I had lunch today with some beekeeping friends, plus one honorary beekeeper. It was very pleasant sitting in somebody else's garden in the sunshine. Our host tells me that I should sit and contemplate oftener, and she is probably right, but when you are at home things that need doing always catch your eye. My friend's garden is beautifully tidy, much tidier than mine (though I suppose it helps at this time of the year not being infested with mares tail), but even so I couldn't resist teasing a tiny piece of annual meadow grass out from between two paving slabs in the otherwise almost weed-free patio. There were a couple of bigger bits under the garden table, but it seemed too rude and eccentric to crawl under the table to pull them out.
I have seen my friend's garden develop over the past several years into an enclosed space with a real sense of place. It is a good sized town garden, that runs gently uphill away from the house. When she first lived there it was divided half way down its length by a small retaining wall and narrow flower bed. There was a great expanse of lawn, and a little planting around the edges. She says that there used to be almost no birds, presumably because there was no cover for them, and not much in the way of forage. With the help of two designers (Writtle trained, I was happy to hear) and a sympathetic landscaper it has been gradually transformed. The bisecting wall, thin bed and steps have gone, replaced by a grass slope so that the eye can run smoothly from the house to the furthest point. The narrow borders around the edge have been made wider, which allows for decent planting, and brought forward around half way up the garden to divide it so that you can't see all of it at once from any single point. She has planted quite a few birch trees, which went in as semi-mature specimens in high summer a few years back. She followed her landscaper's instruction to keep them well watered diligently, and lost very few, an example I cite now to customers who ask if they can plant trees in the summer.
Birds have come into the garden, and it feels more secure and comfortable for people too. It is unsettling to be marooned in the middle of a large blank space. As a child I was never too keen on recreation grounds, apart from the fact that I disliked sport, and much preferred the woodland gardens of Killerton. My friend's garden has achieved a sense of being in a place by dint of putting limits around it, in the form of shrubs, birch trunks and pergolas. Putting an object in the middle of a space, either a specimen plant or some sort of sculpture, can achieve the same effect, which seems to work for animals as well as people. I have noticed if we have a vase of flowers on the dining room table and one of the cats is lying on the table (sorry, but we do wipe the table before serving food on it), the cat will lie next to the vase oftener than not.
The winter plant casualties were about as I would expect. Sweet bay, cut to the ground but sprouting from ground level. Daphne bholua 'Jacqueline Postill' also sprouting from very low down, which did not entirely surprise me, given how mine suckers. Ceanothus mostly dead, though I was surprised to see one branch of one shrub throwing leaves from the actual trunk. Whether it will ever make a decent shaped plant again is another matter. Choisya ternata battered but coming back from low down.
The latest project has been to make a paved area behind a rolling bank of soil, held back by a stone retaining wall, at the very top of the garden. This is a good idea, as it means that your walk up the hill leads to a definite place. There are some boulders and ferns, and I see scope for artworks as finances permit and the right object crops up.
We were royally well fed, and had a thoroughly lazy afternoon, apart from our host. It is very nice to relax in a garden, and so much easier when it isn't your own.
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