Adaptable

From the Chelsea Flower Show to the High Desert, Kate Frey promotes native plants.

by Steve Werblow

Kate Frey has farmed and gardened in nearly every environment imaginable, from the grounds of Fetzer Winery in Hopland, California, to Saudi Arabia and Japan. She brought home a pair of gold medals and a second-place award for her 3 iconoclastic entries at Britain's world-famous Chelsea Flower Show, which she packed with Western wildflowers and crop plants. But wherever she goes and whatever she sows, count on it to be well-adapted to local conditions and local pollinators.

So it comes as little surprise that when Frey and her husband Ben settled in Walla Walla, Washington, in 2020, she quickly got to work getting to know the area's flora. And when she realized there was no local nursery selling native plants, she started one.

The couple's spearmint green home became a showplace and experiment plot for native and pollinator-friendly plants. Blackberries and mint in the backyard were replaced with dogwoods and hyssop, pink monkeyflower, lace cap hydrangea, and more. She planted climbing clematis beside spring-blooming trees and shrubs, creating a second show of color in the same space throughout the summer.

Bee-friendly. Even the alley behind the house is buzzing with insects clamoring for pollen and nectar from sunflowers, foxgloves, Clarkia, and columbine.

Sun or shade, pink, purple, red, or white, Frey's common denominator is making sure her gardens welcome pollinators. As she walks, Frey identifies bees and pollinating flies as readily as she names the scores of plant species and varieties they're visiting.

"The idea is to have a diversity of species for the bees," she says. "You're not sacrificing anything for pollinator plants. We like the same flowers they do."

Frey has never been one to fall for the usual garden show-offs. She launched her career in Fetzer's 6-acre garden, leaning into the Mediterranean climate and moderate rainfall. Something was always in bloom, and she emphasized locally adapted plants, whose grayish foliage was ideal for hot, sunny afternoons.

"I was really trying to show that you don't need to grow English plants or Eastern plants that need a lot of moisture and cool temperatures," Frey says of her 20 years at Fetzer Winery. "I wanted to introduce this gray aesthetic rather than a green, lush aesthetic. That gray foliage, which is so appropriate, can be just as beautiful."

It was there she learned the profound impact of gardens.

"On warm afternoons, the smells of sage and oregano and rosemary were really prevalent," she recalls. "And then there were so many bees and butterflies and hummingbirds, and people would just laugh in delight. So working in a public garden really showed me how gardens can communicate with people, and what an impact they could have in sometimes subtle, sometimes dramatic ways."

Frey developed a honeybee sanctuary called the Melissa Garden—named after the honeybee genus—in Healdsburg, California, and wrote The Bee-Friendly Garden with San Francisco State University professor Gretchen LeBuhn. She also spread the delight by designing gardens for clients around the world.

Above. A bold paint job and carefully selected plants make the Freys' Walla Walla home an eye-catcher. Ladders make whimsical trellises in Frey's garden, where she harvests bulbs and seeds to spread her love of gardening with native and well-adapted plants. Author, columnist, and international gardening celebrity Kate Frey is in high demand as a speaker at garden clubs. Her key message: native and well-adapted plants create vital, inviting habitat for both pollinators and people.

Enriching. Walla Walla is ringed by sagebrush in Eastern Washington. A web of 52 artesian springs provides water from below and the nearby Blue Mountains trap clouds over the area to drop about twice as much rain on Walla Walla than on the surrounding desert. Still, almost none of that rain falls during the long, dry summers, so Frey has to choose her seeds, bulbs, and cuttings very strategically.

She collects some native seed on hikes around the region, careful to only pick up a few seeds from thriving patches and leave plenty to replenish the natural landscape. She orders other seeds from small companies around the region that specialize in native plants. She plants them on a small property a short drive from her house. That second property is packed with flower beds and bursting with color.

She notes that native plants that must struggle to survive in the wild are often vigorous in a well-composted garden.

Frey digs bulbs from her jam-packed lily beds to share with friends and neighbors. She harvests seed for the starts she sells through the popular farm store at Frog Hollow Farm or at plant sales with a native plant group. And she spreads the word further by teaching classes at the local community college, writing gardening columns, and lecturing at garden clubs nationwide.

In short, Kate Frey is an international gardening rock star who uses her microphone to spread her love of well-adapted plants.

"It's my goal to just be an educator, to try to show people these easy ways of gardening and just make it easy, make it enjoyable—show them how to achieve success," she says. ‡