Quick Takes With: Frances Palmer

Frances Palmer is an art historian who, over the past few decades, has come to make enduring art herself: handmade ceramics that straddle the line between delicate and functional, refined and rustic. Her instant classics are coveted and collected by those in the know (including tastemakers like Martha Stewart and the late Nora Ephron), and they’ve been shown and sold internationally at galleries and exhibitions. But if you take a look at her Instagram page, you’ll find that she has another obsession that may just rival her love for the potter’s wheel: flowers. When she’s not crafting vases, plates, and bowls in her studio (next to her 1860 federal-style house in Weston, Connecticut), she’s likely puttering around her tennis court-turned-flower garden. In fact, her second book, out May 2025, is “dedicated to the subject of flowers in my work,” she tells us.

Today we’re sharing a recent Gardenista Quick Takes with Frances, including the garden books she treasures, go-to Instagram inspiration, and homemade bug spray recipe…. (And if you’re in London, be sure to check out her latest exhibition, Pedestal Considerations, at the Garden Museum from October 8 through December 20).

N.B.: Featured photograph by Paul Lowe; all photography courtesy of Frances Palmer.

Your first garden memory:

Sitting in a dogwood tree at the edge of our yard where I grew up in Morristown, New Jersey. My neighbor grew many roses, but I wasn’t allowed into her garden to see them, so I would sit in the tree and gaze at them from above. I always felt like Rapunzel yearning to get in and smell the buds. In our garden, my mother grew peonies, tomatoes and zinnias, very practical but not as alluring as the forbidden roses.

Garden-related book you return to time and again:

Christopher Lloyd’s In My Garden: The Garden Diaries of Great Dixter and Vita Sackville West’s Some Flowers.

Instagram account that inspires you:

@montgomerphoto; @nicholascullinan; @charlestontrust; @gardenmuseum; @floretflower; @bayntunflowers; @oakspringgardenfoundation.

Describe in three words your garden aesthetic.

Exuberant. Functional. Somewhat chaotic.

Plant that makes you swoon:

So many—fritillaria, tulips, bearded iris, roses, peonies, dahlias.

Plant that makes you want to run the other way:

I can’t think of one. All flowers have something redeeming about them and one must be open to learning what that is. Maybe more commercially produced flowers don’t have as much soul as home- or farm-grown ones?

Favorite go-to plant:

I love bearded iris, roses, tulips, rudbeckias, amaranth, zinnias and dahlias.

Gardening or design trend that needs to go:

I think that people are finally learning to garden without pesticides and how to strive for healthy soil.

Old wives’ tale gardening trick that actually works:

My friend Connie taught me a natural spray for roses and citrus: juice of 2 lemons, 2 tablespoons of potassium, 2 tablespoons of cayenne or cinnamon, 1 liter of water—and spray over the leaves. Good for fungus and bugs.

Hardest gardening lesson you’ve learned:

Every gardening year is different and things can be out of your control. It is most important to be kind to yourself and the flowers and try again the next season.

Favorite gardening hack:

I love to fill in bare spots in the garden with coleus. They spread out quickly and add lots of late season color.

Favorite way to bring the outdoors in.

My pelargoniums, auriculas, and begonias live outside in the summer. In the winter I bring them into the house or keep them in my small greenhouse. These keeps me cheered throughout the darkest winter afternoons.

Every garden needs a…

Some sort of water source, such as a bird bath, fountain, or rill.

Tool you can’t live without:

TABOR TOOLS K7A Straight Pruning Shears with carbon steel blades. Natural sisal binder twine.

Go-to gardening outfit:

Bill’s Workshirt from Gamine Work Wear; blue jeans, usually from JCrew; Italian Garden Clogs in red from Gardenheir.

Favorite nursery, plant shop, or seed company:

Issima Works [Go here for our Quick Takes with founder Taylor Johnston]; The Bunker Farm; Olive Nurseries; Johnny’s Selected Seeds; Floret Flowers; Rare Seeds.

On your wishlist:

A rill or fountain cut into the tennis court surface. Mature quince trees. Deer fence around the fruit orchard.

Not-to-be-missed public garden/park/botanical garden:

In the US, Wave Hill in the Bronx and Oak Spring Garden Foundation in Virginia. In the UK, Rousham House & Garden, Great Dixter, and Charleston Garden.

The REAL reason you garden:

I marvel at the beauty of each flower. I love to be in the garden and listen for the hummingbird’s wings and the bees in the petals. Gardening brings me joy and gratitude. I love to use the flowers with my vases to make photographs.

Thanks so much, Frances! (You can follow her on Instagram @francespalmer.)