Today, California's California Friendly® is rarely seen
because we have filled our landscape with palm trees, citrus groves and hibiscus, glorying in our ability to create tropical paradises and English gardens. In doing so, we changed the look, the feel, the smell and even the sound of our landscape.
But the California Friendly® Garden does exist, and when we stumble upon one - in a neighbor's yard, a city's demonstration garden or at an institution such as Claremont's Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden - we find that the garden's natural rhythm allows us to step back in time, to find ourselves instantly at home and in harmony with the surrounding environment. It also gives voice to the land, allowing it to speak to us about the region we call home. And in doing so, the California Friendly® Garden helps restore the sense of place too often lost in our urban settings.
The California Friendly® Garden links us to our past, but also offers the path to our future. In this age of water restrictions and our unpredictable weather cycle, reducing outdoor watering is the surest solution. Native and California Friendly® plants accomplishes this without sacrificing beauty.
