A new book delves into Walnut Creek’s Ruth Bancroft Garden. (Photo by Caitlin Atkinson)
Leucadendron salignum ‘Winter Red’ surrounded by blooming aloes at Walnut Creek’s Ruth Bancroft Garden. (Photo by Caitlin Atkinson)
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A new book delves into Walnut Creek’s Ruth Bancroft Garden. (Photo by Caitlin Atkinson)
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If you’re one of the many fans of the public Ruth Bancroft Garden in Walnut Creek, you might be interested in a new book inspired by the garden and its pioneering founder, Ruth Bancroft.
“Designing the Lush Dry Garden: Create a Climate-Resilient, Low-Water Paradise” (Timber Press, 2025, $34 to $40) was written by Marin residents Cricket Riley and Kier Holmes and Bay Area resident Alice Kitajima, with photography by California photographer Caitlin Atkinson.
Defined by rich textures and bold and colorful layers, the 3.5-acre Ruth Bancroft Garden features regionally climate-appropriate flowers, shrubs, trees and succulents, including Bancroft’s favorite aloes, agaves, yuccas and echeverias that she collected for more than 60 years.
This book takes Bancroft’s methods and presents them as a guide to designing a dry garden customizable to the homeowner’s or professional’s own vision and offers images of 17 real-life dry gardens as even more inspiration.
It also relies on the years of deep knowledge of the Ruth Bancroft Garden garnered by both Riley, the former head of landscape design services, and Kitajima, the former program director in charge of education. Together, they created the garden’s Dry Garden Design Certificate Program, which teaches participants how to create sustainable, low-water gardens using climate-appropriate plants.
Within the book’s chapters are practical tips on how to choose the right plants for a site, integrate paths and structures in a water-wise design and create low-water container gardens and designs.
To learn more about the Ruth Bancroft Garden, call 925-944-9352 or go to ruthbancroftgarden.org.
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If you have a beautiful or interesting Marin garden or a newly designed Marin home, I’d love to know about it.
Please send an email describing either one (or both), what you love most about it and a photograph or two. I will post the best ones in upcoming columns. Your name will be published and you must be over 18 years old and a Marin resident.
PJ Bremier writes on home, garden, design and entertaining topics every Saturday. She may be contacted at P.O. Box 412, Kentfield 94914, or at pj@pjbremier.com.
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