Capitol Corridor
Capitol Corridor
Capitol Corridor
University of California
Capitol Corridor

Picture It

Gardeners are always finding new ways to spice up the garden. After visiting the San Francisco Garden Show, held in San Mateo, I saw a lot of new ideas about how to reuse materials in the garden.  Succulents seemed to play a big part of the reuse.  At the Sunset venue, I saw this great table made from a recycled wooden pallet.  It had this trough in the middle of the table that was planted with succulents.  Très chic!  Of course there is the ever-popular Succulent Gardens booth with their colorful varieties of succulents.  If you visit this booth, you have to sharpen your elbows and dive in.  Many of the people are fanatics about getting just the right succulent for their home.  Among the other booths, I saw the use of succulents in grapevine wreaths, but what caught my eye was this cute 6”x6” redwood frame of succulents.  I am sure many of you have seen the walls of succulents, and if you haven’t, they are something to behold.  But this small frame really appealed to me, so I thought I would purchase the kit and try it making it at home.  I purchased mine from Succulent Gardens http://sgplants.com/ .  They have several sizes of frames to choose from.  The kit came in the mail with the frame, consisting of recycled old growth redwood, a landscape fabric mesh, and a concrete board backing.  Other items in the kit were the cactus/succulent mix, and of course, the succulents.  On their website, they have a video of how to plant the frame with the soil and succulents.  It’s worth a look.

I worked on my frame yesterday afternoon.  I sat at the kitchen table and separated out the succulents by type.  I then cleaned off the old leaves from each of the succulents.  I then put the soil into the frame and packed it in.  Once that was finished, I carefully placed the succulents onto the face of the frame.  I also incorporated a few succulents I had at home just to make it more interesting.  Since none of the succulents have roots at this point, I could arrange and rearrange the plants to my liking.  What is going to be hard is the long wait until the succulents’ root-that will take about 6-12 weeks.  After that, I can water the frame and hang it up.  I will keep you posted on the frames progress.

Empty frame. (photos by Jennifer Baumbach)
Empty frame. (photos by Jennifer Baumbach)

Loose succulents before cleaning.
Loose succulents before cleaning.

One cleaned succulent.
One cleaned succulent.

The finished picture frame of succulents.
The finished picture frame of succulents.

Posted on Monday, April 30, 2012 at 11:44 AM
Tags: plant frames (1), recycle (4), reuse (3), succulents (14)

Comments:

1.
So cute!

Posted by Karen Metz on April 30, 2012 at 8:19 PM

2.
Great artsy addition to one's garden. Gorgeous colors. And it's as cute as a bug (natural enemy category, of course)!

Posted by Launa Herrmann on May 1, 2012 at 1:57 PM

3.
That is gorgeous! Good job!

Posted by Donna Seslar on May 5, 2012 at 7:45 AM

4.
Nifty! Important point you made. I wouldn't have thought to wait to hang it until they rooted though, I probably would've tried to hang it and ended up picking al the little "babies" off the deck. :)

Posted by Patricia on May 5, 2012 at 8:03 PM

5.
Love it, love it! I'm fascinated with the architectural look of similiar succulents planted in mass! Keep us posted as it matures!

Posted by Sharon Rico on May 7, 2012 at 4:31 PM

6.
So clever, Jennifer! And a great way to thin out some of my leggy and ever-expanding succulents! I'll be following this project!

Posted by Martha Grimson on May 8, 2012 at 3:40 PM

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