Laura! I LOVE being called a Jungle Goddess! If I could reasonable rock a leopard skin toga (faux, of course) I would!

Thanks for the sweet comment, Loree – in upcoming Yucatan posts, we’ll be exploring the agave fields! Now THERE’S something we can sink our spiky teeth into, right? I am planning a small agave farm on the site – I just need to cross my fingers that we can find the different varieties I want!

What a great question, Pam! While getting to know the site, I’ve identified the ‘wet’ areas and the ‘dry’ areas. When raining, the wet sites don’t drain very well and there are loads of jungle tree volunteers – the dry sites are rockier and fairly free of volunteers. I’m planning to allow the wet areas to be more ‘permeable’ – it would be foolish not to plan for the incursions that are definitely going to happen anyway. The dry areas will be where the maintenance can more easily monitor the ‘unwelcome guests’ and remove any unwanted seedlings – these areas will be very open and planted sparely and sculpturally with agaves, cleistocactus, desert euphorbias, plumerias … so the garden is planned around balancing the incursions.
Conceptually, I think this is a really interesting underpinning to a garden in Mexico designed by a gardener from the United States, considering our issues with ‘keeping out the unwanted’. That’s one of the reasons I love working with artists – the layers of thought that go into the work is deep, and even though the result is a visual experience I believe the ideas built in to the process read through. And so fun to ponder!
XOXO!

Chanchow my neighbor! Are you suffering as much as I am? Don’t you wish that clean tropical smell was bottled so that we could get a whiff of something other than smoke? I hope you can breathe! It’s so good to hear from you – we should just stare at the wet Yucatan photos and dream ourselves into a fire-free zone! Be well and STAY INDOORS if you can!

Hey Susan! This is going to be a long process, as you can imagine – but I’ll bet we’ll have cool images of good growth by next year, if we plant in late November. This IS the tropics, afterall! And right now, I’ll take ANY rain – even if it causes a car crash or two (as long as no one is injured, of course!)XOXO!

Tendril, of course you would know the magic of the Yucatan! I think all of that fecundity inspires on so many levels … if I weren’t making a garden in it, I could see being inspired to write a book or make a film; I love it that much. I hope this is the beginning of a long relationship with this amazing part of the world! XO!

Why Thank You for that vote of confidence, Summer! Believe me – I need all the confidence and thumbs ups I can get! by the way, my home garden is getting more eclectic by the minute … I realized that I haven’t posted about the goings on here for a while! Got to do that right away!
I hear you about the hot rain – steam heat! But with the fires burning a few miles away, I think I’d go with the wet heat right now – gimme a monsoon!

Hello Susan! This is SUCH a great opportunity – and the best part is working with people I admire and sharing ideas with them. I am in heaven! To work in such a different climate is always an enormous opportunity for a designer like me, who focuses primarily on plantings, to revel in an entirely new palette. I am learning SO MUCH!

Sarah Dear! You should see MY curly hair when I’m down in Merida – total FRO! I love it … I wish it would get as wild at home!
Thank you thank you for thinking of me! Off I go to pick up my award and to move it forward! You are a DOLL!

Why Wicked! It’s ben a while! I am jealous of myself – I totally get it. But at the same time … it’s HARD! But I’m not complaining! It is a DREAM, which is why I am so happy to be able to bring everyone with me, virtually. Sharing the dream is the ONLY way to go, in my book!

On a side note, Toronto Gardens blog was dubbed in a MeMe award, and we would like to pass the honour on to you. Your assignment, should you choose to accept it, is to visit our blog to retrieve it.

It’s monsoon season here in Houston, too. June and most of July were bone-dry. Uff! I love the rain, I just don’t love that it gets 100F the day after it rains.