You know you’re with serious plant people when… (a drive-by garden in Berkeley)

As our group was wrapping up the visit at Ann Nichols’ and getting ready to head to Marcia Donahue’s, there was talk of a drive-by garden we needed to stop and see en route—a garden belonging to someone named Kip. I love everything about this moment. Here we are in a serious power-house garden of renowned and about to head to the garden of an area icon, but wait, “you guys really need to see this garden too!” And they were right…All we saw was the front garden, what you could see from the sidewalk, but man… this is an entirely different level of cramscaping with a color-coordinated house too, wow!
There was not an inch of plantable space that wasn’t filled with a plant (or a rock), it was amazing!
Even the narrow strip between the sidewalk and the driveway was planted. And not just with small plants.
Ditto for the narrow side yard between the driveway and the neighbor’s place.
Looking closer at the plants in that narrow strip of land…I love the striped aloe and that stapelia! I bet it throws out a lot of blooms in season.
A nice tight patch of Deuterocohnia brevifolia at the base of the tree.
And then there’s this! Euphorbia ammak…
More tiny treasures.
Agave ‘Kissho Kan’ (that name might not be right)?
So good!!!

In front of the neighbor’s fence, maybe Kip’s work too?

Looking back towards Kip’s, that’s , Max, and .
I did a little Google Maps sleuthing and I can tell you the house and stairs haven’t always been this color. This scheme so perfectly pops with the plants.

Oh hey, there’s a ginormous cycad in there!

And a big Yucca rostrata too, if I tried to ID the chartreuse pencil-thin plant I’d just be guessing.
Fiery little bromeliads.
And all of this is just right there, smashed up against a busy street.

Agave albopilosa
Another nice chunk of Deuterocohnia brevifolia.

Also via Google Maps I saw a previous fence, wooden, wide slats. This cable version is much better for viewing the plants.

Wow, that was fun!