Love it. What a beautiful collects of dwarves. arggggg!

I've seen Dave in action. He's amazing!

Rocks look great. Thanks for reminding me, I need to plant more rocks and thunbergii. I hope to visit some day.

I've been to the Oregon Garden last Fall and enjoyed it very much.
In my opinion, the rock arrangement is not so great.
Mike

Wait till the plants are in and grow around/over the rocks.

The thing with rocks is you just can't set them on the ground They need to be tilted ,recessed in the ground and flow in some general pattern.

It appears the front end loader operator was in charge of the large rock placement. Not only do they show no natural formation with flow in their placement, very few are right side up, and none look like they belong. They are too disjointed and don't show a 'guiding hand'.
The edging rocks look totally contrived and should be removed entirely. They remind me of a 'pond necklace'. That's a ring of rocks placed around a pond by beginners to hide the liner. They don't belong.
I expect more in a garden constructed by professionals.
Mike...calling it as I see it.

This conifer garden was designed, paid for and constructed by volunteers, who have also been responsible for tending it. If you look at the bed behind the new one, you will see that the rocks do not dominate once the plants have taken hold. If you haven't visited the Oregon Gardens' conifer collection, I heartily recommend it. The Oregon Garden conifer collection

I spent most of the day there last Fall and enjoyed it very much. My hats off to the volunteers, but somebody should be in charge that understands rock placement. Volunteers explains a lot. I've dealt with them a time or two. The more involved, the more difficult it becomes.
The volunteers are probably serious plant people, but not very good at designing and positioning rocks. They're out of their element. It shows. The island doesn't even look like the rest of the islands, and stands out like a sore thumb.
Is it too late to have it corrected?
Mike....in the spirit of constructive criticism.

Mike, I'm on site at Oregon garden at this very moment. I recommend before doling out hate, collect more information. The rock work you see is just provisional placement. They still need to be leveled and buried. The one guy (volunteer) who's doing the work is quite the artist at this stuff. Once I get home I'll post pictures of some of his finished work. He's excellent. I recommend you take a hard look at your attitude when you wonder why so many of the leaders in the field have abandoned this forum.

the leaders in the field have abandoned this forum. The birdwatching forum, antiques & collectables, mid-atlantic, professionals, have all slowed to a crawl. There is no one single reason for this, people find other ways to chat, some don't like the switch to houzz, etc. I think miketann's observations are reasonable.

I appreciate your humbleness. Well done.

Here's what I did with one of my conifer rock gardens using quarried basalt.
Mike
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I have to agree with Mike, rocks need to be rearranged. The only rock that looks like it belongs is the biggest one on the far right. And I don't think that he is being hateful in any way. The rock placement is very important part of the garden, and something that is very difficult to correct later. Look at his work - he obviously knows what he is talking about - it looks like a natural outcropping, all rock strata are parallel, all rocks are right side up, no "tombstones", no rock necklaces etc. It just feels right. Constructive criticism is not hate. I heard that some forums employ robots that dole out praise to everyone. They are very well liked by human posters ;)

I agree completely with the comments on the rock island. Contrived, amateurish, not a good job. I hear Farrar squirming in his Burmese grave.

I agree completely with the comments on the rock island. Contrived, amateurish, not a good job. I hear Farrar squirming in his Burmese grave.

With a divine rockscape like that Mike you are entitled to give constructive critisism! Your rocks look exactly like you travelled back a few hundred million years and selected an area complete!

Thank you for the compliments.

I'm all for The Oregon Garden and it's goals of promoting Oregon grown nursery stock. I just don't want to have it embarrass itself. So far, I don't have a problem with it, but this new bed doesn't cut it as far as the pictures we've seen. I realize the rocks were not in their final position, but should be in place by now.

Sometimes rocks are placed randomly in the design as if they were plants. Rocks are not plants. Rocks come first and plants are designed second. The rocks should never look disjointed and out of place as if dropped from the sky. Rocks come up from below and should stand out as if it were an outcropping on a headland, especially with dwarf conifers. It's a matter of scale and understanding geology.

Mike

Here's a style of conifer/rock gardening that I think very few other than Jerry Morris would be able to pull off. He's discovered and propagated numerous forms of western conifers, but he also appears to have collected rocks! These photos were taken in July 2010.

This garden appears as a tapestry of conifers and rocks of various colors and textures. I think it works because the conifers are of similar scale and shape and so are the rocks, so nothing seems jarring in such a densly packed backyard. And the vignettes are very carefully and artistically composed.

Mike is so right about looking at nature and especially at rock outcroppings for inspiration and direction in building a garden. However, the Jerry Morris garden seams to be inspired by rocks on the surface such as in fellfields, where nature appears more chaotic. But the elements of this garden are not so disjoint that I cannot imagine them co-existing, although in a less dense population.

Here's a couple more images. What do you think, Wabi Sabi or not?