Today’s photos come from Petra Donnelly. Here’s what she has to say:

I live in Markham, Ontario. Approximately 10 years ago I had a vision of a totally grass-free property filled with trees, color, succession of blooms, and variation in heights and texture. It has since become a serene space that not only is welcoming for us but also attractive to pollinators and wildlife. The garden is part sun and part shade and is in Zone 5. It hosts a total of seven trees, various flowering shrubs, and hundreds of perennials. The addition this year of 12 yards of compost along with a reasonable amount of rain, humidity, and sun has made this the best year ever for the garden.

With countless perennials in bloom, and more showing buds full of promise, it looks like Petra has achieved her goal of succession of bloom.

Variation of texture was another part of Petra’s vision. Here you can see she’s achieved that, with the tall, swordlike foliage of iris providing a strong contrast to the rounded forms of flowering perennials.

Did someone say color? WOW! Brilliant daylilies (Hemerocallis hybrid, Zones 4–10) combined with yarrow (Achillea millefolium, Zones 3–9) and bee balm (Monarda sp. Zones 4–9) to light up this part of the garden. Grouping these similarly hued flowers together keeps their intense colors from clashing.

Petra was also looking for variation in heights. Here she’s achieved that by choosing different perennials and even different selections of the same plant. In the front of this image, you can see a tall purple coneflower (Echinacea sp., Zones 4–9) on the left, and a much shorter selection on the right.

This path is all cool blues and purples. The colors of the flowers are echoed by the dark foliage of the forest pansy red bud (Cercis canadensis ‘Forest Pansy’, Zones 5–9) on the right.

Petra’s garden full of blooms. Looks to me like she has turned her vision for the garden into a spectacular reality.

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