Last year, I had the opportunity to design an exhibit in the Ripley Center, “Design for Small Spaces.” Featuring stumpery, fairy gardens, green walls, terrariums and dish gardens, I hoped to inspire visitors with some ideas they could try at home, even in the smallest of spaces. A favorite component of the exhibit was the fairy garden vignette. With this year’s latest installation, I wanted to delve deeper into the world of miniature gardening.

The new exhibit, “Garden Inspirations,” opened Labor Day weekend in the Ripley Center. Images from the Smithsonian’s Archives of American Gardens were used to inspire five miniature landscapes.  Selecting images from the Archives was no easy task. I spent hours narrowing down options from the thousands available in that repository to find “the perfect five” to miniaturize. In my search, I was looking for images that not only documented a range of gardens, but ones I also felt confident in transforming. Which images had features I could replicate with small plants and miniature furniture and would do well in low-light conditions? Ultimately, I found five images I not only fell in love with, but met those requirements.

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The Rossetti Garden, Fairfield, Conneticut. June 2013. Stacy Bass, photographer. Archives of American Gardens, Garden Club of America Collection (left). “Garden Inspirations” miniature interpretation (right).
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Hicks Garden, Jacksonville, Florida. April 2010. Charles Burlingame, photographer. Archives of American Gardens, Garden Club of America Collection.
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Fifth Season, Barrington, Illinois. June 2007. Eric W. Craig, photographer. Archives of American Gardens, Garden Club of America Collection (left). “Garden Inspirations” miniature interpretation (right).
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The Community Garden, Millburn, New Jersey. July 2012. Lisa Gadsen, photographer. Archives of American Gardens, Garden Club of America Collection.
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The Gardens at Harmony Woods, Mendocino, California. March 2012. Sandy Scott, photographer. Archives of American Gardens, Garden Club of America Collection.

I hope you’ll have a chance to visit “Garden Inspirations” and find inspiration in elements in the pictured gardens for your own plantings, as I did in the miniature displays. What colors, textures, scents, or features might you add to your own garden?

Would you like your garden to inspire other gardeners? Add images and a story about your garden to Community of Gardens, a digital home for sharing and preserving stories of gardens and the gardeners who make them grow. Anyone can add their story, which means that an account of your parents’ backyard wedding, your grandmother’s tomatoes, or your neighborhood’s community garden can become a part of the Smithsonian. Visit communityofgardens.si.edu to get started.

– Alex Thompson, Smithsonian Gardens Horticulturist