As harmony is to a tune, so colour is to a garden: it gives a more precise feeling and mood to the under¬lying design. Colour alone cannot make a garden, but it can enrich the design and highlight different parts of the scheme at different times. It can attract atten¬tion by means of bright Read more...
Sunlight is essential because it is absorbed by chlorophyll in the plant cells and converts moisture absorbed through the roots and carbon dioxide absorbed through the leaves into sugar and water. This vital food-making process is known as photosynthesis. Generally, the sunnier a plant’s Read more...
From time to time most gardeners long for an all-green garden. It is a longing for clarity and simplicity, for a rest from the business of gardening. The in¬spiration may be found in a formal garden: picture a white-painted weatherboard house with a long veran¬dah overlooking still trees and Read more...
It is ironic to think that every historical garden style was once the latest thing, fresh and exciting. But what makes a garden modern today? Certainly not the plants themselves, for the world contains no more un¬explored continents to offer us startling new introduc¬tions as it did during the Read more...
Each of us sees colour differently, and one person’s idea of bright harmonies may be another person’s chamber of horrors. Nevertheless, there are certain basic guidelines which will help to produce harmoniz¬ing colours. Thereafter it is up to the individual to satisfy his or her Read more...
These have become popular in recent years in the wake of such famous examples as the white garden at Sissinghurst. They represent an extremely disci¬plined form of gardening in that the gardener has to work with a very limited palette. This can have its advantages: the emphasis is thrown back on Read more...