Welcome to Christie’s Fine Gardening Designs!
Premier Virginia Garden Design & Landscape Maintenance Services
After 30 years of delivering excellent service Christie has semi retired to now do consultations, design drawings and teaching of different skills and subject matters at various locations.
Garden Design
Christie’s objective is to design, install, and maintain the perfect landscape garden for you. Christie uses garden design plans as a blueprint to develop your luxury garden. Read more about the design process . . .
Christie is certified as a landscape designer by the Virginia Society of Landscape Designers.
On Site Consultations
For this service we walk your yard and look at maintenance needs or options for refurbishing different areas and /or future possibilities for plantings and hardscape.
Cost $250 per hour or any part of first hour.
Teaching
Christie has had different requests to teach at different site and locations.
She has taught 2 classes at Lewis Ginter Botanical Gardens in 2023, namely ” All About Perennials” and will teach a new class of “Flowering Shrubs and Small Trees” this March 2024.
She also offers private hands on teaching, “Hands -on Pruning of Flowering Shrubs and Perennials “ for individuals, groups or landscaping company staff.
Find out how your yard can be turned into a luxury garden and outdoor room
Christie’s Garden Design & Landscape Maintenance Projects . . .
Pursuing a Dream
For the past 15 years I have been writing blogs and newsletters about gardening in Virginia. I have loved sharing what I know about being a home gardener after operating Christie’s Fine Gardening for 30 years.
A Surprising Revelation: Trees vs. Meadows for Carbon Absorption
For more than a century America’s the US Forest Service and the majority of conservationists have embraced the idea that conservation is about the planting of trees to help reduce the amount of carbon in the air. In the Biden administration alone, there was a program to plant 1 billion trees in the US.
Tree Favorites with Beautiful Fall Colors: New Hybridized Options for Smaller Spaces
This past month was a testimony to perfect weather creating brilliant leaf color in the fall. What if you could take those big tree favorites in a smaller more columnar version? Hybridizing a plant is when you cross pollinate different parent trees to combine desirable traits in characteristics like tree size or disease resistance. Hybridizing is such a huge practice among nurseries that smaller trees are easier to come by.
Crusher Run Gravel: An Affordable and Good Looking Stone Alternative for Garden Hardscapes
In this time of financial insecurity, there are options to get the walkway or patio you want with some labor and minimal expense for the materials. Crusher run is a compactable, mixed sized crushed stone product that includes stone dust making it a stable and durable base for driveways, patios and walkways. It provides excellent drainage and prevents settling. It comes in gray, bluish gray, blue green, tan, brown, red and even purple.
Ideas for Changing Out Pots: Winter Plants that Work Better than Others
One of the toughest tasks for me each fall was changing out pots from summer annuals, that die when cold weather comes, to hardy plants with color. Most of us prefer to plant now for container plants that will last til the last freeze date in April. This is a challenge for you, the gardener, and your pocketbook.
The Perennial Lobelia: For That Damp and Shady Space That Has No Fall Color
In my travels as a camper in Vermont, there was trip a where experienced usually older campers, also know as ‘trippers’ were ‘invited’ to go on Long Trip. Each year the route of the trip was different depending on the weather and strengths of campers involved.
A Little Bit of This and Little Bit of That for Autumn Gardeners
A Little Bit of This and a Little Bit of That for Autumn Gardeners. Here are a few tidbits of information that might help you maintain your garden this season.
Public Pollinator Gardens are Springing up in Urban Settings: Let’s Look at a Few
Did you know that 1 out of every 3 bites of food you eat is present because of pollinators? This statistic alone should make all of us hungry Americans realize the importance of pollinator gardens and why they are being marketed in the country as important.
Another Gift From Mother Earth: The Healing Benefits of “Grounding”
Oftentimes when even complete strangers learn I am a gardener, the conversation leads to them telling me how much better they feel after putting their hands in the dirt while gardening. Most of us would also agree that putting our feet in the sand at the beach
Old Fashioned Garden Principles …and a Few New Ones
I used to refer to late August as the ‘calm before the storm’ in gardening. Once Labor Day comes it is a mad dash for us all to aerate lawns, reseed lawns, plant new beds, move old plants, put beds ‘to sleep’ and more.
The Joy of Zinnias: How to Grow Them…Successfully
Every time I go to the nursery in the spring, I slowly pass the zinnia section and try to decide whether I want to chance buying zinnias, and potting them up for my back terrace. Every single year they have gotten powdery mildew, withered, slowly died or just looked ugly after a few weeks.
The Invasive Plant List- Some Additions that May Surprise You
Every once and a while my husband hands me an article from the New York Times or Washington Post that has great ideas for my blog. The one he most recently pointed out, however, made me grimace and feel a twinge of guilt.