Fluid Imagination - The Artful Design of Water in the Landscape
Apr 28, 2026
Warren Leach, Landscape Architect
Fluid Imagination - The Artful Design of Water in the Landscape

 

Water adds many enchanting qualities to the garden. Transparent as glass, yet reflective as a mirror, water can magnify a small space or add a visual focus to a large expanse. Depending upon how it is used, water may project many moods - still, gentle, playful, agitated, turbulent or cascading. Its voice ranges from silent pools to roaring cataracts. Warren Leach explores these magical characteristics as well as construction and installation of water features in a diversity of landscape settings and styles.


Warren Leach is a passionate plant collector, nurseryman, horticulturist and landscape designer with a depth of knowledge of all garden plants - both perennial and woody plants and tropical and temperate. Warren is also an admired speaker, writer and educator.

For more than thirty five years, Warren has been creating beautiful landscapes throughout New England as well as making captivating and educational display gardens at Tranquil Lake Nursery in Rehoboth. He is co-owner of this specialty nursery that is a prominent grower of daylilies, iris and distinctive perennials and woody plants.

Warren is an award winning landscape designer, twice receiving the National Landscape Association Regional Certificate of Merit for Residential Landscape Design. Images of his garden design at Brigham Hill Farm in North Grafton, Massachusetts are archived at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.


In 2009, the Rhode Island Nursery and Landscape Association presented him the 1st Place Award for Residential Design and Installation. In 2010, Roger Swain presented Warren and wife Debi Hogan with the Elisabeth and Roger Swain Award for Design and Execution at the Rhode Island Spring Flower and Garden Show. That same year the Massachusetts Horticultural Society honored Warren with a Gold Medal for his horticultural expertise, landscape design as well as years of forcing plants and creating exceptional displays in the New England Spring Flower Show. For six years between 1996 and 2013, Warren and his wife Debi Hogan Chaired the Miniature Gardens Competition in the Flower Show and also created award-winning miniature gardens.

Warren has taught horticulture and landscape design at numerous horticultural institutions throughout the Northeast including: The University of Rhode Island, the Brown University Learning Community, Rhode Island School of Design Continuing Education, the Scott Arboretum of Swarthmore College, the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University, Horticulture Magazine and Radcliffe. He has also offered programs for numerous garden clubs, botanical gardens and professional organizations.

Warren’s book, published by Timber Press, Plants for the Winter Garden, was released on November 5, 2024.   In 2005, it received an Award from the American Horticultural Society.  Articles written by Warren, have been published in Fine Gardening, Horticulture, Green Scene, American Nurseryman and Boston magazines.