A Harmonious Garden Born of Broken Rules; the Bustani Plant Farm Display Garden

I’ve been on a very fortunate streak of seeing many fabulous gardens over the past several years, but in early September I visited the display garden at Bustani Plant Farm in Stillwater, Oklahoma, and, weeks later, I find myself still thinking about it.

Upon first impression, I was struck by its dedication to color. You don’t see that so much these days. In my opinion, this is primarily because of one good reason and also a bad one. The bad reason? It’s not what the cool kids are doing. And why not? Mostly, I think, because of the good reason: it can be a trap. Packing a garden with color artfully is really hard. You see it done poorly more than you see it done well. But at Bustani it is done so tastefully—even parked in the middle of a field as it is—that it looks damn near natural, like it just happened all on its own. And it pulls you toward it. The color, as much of it as there is, is refreshing, like a good gin and tonic. And like a good gin and tonic, it’s also uplifting.

As you enter the garden and start to explore, you begin to realize that this garden is like a spoiled child–it disregards rules without consequence. Makes you question why we have the rules in the first place.  Or why I need to live by them, at least. Take the rock garden, for instance. First, what the hell? A rock garden in Oklahoma? That’s insane! It’s low country. It’s hot and humid. No mounding gem of an alpine with oversized flowers can ever survive that. So, guess what, there are no alpines. Instead, there are a dozen or so individually planted, perfectly sited vinca. That’s right. Off the shelf, branded, trademarked, patented, and available to any suburbanite anywhere in the world vinca.  A vinca masquarading as an alpine. And it works! Mixed in with the vinca, some other common as dirt but perfectly chosen annuals. Some carefully sited, others that had seeded themselves artfully into nooks and crannies and left to grow. You’ll find perennials too and they reveal that this garden belongs to a very knowledgable plantsman with both an open mind and an eye for the exceptional. Plants include roadside weeds, rare Oklahoma natives from unique eocsystems, species from Argentina, and some of the nursery’s own introductions. Added up, this beautiful rock garden is much greater than the sum of its already incredible parts. 

Steve Owens is the visionary behind the rock garden, the other gardens that surround it, and the nursery. He and his wife Ruth (He makes it unique. She keeps it solvent) own Bustani Plant Farm, which as a nursery breaks as many rules as the gardens. Open for several weeks in the spring, and again in the fall, you will find no wall of pesticides, no gazing balls, gnomes, or doodads, no Christmas trees, no pumpkin festivals, not even any woody plants. Nope, besides the display garden, all you’ll see is a modest number of benches holding a carefully curated collection of really cool herbaceous plants. Oh, and hordes of people–most of them devoted, repeat customers from all over Oklahoma and surrounding states–all deep into a feeding frenzy and rapidly filling their carts with one “must have” plant after another. 

I love Steve and Ruth–they are both very nice people and wonderful hosts–but more about the gardens. The rock garden is just one part of it.  There’s also the lovely all-black bed that sits beside it. A string of amazing plants along the fence line and over the arbor, and other beds filled with such similarly odd bedfellows that–in the hands of mere mortals–the whole thing would surely collapse into cacophony. But it doesn’t. It swings. And it sings. It plays like a symphony.

Without a doubt, for your best chance at success, knowing the rules of garden design is crucial. That’s how good gardens are made. But knowing those rules, and when and how to break them, that’s how great gardens are made. That’s where proficiency ends and inspiration begins. So, if you want to be surprised, and amazed, and absolutely inspired, go to Stillwater, Oklahoma. You won’t be disappointed. You will go home with ideas. And a lot of plants. 

*For Steve’s account on how he built his rock garden, see his article in the current issue of the North American Rock Garden Association’s Quarterly.