Plant Pretty Practical

When I was studying landscaping a couple of decades ago, I spent hours in the library, poring over gardening books, and paging through landscape architecture and gardening magazines, admiring the beautiful, mainly US or UK gardens.  I couldn't wait for my chance to create similarly breathtaking gardens.

Aloe cooperi in the morning light. An easy to grow, low maintenance, beautiful plant.

My first attempts at landscaping, (that were fortunately in my mothers garden) failed dismally. The plants that I had used, either died or grew so big that we lost pets inside them. This left me wondering whether I had made the wrong choice in vocation, and I'm sure must have caused my mother to wonder whether she had just wasted a couple of years of tuition on me.

But slowly it dawned on me that the old garden maxim "right plant, right place" were words to live by. Just because something looks amazing elsewhere doesn't necessarily mean that it will suit the situation that I'm working with.

I also began to realise the deception that is inherent in almost all gardening books and magazines. It is the job of publications to sell magazines and books. The best way to do this, is to showcase beautiful gardens in all their splendour. Nobody wants to buy a magazine that shows dry, colourless gardens or gardens that have been pruned back to make way for new growth. These gardens are photographed during the 3-4 week period in an entire year, that they are at their best. In many cases, the planting that you see is entirely temporary, as annuals are planted in their abundance.  Page through any gardening magazine, and you will see the majority of the plants on display are pretty, yet short-lived annuals.  This creates an unrealistic expectation on the part of the casual observer, which when it comes time to garden leaves them frustrated or disappointed.

The garden industry through television and magazines, whilst creating a sense of excitement about the potential for beauty in your back yard, has also created a rod for its own back. I can't tell you how many people I've known through the years, that are keen to get stuck into the garden, but give up after the reality sinks in.

So before you get started with your garden, figure out whether your expectations have been over inflated, by looking around you at the best gardens in your neighbourhood. Ask yourself the following questions:

1. Do they consistently look that way?
2. What plants have they used?
3. What kind of soil have they got? Is it the same as mine?
4. Do they regularly compost and water?
5. Have they got an irrigation system in place?
6. What are my realistic time commitments and abilities?

Finally, do some research before you buy your plants from the nursery. Have a plan in mind, and plant for the long term. Go with a list of plants that grow well in your area, don't get suckered in by the pretty things that are flowering at the entrance to the nursery because almost by the time you get home, the flowers will be gone.

Remember, beauty is fleeting so don't just plant pretty. Be pretty practical too.

The Best Way To Landscape Your Website

You may have noticed that I haven't been posting a whole bunch lately? That old idiom has been coming to mind quite a bit recently "Make hay while the sun shines". Its a great piece of advice, especially for us procrastinators, who might rather be blogging than tackling any tough tasks.

Another task that I have been tackling in the last few weeks, has been the pruning and replanting of my landscape website. Its been a project that I have been working on bit by bit for the last year or so, but I felt that it was time to make a concerted effort to finish it.

As I've gotten it closer to where I want it, I've realised how similar creating a website is to landscaping a garden:

1. Its essential to have a plan of what you want the finished garden/website to look like.
2. Before you start figure out who will be experiencing the website/landscape.
3. Use the best tools you can afford.
4. Its important to have a theme that brings everything together. In a garden, you could have more than one theme depending on the size of the garden, but if you do, it could leave the visitor confused.
5. Figure out the structure first, and build onto and around that.
6. Simpler is often better.
7. Don't make the landscape/site too busy or distracting, it leaves you feeling unsettled and less likely to enjoy the experience.
8. Repetition of certain elements throughout the site/garden is important to give the eye some familiarity
9. When its looking messy, and you're feeling a little overwhelmed, don't give up. Its usually just on the other side that you'll start to see the end in sight.
10. Look at your use of colours carefully - complimentary colours are really restful and harmonious, contrasting colours are bold and exciting.
11. Make sure you do as much research as possible before you start, and if you're unsure of any code/application/plant, do some more research.
12. Experimenting is how you learn. Place the plant/code in your website, and see how it looks. If it doesn't look right, be ruthless and pull it out - it'll get harder to do when you build other plants/code around it. If you feel bad about pulling it out, you can always give it to a friend - a gift of 'html code' is always welcome. (ok, maybe I'm pushing the similarities too far there.)
13. Ask experts for advice (if you can afford it - hire a professional to do it for you), and get feedback from friends, but trust your instincts too.
14. Have fun doing it, but don't let it consume you - everybody needs a hobby, no-one needs an obsession.

I'm currently at number 13. I would love some feedback about the website. Feel free to be as critical/honest as you want. Personally, I think its the best landscape website I've ever seen - but hey, I might be biased ;-)

How Do You Classify A Garden?

Gardening in this new millennium, has become a very different creature to what it once was. In some ways this is an oddity - gardening as a craft being at its core, so basic and archaic, is so intrinsically separate from technology.

But technology has had its effect though - through the development and use of new materials and technologies but also through the spread of ideas via the internet and media.

A Plant Dominant Indigenous Garden

There is more discussion taking place today about gardening and about what defines a garden than has ever taken place before. This conversation is occurring between professionals and hobbyists, intellectuals and labourers.

Out of this conversation, a question I've been asking myself lately is -

'How do you classify a garden?'

Even as I write that, I can hear some people saying, "Why would you even want to classify a garden? A garden is something to be appreciated and felt, and admired."
That is all true, but I see so many types of gardens, from all over the world that it is becoming harder to fit them into the traditional definitions that I'm used to, and as a result, harder to understand.

I believe that people take comfort in our ability to divide and classify the world and put it into nice neat little boxes. In some ways it even makes us human - this ability to define something.

Gardening as an art-form, has not been spared this need to separate and define. Formal, Contemporary, English Country, Eastern, Natural, Wild, Indigenous, Zen...the list goes on and on.

A Structure Dominant Wild Garden

With this classification of gardens into types, and because of the continual segmentation, and the blurring of lines, I believe there exists a need to define gardens in more general terms.

To explain, I'll use an example that we as gardeners are familiar with - just as a particular plant has a Genus, and is then divided into its species, the Species of gardens (i.e. Tropical, Minimalist, Formal) need to be grouped together into Genera.

This is necessary, not for the sake of classifying for classifying's sake.
But rather as:

• a way to clear up miscommunication between client and designer.
• a tool for teaching and passing on knowledge in clear terms.
• a spur to push designers and gardeners to try something different, and venture into new territory.

The most obvious way of defining, would be to look for the defining dominance in the design of the garden.

• Plant dominant - Where the garden's essence is about the plants themselves (Tropical, Indigenous/native, English Country, Natural, Collector)
• Concept dominant - These gardens revolve around an idea or concept(Zen, Feng Shui, Modern)
• Structure dominant - These gardens have strong shape and/or geometry (Formal, Contemporary, Minimalist)
• Function dominant - Where the function of the garden takes precedence (Lawn for playing, Parking Area, Patio)

This defining dominance would be primarily visual - it would be the character of the garden that unifies it or makes it stand out. It could also be intellectual - a garden built around an idea or concept that may or may not be immediately obvious, but that was the guiding principle behind its design. (e.g. Jenck's - Garden of Cosmic Speculation)

A Structure Dominant Formal Garden

But gardens are not always so easily put into their respective boxes, and here is where the Linnaeus analogy becomes inadequate. The gardens themselves may fall into more than one of the above groups. For example, a typical tropical garden at its essence is built around particular types of plants (Plant Dominant), but if the structure of the garden dominates, it could also be Structure Dominant. As to which is truly dominant would become a more subjective matter.

To use a more specific example - many of Gertrude Jekyll's garden's would have been strongly Plant dominant, but with Sir Edwin Lutyens' architectural input, they also had a very strong Structure dominance.

I see the practicalities of this idea being in creating a concept that makes communication clearer and simpler between client and designer, student and teacher, and between various professions relating to the gardening industry.

Gardening has been an art that has been nurtured by the hands of amateurs through the ages, and has at times, and in various cultures been analysed by the mind as well as the heart, but as the world gets internet-smaller, and communication happens across the globe, the thought processes behind garden design will and should become more apparent and utilised by the lay-person and professional alike.
For this reason, I believe that it would help if we spoke in similar terms.

Forage Oakland

If you follow Bloggers 'Blog Of Note' you'll probably have already read about this great idea, and even though its a rather tenuous link to the world of Landscape Design, I thought it was worth a mention.

Asiya Wadud has started a movement called Forage Oakland - the idea being that people would get together in their neighbourhoods to forage for produce from gardens, that would otherwise go to waste. She puts it far more elegantly in her manifesto, and is definitely worth reading.

I love the idea of taking such an ancient method of survival, and bringing it back into todays context as a solution to some of the problems that we face in society at the moment. I hope the idea catches on.

Who Wants My Back Garden?

Food gardening by individuals and communities in South Africa is quite commonplace. Driving through many built up areas - often near areas of umjondolos (the zulu word for informal housing), you will often see gardens of maize, pumpkin, tomatoes etc. being well looked after - and all this, mostly on the verge of highways and busy roads.

But despite the fact that food gardening in SA is thriving, its also quite looked down on - as being backward or rural - definitely not something to be aspiring to!

So its interesting to see that there is a move in the UK and USA to make use of unused land for food gardening. Allotment food growing in the UK is so popular that there are waiting lists to get to garden in the small spaces allocated. Just look out the window on any train ride around London, and you'll see a green streak of community and food gardens going by.

But this latest push to get people gardening, and growing their own food, is aimed at matching up people with space for gardening, and those who want to garden. On Landshare, a UK based website, you can register as a grower, a land-owner, land-spotter or a facilitator.

The idea is simple - if you have a backyard (or any area for that matter) that would be suitable for growing - you can register it on their site. Anyone who is keen to get growing themselves can register on the site themselves, and look for an area close to them where they can get their hands dirty.

I've been wondering, how we in South Africa can learn from this latest agrarian advance? There are a lot more things to consider in our environment. The most obvious being security. Quite honestly, I'm surprised that roadside farming can thrive in a society where petty crime is flourishing - I wonder how often people help themselves to the fruit or vegetables of someone else's labours?
Sharing Backyards - a North American Site has a helpful list of things to consider - from time, to water use, to privacy and security concerns. But I think if its carefully organised, its a concept that could be adapted really well to a South African situation. So who out there wants to organise it?

Another thought that comes to mind - which is possibly far more Utopian. Wouldn't it be amazing, to truly share backyards? Although not suited to everyone, and every situation, wouldn't our neighbourhoods be better off, if we took down the fences that separate us, and linked our gardens. This would encourage birds and other wildlife back into our gardens, and who knows, maybe we would see real community growing alongside our vegetables?

Carbonmade

I recently found a great online way to show some of my portfolio of the gardens that I've designed and built.

The website is called Carbonmade, and is quite simple to use, and looks great. You can take a look at my portfolio here, and if you want to sign up, go here...

Indigenous Beauties - Bird attracting garden

My team and I are busy with the tidying of the garden of a beautiful old Durban home. It has a well established indigenous garden, with some exceptional plants.

Halleria lucida - Tree Fuschia

The Tree Fuschia is a great plant for attracting birds. Sunbirds in particular love the nectar that they get from the tubular flowers that sprout profusely from the Halleria's stem. Fruit loving birds also love the green berries that appear in Spring.
Its an excellent plant when you're looking for fast growth, and it grows to a height of anything from about 3m to about 15m. It will grow in full sun or semi-shade, but will look better in a slightly sheltered spot.
It has been used medicinally for skin and ear problems.

Carissa bispinosa

The Carissa, or amatungulu is a very useful plant. It has attractive white flowers, which appear in Summer, followed by bright red fruit, which are high in vitamin C. The fruit are used to make a delicious jam.
It grows in Sun or Semi-shade, and does quite well on windswept dunes. It is often grown as an impenetrable hedge, as it is covered in painfully sharp forked spines.
It is relatively fast-growing once established, but takes a while to get going. It will reach about 3m in height if left, but looks better when cut back into a dense shrub.

Schotia brachypetala

The Schotia is also known as the Weeping Boer-boon (Farmers Bean) . It has been given this name because of the huge amounts of nectar that drip from the beautiful bright-red flowers, and because its pods are shaped like beans. Because of the dripping nectar, its best not to plant it too close to paved areas, or near parked cars. Nectar-loving birds are frequent visitors to this tree. Its relatively fast growing, and reaches about 15-20m high and wide.

Some of the other well-established bird-attracting plants were Aloes, Cussonia, Indigofera, Polygala, and a Toad Tree. One plant I couldn't identify, which had an amazing sweet scent was this little shrub (1.5-2m high):

Any ideas as to what it is?

Looking Over The Garden Wall

I once took a test to see whether I used the right or left side of my brain, as an added extra the test told me that I am more visual than auditory.
I'm not sure how scientific it was, but it did make a certain amount of sense.

When I pick up a gardening book, most times I very casually skim read the text, preferring to absorb the pictures instead. This has always seemed the right way to approach the honing of my landscaping skills. Gardens are after all primarily a visual experience.

I've also always believed, that like plants and their ability to absorb water and nutrients, my natural ability to learn relies quite heavily on osmosis.

The absorbing of ideas through my eyes has been how I have learned most of what I know. I quickly get impatient with words, preferring to get to the real thing as fast as possible.
I would often look at planting, texture or colour combinations, and decide whether I liked them or not, and why.

I do believe that this is the best way to begin the learning experience as a landscaper. I think its the ideal foundation to lay to make your understanding of gardens as real and honest as possible.

But lately I have found myself drawn to words far more than I ever have in the past. Maybe its the influence of reading so many interesting thoughts in gardening blogs from people all over the world. Maybe its the act of writing this blog, and the discipline of having to put my thoughts down on paper.

It might also be the realisation that while pictures express so much to me, they may not be enough to try to communicate concepts or needs or reasons behind. And it is dawning on me that gardening as an Art, Science, Hobby, Language or even Need, has so much further to go in being accessible to people in general.

We have such a rich heritage and history as gardeners, that it is easy to look at the art of gardening as complete or mature. If I look back at history, and the growth and development of gardens, I could quite naturally compare it to an old man - wise, experienced and learned, but with little space left for new ideas or experimentation. All the ideas are already thought of, with any freshness coming from re-hashing old concepts.

But I keep getting a flash of the truth: that if we choose to look past what we have learnt, and know already, and up over the garden wall, there is a whole world of new ideas beyond.

Behind The Scenes - Courtyard Garden

Don't be fooled, a small garden can be just as much work as a big garden. There have been several reasons, but this project has taken nearly 6 months to complete. Thats a long time for a space that is only 3m x 3m!

This was part 3 of a bigger garden project that we had completed about a year ago. My clients had a small courtyard built onto their bedroom, to give them their own private garden. The brief was quite straightforward:

1. A place to sit with a small table and chairs
2. A waterfeature - along the lines of a letterbox type water feature

We discussed a few options, looked at several books and magazines, and finally settled on a basic style. It would be quite a contemporary formal garden, with a touch of an oriental feel. We would lay a white concrete floor, with white pebbles around the border.
The budget was quite tight for what was needed, but provided everything went according to plan it would be fine.

This was the blank slate:

The work progressed in stages:
1. Subsurface preparation
We laid irrigation pipes and electrical conduit. The irrigation for the entire garden would be run from the unit on the wall in the left-hand corner.
The irrigation, lights and pumps would all need electricity. This created quite a few boxes in the corner that would need to be screened, but still with easy access to plugs and controls.

2. Adjusting of walls and steps
The existing step was too high, and was subsequently chipped away and re-built. Also, the pillar in the center of the facing wall would need to be removed for the water feature that would be installed in the center.

3. Laying the concrete base
Once the builders had finished in this area, we positioned boards around the edges of the soon-to-be concrete slab, and began pouring our concrete. This was then roughly levelled, and left for a few days to harden, before the boards were removed.

4. Building the water feature
The water feature wall was built from brick. The stainless steel chute which would form the sheet of water, had been made up a week before. This had to be installed perfectly level. Even if it is slightly out, the sheet of water coming out would very obviously be skew. The pipes were all joined up, and then connected to the reservoir below.
The test run with a hose pipe connected into the system is always an anxious moment, but the water feature worked according to plan. The top of the wall was then closed up, and plastered.

5. Screeding the surface
We used a combination of white cement and very light sand, so that the concrete screed would be as close to white as possible. Because of the amount of time needed to dry, and the fact that this was our rainy season, we had to wait until the weather man was predicting a dry couple of days. The first chance we got, we carefully screeded the whole surface, and left it over the weekend to dry.
Unfortunately, the final result was a little cloudy, and not entirely white. It did look quite a nice natural sandstone colour, but wouldn't give the necessary final white look that we were looking for.
We chipped it all up, and re-laid the screed. This time fortunately, the colour was a lot more even, so we let it harden for about 10 days before anyone was allowed to walk on it - not that the dogs agreed to that though!

6. Planting
Getting the planting right would be most important, in that I wanted to soften all the walls without closing down the space. I installed trellises on the sides to blur the boundaries of the courtyard a little, and in so doing, make it seem slightly bigger than it is.
I had 3 plants in mind from the start - Bamboo, Arum and Maple. These plants all suited the contemporary, slightly oriental feel, that I wanted to create. Alongside these, I planted Bergenia, Imperata Cylindrica (Red Baron Grass), Tulbaghia and Gardenia. I also planted Jasmine (Trachelospermum) to climb the trellis. Both the Gardenia and Jasmine have beautiful scents.
I planted the Maple in 2 pots on either side of the step - this would also help screen the electricity and irrigation boxes in the corner.

I wanted to add some statues into the courtyard, that wouldn't be too overpowering, and would suit the overall feel. I had seen these dog statues, right in the beginning of the project, which I thought would be perfect, showed a photo to my client, and she agreed. We placed these on pedestals on either side looking into the center of the garden.

After a few weeks, my client called to say that she was a bit disappointed that the concrete would go so dark when it was wet (which was most of the time due to the regular rain that we were having). After a bit of investigation, I discovered a sealer that could be applied to the concrete which would prevent this from happening. I was given the go ahead, and we rolled it onto the surface. It did lose some of the brightness, but at least the colour would remain constant regardless of whether the concrete was wet or dry.
A few days later, white patches began forming on the surface after any rain - the company which supplied the sealer were at a loss as to why this would happen, and suggested that I try waterproofing the surface with an epoxy. We took their advice only to find that it still appeared under the surface. It has improved slightly after a few weeks, but is still there.

Apart from one or two hiccups, the finished garden has turned out exactly how I had planned - the water feature wall was painted a burnt red to tie in with the bedrooms colours. This made all the difference in finishing off the garden.

How To Choose The Best Lawn Grass 2

There are a lot of choices when it comes to using plants/grasses as a lawn. Before you choose a type of grass, consider some questions and alternatives in Part 1 of this post.

Below I have included photos of each plant, as well as some of its characteristics:

Axonopus compressus - Kearsney
Copes with: Shade - Low Traffic - Med/High Water
Good Soil - Medium Length - High Maintenance
Best Property : Grows in Shade

Stenotaphrum secundatum - Buffalo

Copes with: Sun/Semi Shade - High Traffic - Medium Water
Average Soil - Medium Length - Low Maintenance
Best Property : Grows in Sun/Shade, Hardy

Cynodon dactylon - Bermuda

Copes with: Sun - High Traffic - Low Water
Poor Soil - Short Length - Low Maintenance
Best Property : Grows in Full Sun, Hardy

Cynodon transvaalensis - Royal Blue

Copes with: Sun - High Traffic - Low Water
Poor Soil - Short Length - Low Maintenance
Best Property : Can be cut as short as 3mm, Full Sun, Hardy

Dactyloctenium australe - Berea Shade

Copes with: Shade/Sun - Medium Traffic - Medium Water
Good Soil - Long Length - Med Maintenance
Best Property : Grows in Shade, Soft

Paspalum vaginatum - Country Club

Copes with: Sun - High Traffic - Low Water
Poor Soil - Short Length - Med Maintenance
Best Property : Hardy

Pennisetum clandestinum - Kikuyu

Copes with: Sun - High Traffic - Medium Water
Poor Soil - Med Length - High Maintenance
Best Property : Tough, Fast growing

Dichondra repens - Wonderlawn

Copes with: Semi/Shade - Med Traffic - Med Water
Good Soil - Med Length - Low Maintenance
Best Property : Grows in Shade

Lysimachia nummularia - Creeping Jenny

Copes with: Sun - Low Traffic - Med Water
Good Soil - High Length - Med Maintenance
Best Property : Attractive golden colour

Mazus reptans - Mazus

Copes with: Semi-Shade - Med Traffic - Med Water
Good Soil - Med Length - Low Maintenance
Best Property : Pretty blue and white flowers

Mentha pulegium - Penny Royal

Copes with: Sun/Semi-Shade - Low Traffic - Med Water
Good Soil - Short Length - Low Maintenance
Best Property : Very Fragrant

Phyla nodiflora - Daisy Lawn

Copes with: Sun/Semi-Shade - High Traffic - Low/Med Water
Poor Soil - Short Length - Low Maintenance
Best Property : Extremely Hardy, stays short with traffic

The next step to look at, is how best to prepare your soil for planting.

If you have any questions, feel free to leave a comment...

A picture speaks a 1000 words

I thought the best way to start off the blog would be to use some pictures. I obviously have my own preferences when it comes to style, but I always try to plan a design around 3 factors:

1. The specific site, architecture and surrounds
2. The clients needs and wants
3. Something new or interesting to add some originality

All too often, I see garden designers working to a formulaic style, with the same plants, used in the same way every time. To a certain extent this is affected by the client, who's reference point is generally the gardens seen around their neighbourhood. However, it is the responsibility of the landscaper to educate, and sometimes stretch the client, by introducing new ideas, concepts, plants and materials.

South African garden design is definitely in need of some stretching - there are some great international designers that we can learn from. From the sometimes outlandish Diarmuid Gavin, to flowing tropical Burle Marx, and water-coloured Gertrude Jekyll.

If there is a South African style garden, it would be the use of indigenous plants in a fairly natural way. But even this can be developed further.

The following are pictures of some of the gardens that I have designed. Each of them were as different as the clients that I designed them for.