The planter boxes along Chicago’s Michigan Avenue are famous, and deservedly so. New York City can’t begin to compete. The last time I was there, the wide space going down the middle of Park Avenue was a monoculture of some red annuals. Really? Can’t they do better than that?

San Francisco is no better. Of course you can grow plants there year-round and something is always in bloom, but they have no rollicking plantings of shrubs, trees, perennials, grasses and annuals marching down the center of their main thoroughfare, let alone 60-plus miles of planter boxes throughout the city.

Chicago should be proud.

But so should Oak Park. This summer I have often driven down Lake Street and have been oh-so-impressed by their large concrete rectangular boxes that line the street on both sides. Rather than going for perennials, Oak Park went with a collection of low-growing colorful annuals jam-packed together to create a tapestry effect and neat as all get out. It was hard to keep my eyes on the street sometimes.

Photo: Patsy McEnroe

Photo: Jerry Milewski

After a series of phone calls, I finally tracked down the responsible party—Pat Zubak, the executive director of downtown Oak Park. And from her I learned that the actual design and planting had been done by American Gardens, a landscape architecture firm in Elmhurst. Kudos to everyone involved. This is a fine piece of work.

—Carolyn Ulrich