As a software writer for Fiserv, Shelly Trabuco was happy to be able to work from home for 18 years. When she retired, she didn’t yearn to travel. She just wanted to continue staying home. This was her opportunity to spend more time with her plants.
Shelly isn’t your average gardener. She uses plants in traditional ways in her spacious, sloping yard in Prunedale. But like a topiarist, she thinks a lot about what else a plant can do, and comes up with imaginative solutions.
You’ll see lots of succulents, cacti, air plants and staghorn ferns in her yard — more self-sufficient sorts of plants that don’t require a lot of watering, or, in some cases, even soil. These are the plants that allow her the artistic freedom to create what she calls, “living art.” Strolling through her garden you’ll see them incorporated with salvaged materials like old picture frames, vintage birdcages, discarded shoes and chairs.
Repurposing found materials is one of Shelly’s prime objectives. She turns succulent cuttings into artwork inside up-cycled picture frames. She revitalizes a worn cowboy boot into the perfect receptacle for a beaded succulent aptly called string of pearls. She transforms old chair seats into beds for echeveria and sempervivum.
Even her two greenhouses, built on the hillside above her Prunedale home, make use of salvaged doors and large multi-paned wood-frame windows from Second Change Mercantile in Marina. She designed what she calls her “Mission Prune Tuscany”-style dream greenhouses, with tiled roofs, faux adobe walls, and even a bell tower.
No plant ever had it so good, nurtured in these stylish interiors, featuring ceiling fans, a chandelier, French doors, comfortable chairs and mood lighting. The breezeway between the two small buildings provides shade for air plants, which decorate the wire cage of a vintage metal fan, and staghorn fern pups mounted on slabs of wood. Comfy chairs and tables are included for relaxing and creating.
When I visited Shelly’s garden sanctuary in September, she showed me how to make one of her framed succulent pieces, suitable for hanging on the wall. She likes to use low-growing, easy-care succulents such as hens and chicks, echeveria and sedum, and resin or plaster frames, that won’t rot like wood when the plants are watered. She collects a box-full of tiny cuttings clipped from her yard, then places them one by one into a bed of damp moss and soil—a somewhat random process she refers to as “poke and play.” When the space within the frame has been completely filled up with these colorful, flower-like plants, she keeps them damp and horizontal for a few weeks until established. Then the framed living art is ready to hang on a wall.
Shelly took two first place/best in show ribbons at the Monterey County Fair this year, one her staghorn fern moose head, and another for her double brain cactus which sits atop the hollowed-out head of a classical Greek-style bust; and one of her succulent frames took second place. She was also thrilled to win the grand prize — a special award for Excellence in Horticulture.
Shelly loves to share her ideas and techniques with other plant lovers, and did so at a recent Gardeners’ Club meeting in Aptos. Her blog also features lots of photos and step-by-step tutorials, such as how to make boutonnieres and corsages from succulents and statice that can be replanted afterwards; hangable glass globes with a tiny seaside tableau of air plants (tillandsia), sand and seashells; and cement garden stones with phrases such as “Compost Happens” and “My Happy Place.”
Although most of her plants are drought-tolerant, Shelly uses water wisely, channeling rainwater from the roof of her home into a long row of 50-gallon plastic trash barrels, each one connected to the next with pieces of plastic garden hoses. To avoid over-watering, she uses Blumat self-watering probes that can sense when a plant needs moisture and draw it automatically from a nearby receptacle.
For the “Pivot: the Art of Fashion” runway show coming up Dec. 4 in Santa Cruz, Shelly will debut two his-and-her garments made from living plants. Her island-wear designs are made with epiphytes (air plants and Spanish moss) — plants that acquire water and nutrients from moist air rather than from soil — accented with the large red blooms of earth star bromeliads.
Although native to Central and South America, these three plants adapt well to our moderate coastal climate. Air plants are especially suitable for crafting because they can be attached to many different surfaces such as rocks, seashells, ceramic pottery or untreated wood, using waterproof glue, wire, twist-ties, or fishing line.
For more information about growing and crafting with these adaptable plants, as well as events featuring her living art designs, consult Shelly’s website, nestegggardens.com.
For an archive of Tina Baine columns, go to www.tinabaine.blogspot.com. Contact her through features@santacruzsentinel.com.
