Wintergreen

This morning I called out to visit friends – to revisit a garden that we designed a few years ago and see the progress.  We spoke a week ago to arrange a time hoping that it would be a bright sunny day, and today was perfection.

It’s a big garden so the upkeep was always going to be a consideration – although the owners enjoy gardening when they have the time, they also work long hours.

Surprisingly some of the best elements have worked out to be the simplest, like the low wall constructed by Shakkei Landscaping (the team that have built all the garden). The wall doubles as a seat/retaining wall beneath an old ash tree. Close by flowering may bushes have massed on the sides of the dam to make mowing easier, and many of the garden beds have been shaped in broad arcs – planted with grey-leafed Feijoa sellowiana that will form hedges that will `talk’ to the curving stone wall. Towards the end of my visit their daughter and her family arrived and I watched to see if the kids would walk the wall as I had envisaged – and it wasn’t long before one did just that.

A swing has been hung on the branches making this a perfect place where children can play. A cubbyhouse is nestled under an old plum tree, a flying fox secured to the turpentine trees close by.

Gardens are ongoing, at least the good ones are – never finished they go from strength to strength as they mature. We send short messages to each other via email and last summer they asked if a bed near the dam where I had recommended Miscanthus transmorrisonensis be planted could be planted instead with the herb borage. We compromised. As the space was large enough to share, that’s just what we did and both things were planted. This blue flowering annual is a herb, which has the delicate taste of cucumber, buzzing with bees is a wonderful addition.

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