Kelly D. Norris

08/19/2026

An homage to Eragrostis trichodes (sand lovegrass), approaching the peak of its powers in our August garden. Found across the broader Great Plains on sandy soils derived from our glacial past. Its tendency to seed around is limited to the areas where we have sand and gravel, no doubt thanks to the adjacent limitations of heavy clay. Some individuals remain more upright than others, but this is a small price to pay for its diaphanous presentation. Sharing these to the feed from the story… too good not too!

08/18/2026

An August tableau, nearly the view from the dining room windows. There's something almost universal about the prevalence of yellow and gold flowers in August. When I toured with my book Plants With Style a decade ago, I could ask audiences almost anywhere in North America what color August was and, without fail, get a common answer. The aster family carries the banner for the month: Coreopsis, Helianthus, Rudbeckia, and on and on. Chamaecrista fasciculata (partridge pea) has had a banner year, germinating from the archives of the seed bank, the bounty of which has no memory here. I'm writing about this phenomenon of abundance through the lens of w**ding this month for my newsletter. That and other news are dropping later this week. Sign up at the link in my bio!

ABOUT: Kelly D. Norris is an award-winning plantsman and author based at Three Oaks Garden in Des Moines, Iowa. His studio explores the intersections of people, plants, and place through ecological, site-specific design and art. Kelly’s garden work has been featured in The New York Times, Better Homes and Gardens, Martha Stewart Living, Fine Gardening, Garden Design, and in numerous television, radio, and digital media appearances. His latest book Your Natural Garden debuted in 2025 from Cool Springs Press. Kelly and his team specialize in creating diverse and dynamic gardens that reimagine places for consilient encounters with the natural world. For more information or to discuss a possible commission, please contact via the link in the bio!

08/17/2026

A texturally rich but florally subdued part of the garden right now. As I've prepared my remarks for the Connections through Time symposium this past week, I'm reminded that for all the spectacles the prairie lands can offer, many times of the year are relatively green and textural. We try to celebrate these contrasts as much as we can, with silver and blue tones juxtaposed with greens like those of Yucca 'Excalibur', Juniperus horizontalis 'Hughes', and Lonicera reticulata 'Kintzley's Ghost' shown here.

ABOUT: Kelly D. Norris is an award-winning plantsman and author based at Three Oaks Garden in Des Moines, Iowa. His studio explores the intersections of people, plants, and place through ecological, site-specific design and art. Kelly’s garden work has been featured in The New York Times, Better Homes and Gardens, Martha Stewart Living, Fine Gardening, Garden Design, and in numerous television, radio, and digital media appearances. His latest book Your Natural Garden debuted in 2025 from Cool Springs Press. Kelly and his team specialize in creating diverse and dynamic gardens that reimagine places for consilient encounters with the natural world. For more information or to discuss a possible commission, please contact via the link in the bio!

08/15/2026

Sunrise in last week. The prairie border at peak exuberance, anchored by a generous fountain of Panicum 'Bad Hair Day' (Bad Hair Day switchgrass). We're pleased with the proportions and the overall atmosphere after working through several design challenges in this area over the last few seasons. This was the former location of the deck when I bought the property in 2017. Some of the best soil on the property is here, intermingled with pea gravel of varying depths (left over from the underlayment of the deck). Unexpectedly, we ended up with a new heat pump on this side of the house last fall, which turned out to be a welcome design constraint. We resolved it with the lucky addition of three large Euonymus atropurpureus (eastern wahoo) this spring; treasured gifts. This scaffold added just enough mass to bring the grassier center of the border into sharper focus. We also gained another habitat feature for birdwatching. Each view from the house is carefully considered and framed. Our garden is a creative refuge and studio, but also deeply personal. The pleasures of gardening do not exist separately from the reality that the garden is also deeply connected to the ecology of its place; no dichotomies needed.

ABOUT: Kelly D. Norris is an award-winning plantsman and author based at Three Oaks Garden in Des Moines, Iowa. His studio explores the intersections of people, plants, and place through ecological, site-specific design and art. His latest book Your Natural Garden debuted in 2025 from Cool Springs Press. Kelly and his team specialize in creating diverse and dynamic gardens that reimagine places for consilient encounters with the natural world. For more information or to discuss a possible commission, please contact via the link in the bio!

08/13/2026

Recent inspiration images on the boards, informing current planting design commissions for installation in 2027. Today, the dry prairie vibes of here at feel like a form of escapism (it's been raining since 7 a.m. this morning, and more is in the forecast, including a flooding advisory).

In this view, three species of grasses form the primary matrix along a reclaimed concrete (urbanite) path: Sporobolus compositus (rough dropseed), Eragrostis spectabilis (purple lovegrass), and Muhlenbergia cuspidata (prairie satin grass). The rough dropseed forms patches over time, one of which you can see in the green blur in the back of the photo. In the mid-ground, the fine-textured fountains of the prairie satin grass interrupt droves of Monarda puncata (spotted horsemint). The rose-colored fog of purple lovegrass finds its way into gaps. It does not persist well enough to be a consistent matrix species, but often with enough disturbance, limited competition and appropriate soil texture, can remain part of a planted system for many years.

📸 August 2025

ABOUT: Kelly D. Norris is an award-winning plantsman and author based at Three Oaks Garden in Des Moines, Iowa. His studio explores the intersections of people, plants, and place through ecological, site-specific design and art. Kelly’s garden work has been featured in The New York Times, Better Homes and Gardens, Martha Stewart Living, Fine Gardening, Garden Design, and in numerous television, radio, and digital media appearances. His latest book Your Natural Garden debuted in 2025 from Cool Springs Press. Kelly and his team specialize in creating diverse and dynamic gardens that reimagine places for consilient encounters with the natural world. For more information or to discuss a possible commission, please contact via the link in the bio!

08/11/2026

I don't know why it's never really occurred to me to hang out the second-story windows of our house and photograph the garden, in this case the . But on Sunday evening, with a little help from , I did just that. The garden favors the house and so intimately defines our collective habitat. While this has reached its apex, lush with abundance, it will take a few more months to unwind before frost. While there's plenty in bloom right now, thanks mostly to late summer Asteraceae, the interplay between forms holds my attention the most, as seen when the grasses approach Eutrochium (Joe Pye w**d) and Amsonia (bluestars), for instance.

ABOUT: Kelly D. Norris is an award-winning plantsman and author based at Three Oaks Garden in Des Moines, Iowa. His studio explores the intersections of people, plants, and place through ecological, site-specific design and art. Kelly’s garden work has been featured in The New York Times, Better Homes and Gardens, Martha Stewart Living, Fine Gardening, Garden Design, and in numerous television, radio, and digital media appearances. His latest book Your Natural Garden debuted in 2025 from Cool Springs Press. Kelly and his team specialize in creating diverse and dynamic gardens that reimagine places for consilient encounters with the natural world. For more information or to discuss a possible commission, please contact via the link in the bio!

  “[Norris] makes a compelling case for letting plants lead the way.”—Better Homes and Gardens Explore Kelly's Work    

08/09/2026

Dewy August morning after the rain. Intersections of the ruderal picturesque. Very few combinations are deliberately created or frozen in time here. These images document scenes from the garden in motion and the sundry patterns that occur within the frame of a designed system; sometimes predictable, sometimes serendipitous.

🌱📸 Rudbeckia 'Sweet as Honey' (Sweet as Honey black-eyed Susan), Eragrostis spectabilis (purple lovegrass), Euthamia gymnospermoides (Great Plains goldenrod), Eragrostis trichodes (sand lovegrass), Chamaecrista fasciculata (partridge pea), Agastache scrophulariifolia (purple giant hyssop), Oenothera biennis (evening primrose), etc.

ABOUT: Kelly D. Norris is an award-winning plantsman and author based at Three Oaks Garden in Des Moines, Iowa. His studio explores the intersections of people, plants, and place through ecological, site-specific design and art. Kelly’s garden work has been featured in The New York Times, Better Homes and Gardens, Martha Stewart Living, Fine Gardening, Garden Design, and in numerous television, radio, and digital media appearances. His latest book Your Natural Garden debuted in 2025 from Cool Springs Press. Kelly and his team specialize in creating diverse and dynamic gardens that reimagine places for consilient encounters with the natural world. For more information or to discuss a possible commission, please contact via the link in the bio!

08/07/2026

Portraits of summer. The prairie border has been in development for several seasons, a more composed passage between the house and the larger expanse of the . David McKinney and I are pleased with its development, including the recent addition of Salix ‘Iceberg Alley’ from First Editions Shrubs & Trees.

Portraits of summer. A smattering of August yellows only amplifies the golden hour in this week. Rudbeckia ‘Sweet as Honey’, Helianthus occidentalis, Patrinia monandra and more all at full tilt.

Portraits of summer. Hot corner of the lower garden at the transition of paths and near the property boundary. The Eutrochium maculatum holding forth with Solidago ‘Loysder Crown’ and Rudbeckia triloba ‘Prairie Glow’.

08/03/2026

Despite intense heat and inundating rain this last month, the stormwater basins continue to roar only a year after the installation of our designed plantings and seedings. I love this recent capture from that captures the textural patterns of the various zones weaving together across the basin floor and adjacent slopes.

A few details I'm loving:
🌱the straw-yellow blades of Scirpus pendulus (nodding bulrush), a key matrix species here that weaves through the basin floor as a stitch between zones. The collision of Scirpus with Liatris pycnostachya (prairie blazingstar), just going over here is 🔥.

🌱🌱 The graphite haze just coming into focus from patterned groupings of Panicum virgatum 'Dust in the Wind' (Dust in the Wind switchgrass). The "la grande ligne" (big line/primary pattern organizer) is a sinuous band that runs from the building along the wettest portion of the site, from inflow to outflow drains. As these switchgrass increase with the years they, along with other species, will make this line more legible.

🌱🌱🌱 Hibiscus 'Angel Eyes' from works as a hedge along the apron of the building (top of the photo). Another grouping echoes this idea further into the basin away from the building.

ABOUT: Kelly D. Norris is an award-winning plantsman and author based at Three Oaks Garden in Des Moines, Iowa. His studio explores the intersections of people, plants, and place through ecological, site-specific design and art. For more information or to discuss a possible commission, please contact via the link in the bio!

08/02/2026

The Edible Prairie Oak Park was in fine August form last night. This week we learned that it won an Award of Excellence from the Perennial Plant Association, one of only four given nationally this year. Designed and planted in 2024 (with a shout out to our construction partners Matty and Lexi Young), it’s rapidly maturing into a robust planting that captures the essence of tallgrass prairie through the lens of its culinary properties. You can read more about it on our website (link in bio).

Scroll to the end to see a picture of last night’s dessert course featuring, among others, a mountain mint ice cream made from the Pycnanthemum virginianum (common mountain mint) growing in the garden. A wonderful culinary experience last night in celebration of the all the garden gives us at this time of year.