Landscape designer Margaret Swenson enjoys using local plants

CHENEY – Margaret Swenson began her business in 1992 by selling just a few tomatoes. That quickly developed into Swenson’s Gardens and Nursery with a greenhouse and acres of trees for sale.

“I started out just selling some vegetables,” says Swenson. “Then by the end of that year I had gotten in touch with some growers and some nursery people and started buying plants to sell.”

Her first real interest in gardening was in 1961 when she bought her Cheney home. There was no yard, and she wanted at least a small patch of grass in which her children could play. By hauling dirt from the woods and water from a stream, Swenson gradually built up a little grassy area.

“When we bought this place it didn’t have a lawn,” says Swenson. “One day as I was hauling dirt with a bucket the neighbors came by to greet me,” she said. “The next day there was a new wheelbarrow and shovel outside. From that point on I started designing our property and developing gardens, and from that I developed a passion for that kind of thing.”

Swenson never thought of her gardening as a potential business until her children suggested the idea. She took the Master Gardeners program through the Washington State University Extension, studied, and learned through trial and error. There were only the basic elements of landscape design in the Master Gardener program, though. She attributes much of her success to innate talent. Gardening is in her family – her father was an avid gardener, especially of roses, and her grandmother raised orchids.

“I think that probably most of what I know that works comes just from the fact that I have a very artistic family,” Swenson said. “My mother was a prolific artist and my grandmother a concert pianist and gardener. And I’m always learning and I’m always seeing things. I find it exciting to have somebody say ‘Oh, I have this yard and I don’t know what to do with it. It’s nothing but dirt.’ To me that’s exciting. In my head I can just picture these things. That gives me pleasure. But I don’t know that I learned it.”

Swenson buys and sells mostly plants in Zone 4, hardy native plants, though she sometimes she does buy Zone 5 if it’s for a type of microclimate. Some Zone 4 plants include Philadelphus, commonly known as Mock orange, the early blooming serviceberry, and snowberry bushes, which grow well under pines and has white berries all winter.

“Around here I think it’s a good idea to stay with Zone 4 plants,” says Swenson. “A lot of our native plants are good to use because they aren’t so thirsty. You can get by, ration their water a little more than some of these exotic plants that you bring in. They might be the right kind of a zone, but they don’t have that element of drought tolerance that plants indigenous to our area have.”

She occasionally does get special orders of plants she wouldn’t usually buy, such as Elizabeth magnolia, which has yellow flowers and is hardy compared with other magnolias, and Golden Spirit smokebush, a recent introduction from Europe, with drought tolerant, golden leaves. One person wanted a whole hillside of rosemary, which Swenson tried to discourage, as it’s an annual and usually will not last the winter.

For the past three years Swenson has focused more on landscape consultation and design as heavy garden work is getting a bit arduous. After she sees a client’s yard she usually has an initial vision of a plan, sketches it with many adjustments, and then shows her client. She asks them to go through magazines for ideas and themes. Sometimes she does the planting herself with help from her grandchildren. Other times she just places the plants where she thinks they’ll look the best and the client plants.

“I love doing the consultation and I like doing design,” says Swenson. “It’s fun helping people realize what they have in their head but don’t know exactly where to put what. I really enjoy helping give people a place that gives them peace.”