Design - Why bother?

Absolutely everything ‘man made’ that we use in our everyday lives, from knives and forks and tables and chairs, to the cars we drive and the houses we live in, have the origins of their form – the way they look, in their function – the thing they do.

In other words they have been designed to be fit for their purpose.

So why is it that still most of our gardens continue to just muddle along, bits of them occasionally changing piecemeal when the home changes hands and often it seems with very little real thought and consideration.

Take patios as an example. Most builders’ standard layout (sorry builders!) is a  rectangle of slabs along the back wall of the house regardless of its orientation, the material it’s made from or its age and style.

You might end up sitting shivering in the shade if it faces north on paving that looks just like all your neighbours’, it might be a lost opportunity, but at least it’s not a living thing and it won’t die by being in the wrong place.

Plants on the other hand could very well do just that if so little thought is put into their placing. Different plants need different conditions to thrive depending on their species origins. Some need full sun and well drained soil, maybe these came from the Mediterranean region or coastal sandy soils. Some need shade and deep humous rich soil, possibly woodland dwellers and others will need more moisture than the average coming first from the margins of streams and ponds.

Luckily most gardens can supply several conditions so we can accommodate plants with quite a range of different needs. By a north facing wall, instead of that paving , we could have Hosta and ferns, in the drier shade under a hedge or trees, Epimedium and Pulmonaria and on a sunny bank Lavander, Rosemary, Sage and Thyme.

By choosing plants which are best suited to them, we can use the opportunities these conditions give us to make the most of our gardens.

There’s a lot more to planting design than this of course but fundamentally it’s not about the latest plant fashion, at its heart it’s the it’s the combining of the right plants in the right places.

Our gardens are ‘man made’, and just as worthy of being made fit for purpose and designed with as much thought as anything else, so this spring when you go to the garden centre and buy some lovely new plants make sure that you’ve put some thought into the design of your planting first.

Why bother?  Just look at a well designed garden, it really is well worth it.

Measuring the changes in the seasons by breaking shoots and fattening buds is something all gardeners share. It’s the encouragement we need to remain optimistic as the chilly March winds blow . Winter is nearly behind us, spring just round the corner and then it will be summer with all its blissful flowery fullness.

If it stays cold and I need a bit of reassurance, then I go through photographs of gardens I’ve designed. They are usually taken in mid summer, preferably on a good day. After all, as well as a visual record for me, they are my shop window so I like to display the results of my designs at their sunny best.

They also give potential new clients faith and confidence in my abilities, knowing that the beautiful gardens they can see in them have grown and blossomed from the seeds of ideas developed and drawn up as plans.

It’s in this same spirit of confidence and faith in nature that we go out and buy packets of seed. It’s amazing to think that those tiny specks of dust and parcels of genetic material will become flamboyant silky headed poppies, shimmering white saucers of cosmos or sprawling nasturtiums. What incredible reward we get for such little effort and a bag of compost.

When it comes to growing vegetables it’s incredible value for money too. So easy to grow yet expensive to buy, runner beans are an absolute essential for me and one day I’m going to weigh the crop from one bean plant just to calculate the return on my investment in one bean seed.

My dad had even better value for his money, he always saved his bean seeds form one year to the next, driven as much by his ‘careful’ nature as the fashion of the time.

Gardens and plants are as prone to the whims of fashion as anything else we can be convinced to buy, but there’s one at the moment I’m all in favour of.

From the rise in popularity of vegetable growing it seems to be the current one and what a great way to use your patch of land.

Good for the body, good for the soul and good for the environment, as long as you garden organically of course.

It can’t be done with anything other than a spirit of optimism and I can’t think of any better way to prepare yourself and your garden for summer.

Brilliant birds!

This winter my garden has been an absolute delight, there’s been so much to look at I’ve hardly been able to drag myself away from the window. What has kept me there when I should have been doing other things is nothing directly horticultural but much more a result of the prolonged spells of cold weather and my investment in generous offerings of peanuts, bird seed and fat balls!

It’s been just like Autumnwatch, the number and variety of visiting birds over the winter has been exceptional, especially as my garden is on the edge of a housing estate.

For sheer size of wingspan in such an enclosed space the heron made the biggest impression and was the most surprising with a pair of pheasants strutting up the drive a close second.

Less of a surprise but just as welcome have been the passing fieldfares and redwings dropping in and lovely to see that the solitary thrush who’s been around for a while now has a mate and has overcome his shyness enough to hop down out of the tree onto the hanging bird table,

In terms of sheer numbers, the blue tits, great tits, sparrows blackbirds and starlings were the indisputable winners but the goldfinches brought all their relations, encouraged I think by the ‘mixed finch’ seed I splashed out on. This has also been a bit hit with a flock of beautiful apricot coloured bramblings, they first came in ones and twos with a group of chaffinches, then suddenly increased to at least ten, flitting about too much for an accurate count.

With such a number and variety of avian visitors it does seem churlish to complain about species I haven’t seen in my garden but I was very disappointed that the beautiful waxwings which were spotted on Goldwire Lane passed me by. Apparently they are attracted by large numbers of berries and although I can offer them hawthorn, sloe and guelder rose as well as the more exotic Crataegus prunifolia

(a hawthorn relative with marble sized orange berries still hold on in January) they were obviously not impressed.

If only I had a bigger garden I’d plant a rowan tree especially for them.

I’ve found from experience that attracting birds, like any other wildlife can be reasonably straightforward. Provide food, water and cover and if they’re in the area they’ll find the garden, but I have made some mistakes too. In the spring I split and moved a big Miscanthus grass whose seed heads had brought in reed buntings and linnets last winter, but it hated being moved, sulked and refused to flower so not only did I miss its striking winter silhouette, there were no reed buntings or linnets either this year.

Oh well, winter’s nearly over and longer hours of daylight bring the opportunity for more time outside and a bit of a revamp. Another Miscanthus will be top of the list and if only I had room for a rowan… I wonder how well one would grow in a pot!

Happy New Year

January the 1st right in the middle of winter, has always seemed to me to be a very unnatural time to choose for the start of a New Year. Much more in tune with nature’s rhythms is the vernal equinox in mid March, which is where New Year was before the Roman Julian calendar in 46BC. Quite a while ago I know although according to Google we British only really embraced the 1st of January date in 1752, not very long ago at all.
I’m still not convinced though, I’d much rather be able to see more evidence of new growth and renewal along with more clement weather and longer hours of daylight, March would be much better.
But the 1st of January it is and although cold and dark the snowdrops are pushing their pointy noses out of the chilly soil and some of the earlier Hellebore flower heads are full and fat and just about to burst.

One of my favourite cold weather flowers, winter aconites, are ready to pop up and make me smile with their bright sunny cups of flowers sitting just above the soil on their frilly ruff of green bracts. They always catch me by surprise by sprouting up overnight like mushrooms and as they’re soon over I’ve planted some by the front door to make sure I don’t miss them. Luckily the front door faces north and I brush all the dead leaves which the wind swirls around it onto their patch of soil in the hope that I’m fooling them into thinking they’re living in woodland under the canopy of deciduous trees, their favourite habitat.
Like lots of early flowering plants, they like woodland edge conditions, they’ve evolved to make the most of the light available while the trees are still bare of leaves.

The hedge at the bottom of my garden makes a perfect, if very short, edge of woodland. Beneath the hazel the deep summer shade is ideal for ferns and now the leaves are decaying gently beneath and the blackbirds and thrushes are busy poking through them, the bare branches are lined with rows of lengthening catkins, soon to be full of yellow pollen.
The Mahonia relishes the shade there too. It’s flowered its socks off all November and December and been a magnet for blue tits, maybe there are tiny insects sheltering in the sprays of flowers or maybe blue tits just like bright yellow.
It’s one of those ‘tough as old boots’ plants as are its companions in my garden, Cornus ‘Flaviramea’ with yellow and orange stems and a birch with bright white bark. They are all happy in my woodland edge with a big clump of Hellebores and a few snowdrops at their feet.
I put them together partly to emphasis their seasonal appeal but mainly because they like the conditions and so are happy to grow together there.
Happy plants, happy birds, happy garden, happy me. Maybe New Year in January isn't so bad after all!

A gift for Christmas

It's that time of year again and if you're looking for a really special gift, a Garden Design Consultation is the perfect treat for anyone with a garden.
                                                        

'Two for the price of one'

It’s been absolutely fabulous for flowers, fruits, berries and autumn colour this year and my garden like so many others has been lush and glorious. As we come to the end of another year I have no complaints, even the slugs struggled to make an impact on  the abundant growth.

But that’s all over now, I’ve picked up the last of the perennial leaves left soft and mushy by the early frost and although the reliable grass stems are still holding their own, the tree branches are bare and the stark bones of my garden are revealed again.

As in every other winter for as long as I can remember, I find that I’ve forgotten what summer looked like. It’s the same with the landscape around me, I look up at the hills and just can’t imagine them green. In high summer it’s exactly the opposite, I can’t remember what winter looked like!

I don’t know if it’s just me or if we all feel that way as the seasons make such a dramatic impact on our surroundings.

Apart from the worry of impending older age and memory loss, this does have a positive side in that the view from my window is so different from six months ago that I feel as if I have two gardens for the price of one.

There are a few stalwart evergreens standing resolute in the face of seasonal change but apart from these if I compare summer and winter photographs the difference is remarkable.

Last year’s ice and snow were magical, especially at night when the garden lights made the frosty branches sparkle like tinsel dusted Christmas cards, but if this year we miss out on the arctic conditions then even dismal grey days will have their moments.

I used the sloes from the hedge to make slow gin so that will give me a warming reminder of better days and there is still some of my grape jelly from the vine outside the kitchen door. I have just a few quinces left, their faint but evocative scent all but gone now and a dwindling supply of little pumpkins and squashes which keep so well and look like a photograph from ‘Country Living’ sitting in the bowl of some old scales in the kitchen. There’s just a hint of loss with the last of the summer harvest though, so if it’s a bit of a lift I’m after, the birds do it for me.

The vibrant wings of the goldfinches, great tits and siskins flitting to and from the bird feeders, the sudden flash of the sparrow hawk as he darts through to catch a blue tit, the cheery robin almost always present and if we’re really lucky redwings and fieldfares might briefly join their blackbird and thrush relatives to strip the sloe and hawthorn branches.

Provide for the birds and even after the Christmas spirit has long evaporated you only have to look outside for a refreshing dose of winter cheer.

Into Autumn and beyond...

Autumn in the garden can be absolutely spectacular. The fiery brilliance of the turning leaves, the vivid gloss of the fruits and berries and the late summer perennials. Dahlias, asters, Japanese anemones and sedums keep the flower colour going to the bitter end and as the weather becomes inevitably greyer, murky and miserable the garden gives a last intense burst of colour, brilliant on those few perfect clear blue sky days.

There are some plants which far from performing a final fanfare are actually just coming into their own. Nerines are amazing plants, their shocking pink spidery flowers so unexpectedly exotic.

We don’t often think of choosing grasses for their flowers but they can add so much. Theirs is a quiet charm, not just in terms of colour but also for their texture, elegant shapes and their ability to sparkle in the chilling air and attract seed eating birds right through into the depths of winter.

The many named varieties of Panicum virgatum or switch grass, like ‘Hanse Herms’ and ‘Squaw’, their tiny flowers dangling singly from sprays, like little glass beads in the wet, and reddening leaves which arch gracefully at the tips.

Miscanthus are generally taller and stay reliably erect even in strong wind. Their flowers are upright in fairly dense fingers, often in darkening shades of bronze or plum. My favourite is Miscanthus ‘Morning Light’ with fine green and white striped leaves which as the weather turns colder fade to bleached blonde for the winter.

I have very mixed feeling about Cortaderia which we all know as pampas grass, probably because I have memories of so many seen planted in the middle of a lawn, incongruous and so out of place.

I’m embarrassed to admit now that I think it can actually look quite good in a mixed planting with other stars of the season, its flowers sprouting up and bursting into huge feather dusters. Bold and brassy it’s a definite statement plant for this time of year and then as early spring turns the sparrows’ thoughts to pairing up, they’re pulled to shreds to be recycled into lovely soft fluffy nesting material.

That’s the wonderful and optimistic thing about the garden, it’s always making us look forward. At the moment it’s through the less appealing days of winter and on towards spring and new growth. Autumn isn’t just the end of this year’s pleasure in the garden, it’s a  time of year to take stock of what’s worked well and what hasn’t, celebrate the successes and learn from the failures.

Now is the best time to plan for the garden’s future. It might be just ordering a few new spring bulbs or planning an altogether more wildlife friendly garden, whatever it is you’d like to make the most of in the garden, the opportunities for renewal are endless.