Transformation – days 5 & 6

Posted on May 1, 2012 by Sara Davison

By now the garden was really starting to take shape; the brick paths and sitting area were completed, the railway sleepers for the raised bed were in and it had been filled with compost, and the posts and ropes for my climbing roses had been installed.  It was all a bit stop and start last April, we had Easter in the way, plus a Bank Holiday Monday for the May Day holiday not to mention the extra day for the Royal Wedding!  But it was so very nearly there, and the weather remained dry and sunny, I might have ordered it!

 

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Recommended Reading 2 – Helen Dillon on Gardening

Posted on April 29, 2012 by Sara Davison

Another plant hero of mine, Helen Dillon, gardens in Dublin; it is many years since I visited her garden but it is on my list – next time I’m in that fair city I must plan my trip to coincide with when her garden is open to the public (www.dillongarden.com).  Her book ‘On Gardening’ is a collection of her garden journalism, arranged month by month so that you can either read your way through the year from January-December, or dip in to suit the calendar; however you read her, Helen Dillon’s take on gardening is wonderfully witty and perceptive.  For instance, “Handling plants is like handling puppies or babies.  You must learn not to be frightened of them”.  Now I’ve not handled many babies or puppies, but I have handled many, many plants and I know exactly what she means – there is something nerve-wracking about tipping a carefully nurtured treasure out of its first size pot and preparing it for potting on.  You fuss about the compost mix, too gritty, not gritty enough – seek advice from the experts, etc etc – whereas sometimes the best thing to do is take a steadying breath and go for it!  Mind you, plants don’t bite and you won’t get reported to Social Services if you don’t quite get the compost mix right.

Anyway, if you can obtain a copy of this book you won’t be disappointed – my edition has a picture of Helen on the front with one of her favourite gardening tools, and this is one thing at least I can say I have in common with her – we both use a black builders’ bucket for transporting all our gardening ‘stuff’.

I’ll finish this post with another quote from Helen, which I’m sure is shared by all gardeners who open their plot to the public – ‘Let us be quite clear about it, taking cuttings in somebody else’s garden is stealing”.  Quite – very often, if you get chatting to the gardener, and ask nicely, they will have a piece already rooted they will pass on to you – we gardeners are generous like that.

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Exciting news!

Posted on April 28, 2012 by Sara Davison

I’ve arrived at the top of the waiting list for an allotment – and now have more space in which to garden!  When I applied last year I was warned to expect a long wait, I was about no.24 on the list, so when the phone call came out of the blue on Thursday it was quite a shock.  But having thought about it overnight I decided that if I didn’t take it I would come to regret the decision; I enjoy the community garden and goodness only knows how I will manage to spend time there, in my own garden and on the allotment, but I’m sure I can work out a balance.

Of course the other attraction was that I would have something else to write about here – so welcome to my allotment – this photo shows it in all its glory; I have my work cut out.  I’ve ‘inherited’ some rhubarb, but that’s about it – apart from the dandelions of course.  Funnily enough I’ve been looking at these very dandelions (I walk through the allotments twice a day, to and from the station) and thinking that I’d like to get some photos of them once they have gone to seed – now I have the right to roam over this patch, and as the new ‘owner’ am thinking I will need to dig them out before they go to seed.   Such are the conflicting demands of a gardener/photographer!

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Transformation – day 4

Posted on April 26, 2012 by Sara Davison

Back in 2011, April 26 saw the fourth day of work in the garden, and now it really began to take shape.  There were four guys working on it, the landscaper and his labourer, plus two brilliant bricklayers who were laying the path and sitting area.  We also had the electrician stopping by; he would not complete his work until the garden was finished, but we needed to install the cable up one side of the garden, crossing beneath the sitting area and back down the other side – there was some juggling of priorities to be achieved, so I kept my distance – supplying tea and coffee at regular intervals and dreaming of the day when it would be finished.  My time in the garden was restricted to the end of each working day when they had gone home, and I’d walk round capturing progress on my phone.

Now when I look at the photos from last year I thank my lucky stars for the weather we had – it was dry and sunny every day.  Whilst this meant I had to keep watering all the plants patiently waiting in their pots I shudder to think what this scene would look like with the rain we’ve had lately, it would certainly have delayed the work and made the guys very miserable.  In case you are wondering, the grey square installation is the raised pond!

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Recommended Reading 1 – Beth Chatto’s ‘Garden Notebook’

Posted on April 25, 2012 by Sara Davison

I’ve added a Recommended Reading page to my blog where you will (in time) find my list of favourite garden reads; my post today is about one of them.

Beth Chatto is one of my gardening heros and I have visited her garden near Colchester several times; she has had the benefit/challenge of creating a garden on very dry poor soil together with an area of very damp soil and a woodland – so she can speak to any gardener.  Her plant nursery, Unusual Plants, is a brilliant source of  hard to find ‘must-have plants’, and the colour illustrated catalogue is a gem in its own right (but I have to confess one of my most treasured gardening books is a non-illustrated catalogue from 1999, where Beth’s words more than replace photographs).   This book is one of several written by Beth and takes the form of a garden diary; one of my favourite writing styles when it comes to gardening books and the inspiration for my own gardening journals.

Starting in January, where Beth walks her reader around the garden to highlight those plants that are at their best at this often bleak time of year, in the opening chapter she also describes life in the nursery during the ‘down time’ outside of the main growing season.  As the year progresses she describes the excitement and anticipation of building a garden for Chelsea Flower Show (she holds 10 gold medals) and the challenges of maintaining her garden alongside the plant nursery, both of which are open to the public.

If you love English gardens, this book is a ‘must read’ – with the added benefit of some exquisite illustrations, and recipes too along the way.

www.bethchatto.co.uk

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Celebrating Botanical Art & artists

Posted on April 24, 2012 by Sara Davison

Visited the Society of Botanical Artists’ (www.soc-botanical-artists.org) annual exhibition in Westminster today, what a treat.  Over 700 works on display meaning that on entering the hall you left behind a dismal damp morning in central London and exchanged it for a celebration of the plant world exquisitely rendered in a variety of media.  One picture of a primrose (Primula vulgaris) in watercolour on vellum was so lifelike you could sense the texture of the leaves in your fingertips.

Returning home the weather tempted me into the garden so I weeded, planted some Digitalis ‘Sutton’s Apricot’ seeds for next year and some Borage (Borago officianalis) for adding to my Pimms this summer.  This time 12 months ago it was Easter Sunday which meant no work on the re-design for a few days, so I return you to the crab apple whose blossom is finally opening. The cool weather we’ve had this April has meant that blossom and bulbs are lasting for weeks rather than days which is great, it’s always swings and roundabouts in the garden!

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Happy Earth Day!

Posted on April 22, 2012 by Sara Davison

This is for all fellow gardeners out there working to make their plot, whatever the size, beautiful. Here in the Surrey Hills it is typical April weather, showers and sunshine; just perfect for making the flowers grow and helping to create an English country garden. As I write this it is raining and the sky is dark grey, but in turn that makes all the fresh green foliage glow. Likewise I know that the bluebell woods nearby will be getting ready to look their best – and the perfume of a bluebell wood, after a shower of rain, is something to be experienced.

In celebration of Earth Day I give you a photo of my favourite bluebell wood.

Continue reading →

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Transformation – days 2 & 3

Posted on April 20, 2012 by Sara Davison

Lots of progress made in two days, and what was most exciting was that the impact plants I’d selected were delivered.  In the plan my designer had placed 5 plants at various intersections of the path, punctuation points so to speak, as well as a large ‘something’ to give some seclusion to the reading area.  We visited her wholesaler  in the weeks before work began to select what the items would be – I had a completely open mind; we thought evergreens, as my garden lacked these – maybe some sort of conifer for the 5 points, but much depended on what was in stock, and looking good.

Spring in a plant wholesaler is like a visit to the garden centre only more so – because the shrubs and trees are in all sizes almost from acorn to mighty oak (and prices to match) so if you want an instant garden you can buy it.  It was wonderful!  Fresh in from Italy, and catching my eye immediately were some box (Buxus) spirals, and once I’d seen them my mind was made up, no need to look at anything else.  We put five to one side.  Plans for a larger evergreen went by the wayside when we saw some large multi-stemmed Crab Apples (Malus) about to burst into blossom – my specimen plants were selected!

Also over the course of the two days the building materials were delivered – bricks, sand, oak posts, railway sleepers, more bricks and more sand.  The scalpings (stone chips) that would provide the foundation for the path and the sitting areas were laid, the plan was really coming to life.

The two images show my box trees and the crab apple (white blossom) and just some of the building materials.

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Transformation – day 1

Posted on April 18, 2012 by Sara Davison

This is what I came home to after the guys had been at work for one day – just two of them, with spades and wheelbarrows!  Originally we hoped to use a [small] digger, which would have fascinated the little boy next door, but the access to my garden, at the side of my neighbour’s house, was too narrow.  They worked so hard, and April 2011 was hot.  The diary images I’ve captured on my iPhone, and I  used the Momento App to write up my impressions as we went along – and now I’m blogging the experience – don’t you just love technology?

What this picture doesn’t show, probably because it was all a bit traumatic at the time, is the mountain of topsoil, removed from my garden, that the guys had deposited in the garden on the left hand side.  I’d offered it to my neighbour for his allotment, rather than see it taken away; the soil round here is pretty good stuff.  It was enormous, 3 tons or so – more than either of us had anticipated and he still had to barrow it to his allotment!  We laugh about it now, but it gave me a bit of a sleepless night at the time.

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Beginning the transformation

Posted on April 17, 2012 by Sara Davison

Work to change the landscape in my garden began one year ago tomorrow – and I’ve posted another image of  ‘before’.  The red ribbon on the tree in the foreground was the marker I used to tell the team that an item was to be left in place – otherwise everything was going to go.  During the preceding weeks I’d carefully lifted all the plants I wanted to keep, and now had about 200 ‘treasures’ planted up in pots and safely stored in the gardens of my neighbours either side of me.  Their support was very valuable, had I not been able to annex a corner of their gardens for a few weeks, I’m not sure what I would have done.  I was also very lucky that there was no hosepipe ban in 2011.

I made my way around the garden with my camera – capturing the view I’d lived with for the past 10 years and trying to imagine how it would look when I returned home from work the next day.  It was a bit daunting, but overall my feeling was of excitement.

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