Peg's Garden: TOPIARY SOFA

Custom Search

I have had several requests to add my topiary to my blog, frankly I just forgot...so here it is.

The sofa is shaped from variegated privet, the coffee table is boxwood, the rug in front of the coffee table was gordata, I have since changed it out. Finally in the back of the sofa are two floor lamps shaped from white Rose of Sharon.
The measurements are:

The sofa is 8' wide x 4' 5" tall x 3' 5" deep
The boxwood table is 3' 6" long x 21" wide x 19" tall
The two white Rose of Sharon standard lamps behind the sofa are 6' 6" tall

There have been several articles written about the sofa and my physical limitations. Here are two links to read a little more about the journey.

http://davesgarden.com/guides/articles/view/1980/]and[http://davesgarden.com/guides/articles/view/2018/]

HOW I BUILT THE TOPIARY SOFA

YEAR ONE

This art form is not for people who want instant gratification. It can take years to form a topiary and on going maintenance to keep it shape. I personally put on some kind of music that inspires me or calms me and just enjoy being outside with my birds, cats and butterflies.

It all started with 8 one gallon variegated privet, 6 one gallon boxwood and 2 white Rose of Sharon bushes the neighbor grew from seed which were about one gallon size also.
The privet were planted in two rows off center to ensure they would fill in properly. The six boxwood were planted on center.

The first year is about trimming and pinching. Pinching also called pinching back is the practice of removing the soft growing tips of stems, branches and leaders in order to encourage the sprouting of lateral buds for bushier growth. I used scissors for this as it is just easier and the results are the same. The privet and boxwood were both done this way just to make a dense shrub yet still barely trying to get a basic shape of a sofa and table.

The Rose of Sharon were shaped by selecting a central straight branch known as a central leader. I kept removing any growth from the leader and allowing some growth on top to create the "standard" look. The word standard in topiary is used to describe a plant trained to have a crown of growth atop a single, erect, unbranched stem. This procedure is used from then on to keep the shape of the standard.

I maintain the Rose of Sharon now by selective pruning and pinching the crown. This technique is basically used to keep is round ball shape and keep the size the height I want it to be. To do this you must look at the way each stem is growing, find a growth bud, look at which way the bud is facing. If the bud is facing inward and you want more growth in that direction then you would make your pruning cut just above that bud. It will force the plant to direct the new growth inward. This is the same procedure for all the selective cuts you will make to control size and shape on most topiary. Find the leaf that is facing in the direction you want the plant to grow and cut just above it.

YEAR TWO

You can see that it is taking some shape now. The privet is still sparse so I fertilized it with high nitrogen to give it a boost. This picture was taken in late spring. The boxwood is filling in nicely and at this point I planted some Gordata in front of the boxwood to give the illusion of a throw rug in front of the table. That planting did not work out as the Gordata was really invasive. At first it stayed nice a low and then just became a nuisance and really never did fill in solid like I had imagined. It took two years to completely remove it or try to kill it out. It has underground runners and will just sprout everywhere.

YEAR THREE

The sofa is much thicker at this point but nowhere near where it should be. Notice that I have pillows on each end of the sofa now. I took some chicken wire and formed into the shape of a pillow. I stuffed the pillows tightly with potting soil and moss. I then planted portulaca all around the pillows hoping it would fill in. The pillows are mounted on a metal rebar stake that I stuck in the ground to support them. This trial never worked out either as I could not keep the soil in the pillows no matter how hard I tried. So, I then scrapped that idea and moved on.

YEAR FOUR

Finally, it looks like a sofa, table, floor lamps and a throw rug. I moved on to fabric pillows when people want to view it. I also added props to the coffee table and brought in a sculpture and a iron garden chair.
div style="text-align: left;">
The gordata that I said previously I removed looked its best here and went downhill from there. Oh well another lesson learned!

YEAR FIVE

This was the final product, I was pretty satisfied with it except for the front of the coffee table. I planted Persica in place of the Gordata hoping I could still get something to look good all season long...well it didn't happen. The Persica was sparse and also invasive. I ripped that out this year and planted red begonias in front of the table. I really think white begonias would have looked better but a kink nursery woman gave me a flat, so that is what went in.

On the bottom right, is a newly planted chicken topiary. I started it in a one gallon container and planted it summer of 08'. Its not shown in this pic from spring of 08'.

Well, that's how it was done, now get out there and carpe diem! Put some music on and just do it!

Avid gardener turns to topiary as therapy for her pain

03:22 PM CDT on Wednesday, October 22, 2008

By JESSIE MILLIGAN / Special Contributor to The Dallas Morning News

Topiary may seem an unlikely subject to turn to for physical and emotional therapy, but for a Fort Worth gardener it is her salvation.

Peg Surber combined work and her love of gardening into what seemed an ideal job working at a retail garden center. But she injured her back in 2002 while moving large, heavy containers of plants. "I was moving tree-size pots for two days," she recalls. "On the last tree moved that day I felt pain in my back."

What she didn't know at the time is that she had herniated three disks in her spine and developed blood clots in her leg from bruises sustained while moving the pots. Complications from surgery to remove the clots left her in constant pain.

Physical therapy didn't improve her condition; pain medication seemed the only remedy.

Peg Surber came upon the idea of topiary while browsing through her library of gardening books. "I knew I could do it," she says. "The worst that could happen is that I would have to have something pulled out."

Meanwhile, the ground around her north Fort Worth house was almost barren; she and her husband had moved in after her injury. Although the property's condition weighed on her gardening instincts, Mrs. Surber couldn't move a water hose without hurting. She couldn't dig holes without losing her balance. She could barely hold a coffee cup because of the radiating pain.

But she was determined to garden.

"It makes me feel good," says Mrs. Surber, 56. "Mentally, it takes me to another level."

She had portable speakers set up to pipe classical music into the back yard. She directed her husband where to dig planting holes in the hard-packed clay, which he did willingly despite the need to protect his piano-playing hands. Plants to attract butterflies went in; so did shrubs. She "begged, borrowed and stole" plants, propagated cuttings and rescued nearly dead specimens from trash bins; still unable to work, she has a tiny budget for the garden.

She came upon the idea of topiary while browsing through her library of gardening books.

"I knew I could do it," she says. "The worst that could happen is that I would have to have something pulled out."

A young variegated privet hedge beckoned. She began clipping on it. She could minimize back pain by working on the project standing up or sitting on a stool. She exercised her hands by using the topiary tools. After two years she had accomplished what she set out to do: create a topiary sofa of privet, with the back reaching 48 inches, and a boxwood cocktail table and two white-flowering rose of Sharon standards pruned to resemble torchieres. She sets china cups on the table, and throw pillows grace the sofa, under which turned wood legs have been installed.

"I love it. There are no phones allowed in my garden. I've got my pruners in my hand, and my cats are supervising. It's peaceful," she says.

Her doctor approved. "He knew anything that gets you up and moving and into a better mental state is good," says Mrs. Surber. "A garden is definitely a motivational thing." Over the last two years she completed her certification to become a master gardener, in spite of pain flare-ups and new clots.

She works in spite of the pain, she says, because exercise and the gardening-induced sense of well-being keep her going.

"If I start to hurt I go inside," she says. When she is not in pain, she clips more shrubs. Small topiary bears and roosters are taking shape, and she is planning to create a topiary dinosaur at a children's community garden.

"Topiary helps me focus on what I can do, rather than what I can't do," she says. "The garden has gotten me through all this. It gave me a reason to get up in the morning."

Jessie Milligan is a Fort Worth writer.

Posted on Sat, Sep. 29, 2007

The art of healing

By creating topiary furniture, an injured Saginaw woman restored whimsy to her life. Now she's taking her talent to the Fort Worth Botanic Garden.

By JESSIE MILLIGAN
Star-Telegram Staff Writer
Not every struggling backyard gardener comes up with an idea so creative that they are asked to do a project for the Fort Worth Botanic Garden.
But it happened for Peggy Surber.
Six years ago, Peggy, married for just two days, was working at a large garden center, lifting heavy pots. Three discs in her spine ruptured. A blood clot broke loose. She ended up having heart surgery and back surgeries.
Disabled and in constant pain, Surber felt despair. The pain medication was too strong. Physical therapy wasn't helping.
She knew that to resume life would mean pushing through the pain.
Her main passion, gardening, was the one thing that would get her outside and moving around.
"I've fallen backward so many times," she says. "I've fallen into eggplants; I've fallen out the back door."
She kept getting up.
Peggy and her husband, Ken Surber, moved into a new home in Saginaw a year after she was injured.
The back yard was a blank slate: A few landscape timbers. Rocky soil. Garlic and daylilies struggled along.
Peggy saw a retreat.
Ken got out the shovel. Peggy started looking for plants.
She wanted to create topiary, the patient and peaceful art of training and pruning plants into interesting shapes.
Although many gardeners try their hand at simple round topiary balls, Peggy wanted more. She wanted a tribute to her husband.
"He has been wonderfully supportive," she says.
Ken is the grandson of the man who started Homer O'Neal Furniture, a longtime
Jennings Avenue fixture in Fort Worth until Ken and his brother tried moving the store to Keller in 1999.

The new store closed.
So Peggy hit upon an idea while looking at the back yard.
Topiary furniture.
She planted variegated privet with the intent of growing it and pruning it into a topiary sofa. She put in a boxwood hedge to trim into a coffee table. Rose of Sharon standards were trained to resemble lamps.
The whimsical setting delighted her. She set out pillows on the "sofa" and a tea cup on the "coffee table."
Her happiness started returning.
Some days she'd be strong enough to work in the yard. She'd put on Celtic or classical music to soar through her outdoor speakers.
With the help of her husband she transformed a bed 60 feet long and 30 feet deep. Cypress mulch pathways wind through it. Arbors lead to separate planting beds. Pecan and peach trees give it shade.
Physically, she began to get stronger. The garden work had done what physical therapy and medicines had not.
"This is what calms me down. This is what makes me serene," she says.
Not long ago she sent a picture of her topiary sofa to the Fort Worth Botanic Garden, where she is working toward becoming a volunteer Master Gardener.
Administrators at the garden loved it. They've asked her to create what for her is a dream come true. Peggy is getting started creating topiaries for the entrance to the children's garden. She'll be carving hedges into butterflies, caterpillars and other creatures.
She still feels pain from her disability, but she also feels transported. The joy and whimsy she found in her own garden is about to be shared.
Inexpensive plants
Peggy Surber is creative about acquiring plants. Her tips:
Large garden centers put plants on sale if they are bedraggled or when the season changes. Surber nurses them back to health.
Find a neighbor who likes to garden and trade plants and seeds.
Join Master Gardeners or other gardening clubs and trade plants with members.
Visit the "communities" section of http://www.davesgarden.com/ to trade seeds and plants.
jlmilligan@star-telegram.com

TOPIARY PROJECTS IN THE WORKS

A woman that came to my garden to see my topiary commissioned me to make a topiary for her. She wanted this euonymous shaped into the 80's style rattan fan back chair. Remember those? I think of them and remember seeing Marlon Brando sitting in one.
She wants to able to put a mannikin in the seat and pose it for different occasions. She has a great sense of humor.

The first cutting of this 8' shrub took hours it would have been less time except that there is a hot tub right in front of the shrub. When I made a cut I had to back off to view it. In order to do that I had to go half way around the pool or I would have ended up in the hot tub. In the picture below you can see the stone faced hot tub and its proximity to the shrub.

Its pretty ugly at this point but she understands it will take a couple of years to get it in shape.

The large beautiful round center shrub green Euonymous is shown before cutting.

This is how far back I had to go to view the shrub. You can see the hot tub in front of it. This will be the last cutting for this year as I want the new growth to harden off so the frost won't damage the new growth.

THE DINOSAUR TOPIARY

The Tarrant County Master Gardeners Association has a Community Garden in Fort Worth. Its a great garden with all kinds of great ideas and help with gardening, The Master Gardeners that tend to the space are very dedicated and creative. Knowing that I make topiaries, the Association asked if I could make them a dinosaur for the children's garden section. We mapped out the area, I submitted the above dinosaur rendering and the rest is history. I started the project in February 09'.

The dino when finished will be eight feet high at its head and 5 feet long not including the tail.

This is the first picture of 2010 when it is actually starting to look like something. It took four five gallon variegated privets, one pot for each leg.

PRE-SHAPING~ AUGUST OF 2010

Now with a little shaping you can see it looks a little like some creature with four legs. I had to drive two pieces of rebar in the front legs to stabilize it as it sets on top of a hill with the wind whipping across it. It was constantly crooked because of the wind.