Other formats

    Adobe Portable Document Format file (facsimile images)   TEI XML file   ePub eBook file  

Connect

    mail icontwitter iconBlogspot iconrss icon

Design Review: Volume 3, Issue 6 (May-June 1951)

A Garden for Pleasure

page 139

A Garden for Pleasure

I should like to talk about gardening lay-out and planting in terms that have general application; but the more I think about it the more difficult I find it. In the matter of design good gardens have very little in common: they depend so much on peculiarities of site and on the preferences of their owners. That, of course, is a virtue, for standardization of gardens becomes much less tempting than it is with houses. A house, it goes without saying, should have a character of its own which reflects the character and taste of its owner. But most houses have so many practical purposes in common that individual taste and preference are a good deal more limited. A small garden, too, has certain practical requirements that cannot be neglected — a sandpit for children perhaps, or a piece of sheltered lawn or paving, or a vegetable garden; very often, however, there is some ground left to play with according to one's fancy.

Many people, I find, start gardening by growing their own vegetables, a very enjoyable and satisfying pastime. But when they begin to grow flowers too, they cannot get away from the way they grow vegetables: garden-beds are made level and square, and into them go nurserymen's annuals; rows are dead straight, distances precise, for all the world like cabbage plants or soldiers. If the soil is correctly manured and regularly watered the plants will, in due season, present their attendants with fine and healthy blooms. These are cut and used to decorate the house or proudly given away to friends. That is one way of gardening, and the right way if one wants to win prizes at exhibitions. But as it is not my way, I cannot offer any hints or advice or tips about how to do it. Perhaps, however, the experience of making my own garden will be of some interest and help. And perhaps out of a rather discursive description a few useful ideas may emerge.

The main part of my garden which is still in use and which still gives a great deal of pleasure for a small amount of work is the long path that leads rather steeply from the gate up to the house. There are two big macrocarpas that give shelter to some rather nice korako trees and ribbonwoods, treeferns and other natives which were already in the place when we came; but beside the path there was quite a wide space where hardly anything grew but wandering willy, sprawling over heaps of rubbish. Here it was shady enough to plant rhododendrons and azaleas.

When we moved into the house, one of the first things I did was to make a tiny cold frame out of an old window sash. This I used for propagating perennials and shrubs, for I was determined to have plenty of plants, and as I hadn't money enough to buy them I had to propagate them. About thirty erica carnea plants were raised like that and about as many azaleas. I raised regal lilies from seed and other lilies from bulblets. It took three years' patient, waiting before these plants were really big enough to make a show. It is slightly embarrassing if your friends, who know that you are interested in gardening, come to see your achievements and you have nothing to show for your activities but well-fed weeds. We did not even trouble to fight the weeds, as all the time we could spend on the garden, and it was really very little, was devoted to more constructive work, like building rock walls and steps and terraces.

I decided that the best way to treat the side of the path where the rhododendrons and azaleas are would be to think of some woodland when I was planning it. That simply meant that I would not use plants which I could not imagine in wild surroundings. For instance, zinnias and dahlias would not do at all. So between the azaleas I planted tall bellflowers (campanulas)
The top photograph shows the house and its early surroundings in comparison with the very pleasant setting of today.

The top photograph shows the house and its early surroundings in comparison with the very pleasant setting of today.

page break
1

1

The plan above shows the complete layout of the garden in relation to the house. The numbers on the plan correspond with the numbered photographs.

The plan above shows the complete layout of the garden in relation to the house. The numbers on the plan correspond with the numbered photographs.

page break and bluebells for spring, lilies and spireas for summer, and wood anemones (anemone japonica) ranging from white and pink to purplish red for autumn. The wood anemones flower at the same time as the blue aconite (monk's hood) and they look very well together. In winter white hellebore makes a good fresh splash of colour. Later there are petticoat daffodils and polyanthus. After that come the various aquilegia hybrids, in all shades from light to dark blue, yellow and pink and dark red. They oblige by seeding themselves and are extremely lovely in this shady, damp sort of place, though in a border they can look quite insignificant.

With every plant I always try to find a place where it looks its best; of course the growing conditions that a plant wants also have to be taken into consideration. The kind of soil, sun or shade, amount of moisture and manure have also to be thought of — but for me the most important considerations are always these: how does this particular plant look in this particular place; how will it look with the other plants; and how will it appear from where one is most likely to look at it? What is the good of a fine gladiolus if it turns its blooms towards the sun and away from you? (Nobody can blame it for that; and as this side happens to be just where you and the path are not, the only thing you see is the back of the gladiolus, which is annoying.) But if you had planted a dahlia or a lily instead of the gladiolus you could have avoided this slight, as they are not so fond of the sun.

Where the trees end there are two old camellia trees, a white one and a dark pink one. The pink one is a special delight, as it starts to flower before the last chrysanthemums are over and keeps on flowering through the whole winter. Then before the path turns and leads on a level towards the house we made a little rockery. I don't like rockeries with the rocks scattered everywhere as though a lorry had dumped them and then forgotten them. Rock gardens made of rocks disposed on the ground freely and naturally can be very charming, but it is difficult, I think, to make them well; you need rocks especially suited to the purpose and many to choose from; you need a lot of time to think about the garden and, most important of all, a skilled eye to design it.

Since there is in Wellington no choice of rocks of the right quality and size and number, we decided to make small level terraces about one to two feet wide, supported by small dry rock walls about one to three feet high. You can buy fairly good rocks suitable
2

2

3

3

4

4

5

5

page break
6

6

7

7

for this kind of work, even in Wellington.

The dry walls are planted with rock plants, which stay there all the year round and need hardly any looking after. The terraces are full of spring bulbs, lachenalias and various freesias, hoop petticoat daffodils and the pheasant eye narcissus, crocus, iris reticulata and dwarf irises. There is one big erica carnea and a few helleborus niger for the winter.

In the shelter of the camellia I intend to plant lilium formosanum until I have enough of them. Planted on top of the spring bulbs are verbenas, which also remain throughout the year. When the leaves of the bulbs start to come I cut the verbena severely back until there is hardly anything left of them. That gives the bulbs plenty of space when they need it. When they start to become unsightly the verbenas spread over them.

Between the bulbs I have some corms of salvia with its lovely strong blue flowers. This plant, also a perennial, conveniently dies down in autumn and starts to grow only when the bulbs have faded. For this place I choose only bulbs that are moderate with their foliage, and don't (like grape hyacinths or soleil d'or narcissus) take nearly half the summer to finish with their leaves. Such bulbs as petticoats and poet's narcissus and some of the lachenalias and freesias are not so retentive of their foliage; in fact they die down very quickly after flowering and leave space for the other inhabitants. There are also some low deep-blue delphiniums that go very well with the red verbenas, and pink delphiniums that go with the blue salvia. If there is any space left I plant it full of free-seeding lobelias. Lobelias, I think, look well used as rock plant. For this purpose, though, they should be planted in clumps and not in the usual edging.

My main purpose is to make the garden look well at all seasons, and if it is not always perfectly tidy that is because I haven't time to keep it so. I try to achieve tidiness by having some plants in bloom at all seasons and if possible in several shades that go well together. In other words, I make the utmost use of the space devoted to page 143 flowers. I do not cultivate plants specially for cut flowers. I find there are always enough for my moderate needs. In fact I dislike picking flowers that should adorn the garden, for there can never be enough in the important places. If one has time enough and space I think it a good idea to have an inconspicuous bed or two of flowers especially for picking.

To continue, then, with the description of the garden. Opposite the rock garden on the right-hand side of the path is a slope which in spring is covered with daffodils. Later on the fuchsias take over. They flower the whole year through and in winter when the daffodils start to grow I prune them hard back to give the daffodils room.

The path then curves out of the trees and leads on to a level with the house. A few wider terraced beds run beside and above the path. Here I grow roses and delphiniums and various kinds of lilies, for I think that the roses when they flower together with the regal lilies and delphiniums look superb. Later on come phlox, many colours planted together, and dahlias and the later lilies and chrysanthemums. Then the erica takes over with iris stylosis and helle-borus niger. And then it is spring again.

This is of course not the whole garden: there is a little hillock which we planted with rhododendrons and various other flowering and berrying shrubs; the ground below them is covered with spring bulbs and lilies. Quite a large part of the hillock is completely covered with erica carnea; in winter it looks very well, especially with the rhododendron Christmas Cheer flowering at the same time. It has the added advantage that one hardly needs to do any weeding as the erica keeps the weeds down.

That reminds me that I ought perhaps to say something about tidiness in the garden. Tidiness should not, I think, be overdone. Plants in exact rows, each little thing marked with a stick, the sticks conspicuously accentuating the order — that to me is a nursery rather than a garden. I prefer a much wilder effect than that: the sticks, if possible, not visible and no bare soil to be seen round each plant. Certainly better specimen plants are grown in this tidy way, but it is better to keep a special part of the garden for them. One must, of course, have good plants, but growing fine blooms is not the purpose of gardening. I remember being quite taken aback when someone once said to me: “This shrub looks very well, but I can't leave it in the garden; it takes all the goodness out of the soil.” And the plant went, but nothing pleasing or interesting replaced it — the soil remains, full of ‘goodness’.

When you plant perennials, prepare the soil well, give them a good mulch of manure from time to time and appropriate artificials. Apart from that, you will find there is very little upkeep. Once established, they cover the soil well; weeds are few because there is very little space left for them to grow. Only with perennials can you have your garden full of bloom all the time, and watch each month bring with it different flowers. You even forget what is going to happen next. Indeed, you are quite surprised when in a very short time the garden changes from roses, delphiniums and lilies and puts on the varied colours of the perennial phlox. And you think: “But surely after this there must be a gap; I simply can't remember what came after the phlox last year.” Then you notice that the buds of the anemone japonica and the blue aconites and the pink and white lilium speciosum are already packed full and can hardly wait to open and show what they can do.

Perennials are like shrubs; in the beginning they are not much to look at, but with a very little care and some understanding they give you more joy every year. Certainly it takes time to get a garden of this kind properly established, but the making of it (and the mistakes you try to put right next year) is an endless delight.

Back and white woodcut of a snail on a leaf, by E. Mervyn Taylor.

page 144