Container gardening ain’t what it used to be. Time was, you’d buy a few red geraniums, plop them in a pot and call it a day. Or maybe you’d buy pink for a bit of variety.



Today, planting a container is an opportunity to indulge your creative impulses, sort of like interior decorating moved outdoors. Colors, textures, plants of all sorts—tropicals, perennials, conifers, vines and, of course, annuals. The more the merrier.

Of course it helps to know a thing or two, and that’s why we have workshops. On October 1, Mariani Landscape is offering one at its headquarters at 300 Rockland Rd. in Lake Bluff. 9 to 10:30 a.m. Cost is $30 for materials for a15-inch potted garden. Registration required by September 28. Call 847-810-6937 or email ewilberg@marianilandscape.com. Come prepared to get your hands dirty, but then you get to go home while Mariani handles the clean-up. Sounds like a good deal to me.

—Carolyn Ulrich