Terraced Rock Garden

How to create a distinctive and artistic floral design that mimics a multidimensional rock-wall garden, in miniature.

Floral design, photos, video and text by Donald Yim, AIFD, CFD, PFCI

Smithers-Oasis Design Director

Sponsored by Smithers-Oasis North America

The inspiration for this design, created by Vancouver, B.C. Canada-based floral artist and Smithers-Oasis Design Director Donald Yim,AIFD, CFD, PFCI, is a terraced rock-wall garden. Yim chose OASIS^® Midnight Floral Foam to create the effect of multidimensional rock walls, and he arranged all of the botanicals, at staggered heights, into water tubes placed among the rows of black floral-foam “rocks.” The botanicals’ colors are warm, vibrant and happy, their brightness popping against the dark terraced “rock walls.”

STEP BY STEP

Step 1

Place one brick of dry OASIS^® Midnight Floral Foam into an ECOssentials^™ Rectangle Planter.

Step 2

Cut a second brick of dry OASIS^® Midnight Floral Foam into thin squares (12 to 15), of varying sizes. Insert a wood pick into the center of one edge of each square.

Step 3

Insert the wood pick in each floral-foam square into the floral foam in the container, to create a multiheight, multidimensional series of “walls.” Leave space between the “back wall” of floral-foam squares and the more forward “walls,” to accommodate the placement of water tubes.

Step 4

Insert eight to 10 4-inch water tubes vertically into the floral foam in the container, in front of the “back wall” of floral-foam squares.

OPTIONAL: Dip the rounded ends of the water tubes into hot-melt (pan) glue, if desired, to make them more secure.

Step 5

Fill the water tubes with properly proportioned flower nutrient solution.

Step 6

Arrange small, short sprigs of seeded Eucalyptus low into several of the water tubes.

Step 7

Arrange stems of billy buttons, spray roses, miniature Gerbera and Ranunculus into the water tubes at approximately the same height, just above the sprigs of seeded Eucalyptus. Then arrange stems of chamomile daisies slightly higher than the other botanicals. The overall effect should be that of a terraced rock-wall garden.