Artist and sculptor Marcia Donahue has created a wild and whimsical garden that serves as her own personal paradise. The small back yard of her Berkeley, California, home overflows with a mixture of tropical plants and delightful surprises -- a design that reflects Marcia's artistic nature. In addition to sustaining a splendid variety of plants, Marcia's garden also serves as a gallery for many of her unique stone carvings (figure A), as well as a variety of unusual steel sculptures created by an artist friend (figure B). These elements add eclectic charm to the garden and emphasize its individualistic theme. Among the plants that fill Marcia's garden are passionflower, kiwi, cypress, Italian cypress, Solanum quitoense (a tomato relative from Ecuador) and the Australian grass tree (Xanthorrhoea), which Marcia calls the "star of the garden" for its brilliant-yellow cattail blossoms. Marcia strives to integrate art and nature and says nature is one of her most powerful inspirations as an artist. She also draws inspiration from other cultures. In her garden Marcia has adopted the African "bottle tree" (figure C ) tradition, in which glass bottles are hung from the tips of tree branches. Besides providing beauty and supplying a creative outlet, Marcia's tiny garden holds deep spiritual meaning for her. She says she is able to see things more clearly in her garden, where nature and art combine to create a wonderfully peaceful and tranquil environment.
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