

Why is it that spheres always look so great in gardens? Perhaps their full-moon shape is a perfect foil for mostly vertical plant shapes. Old bowling balls can be used to edge beds, and concrete or pottery spheres look fabulous lying around the garden or grouped with containers. New, hollow spheres from Quinterra look like they're made from solid, heavy concrete, but are actually lightweight enough to easily move around the garden or even float in a pond or pool.

The cleverest focal-point scheme I've seen lately was inspired by Dale Chihuly's glass spears. Garden designer Ben Hammontree carves tall, wooden dowels sharp on one end, paints them purple, then sticks them among the billows of cool plants in his tiny Georgetown garden. The forest of purple spears creates a spiky, vertical rhythm through his plant-rich garden. This low-budget take on glass art is so successful it draws the eye from a block away. Now Hammontree is happily building fences and gates out of purple-painted dowels, all to enclose and show off his impressive collection of plants.

Valerie Easton is a Seattle freelance writer and author of "A Pattern Garden." Her e-mail address is valeaston@comcast.net.

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