Alliums and astrantias

If we had to name two must-have Chelsea plants, it would be these. Few gardens are complete without a sprinkling of alliums, aka the onion family. Usually it’s the ornamental alliums such as Star of Persia (Allium christophii) and ‘Purple Sensation’ that star, rather than the edibles, but with the grow-your-own trend still building, expect to see some of the tastier alliums on display: Adam Frost’s Sowing The Seeds Of Change garden for Homebase includes garlic chives (A. tuberosum). A new astrantia variety called ‘White Giant’ will feature in Chris Beardshaw’s garden for Arthritis Research UK, while Ulf Nordfjell will use the much-loved cultivar ‘Shaggy’ in his Laurent-Perrier garden.

Big-name designers

Some recent winners are noticeably absent this year, with Cleve West, Tom Stuart-Smith and Andy Sturgeon all taking a break. And if you’re wondering what’s happened to Diarmuid Gavin, he of the brash pyramid-with-loopy-slide job you either loved or hated, he’s eschewed Chelsea in favour of Hampton Court this year. The Marmite moment may well be provided by The Sound Of Silence, designer Fernando Gonzalez’s take on Japanese zen gardens: it features a single bonsai tree, ripples of acrylic “stone” and very little else.

Controversy

From fears of overcrowding and overcommercialisation to rows between designers and disagreements over judging methods, controversy is never far away. One classic example involved Top Gear presenter James May’s plasticine garden in 2009, which was shockingly free of live plants. The disagreements haven’t always been so trifling, though: in 1986, Newham council withdrew a planned exhibit in protest at a South African government stand.

Death and destruction

Not, it’s true, something instantly conjured up by Chelsea, but perhaps the mounting threats to the world of horticulture – from ash dieback disease to the plight of the honeybee – have prompted some designers to take a more downbeat approach this year, albeit with a positive message at the core. Kate Gould’s The Wasteland garden will show how salvaged objects from corrugated steel panels to (brace yourself) crazy paving can be used to create havens for wildlife and people in unloved urban areas. Stop the Spread, Jo Thompson’s garden for the Food and Environment Research Agency and the National Trust, includes an avenue of dead trees, representing the threat to our landscape posed by newly rampant pests and diseases and invasive non-natives.

Environment

The Guardian’s John Vidal caused a stir last year when he called the show “nature for the 1%”, but he’s far from the first to berate Chelsea for its excess and the size of its carbon footprint: trees and hard landscaping materials shipped from all over the globe to create a six-day wonder. John Walker, author of How To Create An Eco Garden, says some exhibits do showcase greener ways to garden, but he wonders about their impact. “It’s good to have Chelsea gardens that show what could be, but how many people who come through those gates have done something in the garden to make a difference to the world – building a rain garden or a green roof, or started growing vegetables? I don’t think many do.”

Fresh

The 15 show gardens always draw the most attention, but don’t forget the smaller plots. The 11 gardens in the “fresh” category are where you’ll find the most far-out designs, while the eight artisan gardens are probably the most useful for the average punter, providing small-scale ideas you can put into practice in tiny spaces: expect wall-to-wall rustic shacks and cottage garden planting.

Gnomes

Gnomes were banned, but this year the RHS has embraced them. Photograph: Alamy

They’ve been a no-no up until now (the rules state no coloured sculptures, as well as no balloons, bunting or flags), but this year the RHS has relented and allowed gnomes to feature. In fact, it has embraced the gnome theme, auctioning off figures decorated by celebrities to raise cash for the RHS Campaign for School Gardening. A gnome called Borage did creep into Jekka McVicar’s stand in 2009.”I have never understood the prejudice against gnomes,” McVicar said. “To me, they just represent our search for a bit of magic.” Gnome lovers shouldn’t get too excited, though – the ban will be back in 2014.

Hitches

At the time of writing, the stone for Ulf Nordfjell’s garden is stuck on a container ship docked for repairs in Malta, when it should have reached the UK three weeks ago. Mark Fane of garden builder Crocus blogged: “It’s going to be a stressful few weeks. Without the stone, we have no garden…” And yet somehow the gardens come together, even if it involves a last push conducted under the headlights of the vans.

Irises

This spring’s cold start means there’s a question mark over whether all the plants will be blooming in time, including that Chelsea icon, the bearded iris. “It’s all about the timing and holding your nerve – an awful lot happens in the last week before the show,” says Robin Wallis of Hortus Loci, which is supplying 70,000-80,000 plants for some of the top designers, including Chris Beardshaw, Jinny Blom and Nigel Dunnett. Nurseries use all kinds of tricks to bring on or hold back plants from flowering, Wallis says. Iris buds are held closed using cotton wool and string, and boiled egg tops put over the top of peony buds will stop them opening. But most techniques are more obvious: moving plants between different areas of the nursery, some warm, some cooler. “You can hold things back by about a week and you can push things forward by two to three weeks if you have plenty of warmth, but if you push plants too hard, when they come to the show, they’ll flop.” Rusty red irises are a favourite, something Gardens Illustrated magazine dates back to Christopher Bradley-Hole’s modernist garden of 1997. This year will be no different: Beardshaw will be using a maroon and golden iris called ‘Supreme Sultan’.

Japan

Probably the most keenly awaited of the 15 show gardens is that of Bradley-Hole, back after an absence of eight years. RHS historian Brent Elliott called his 1997 garden “a turning point in modern British garden design, showcasing a minimalist style and sparse planting”. This year he will be offering “a Japanese-inspired abstraction of the English landscape”. Let’s hope he can produce another mould-breaking design.

Kaiser

Dozens of plants make their debut at Chelsea, and among them is always a clutch of clematis – one of the most enduringly popular of garden plants. The trend seems to be compact plants, suitable for containers and among low-growing shrubs; one of the best-looking is ‘Kaiser’ from Thorncroft Clematis, with dark pink double flowers that sport a lighter pink, spiky centre. Breeder Raymond Evison is debuting a compact, single-flowered form in creamy white called (predictably) ‘Chelsea’.

Lingholm

This variety of the Himalayan blue poppy (Meconopsis) is set to become one of Chelsea’s most desirable plants. Its sky-blue blooms will nod effortlessly in the wetlands of Nigel Dunnett’s RBC Blue Water roof garden, but beware: to replicate the look at home, you’ll need dozens of plants, and a moist, humus-rich spot to put them in.

Marquee

The plant nuts make a beeline for the marquee. This huge space, heavy with pollen and petals, is where nurseries put on their show. Before 1951, nurseries exhibited in a hodgepodge of tents, but then along came the Great Marquee, all 3.5 acres of it, named in the Guinness Book of Records as the world’s largest tent. A new millennium meant a new tent: the Great Marquee was replaced in 2000 by a more modern modular structure, and the fabric of the old shelter was used to make 7,000 bags, aprons and jackets. (If you missed out on those, Liberty sells satin inspired by the marquee.) Three nurseries that exhibited at the first Chelsea in 1913 are still showing: McBean’s Orchids, peony and iris growers Kelways and begonia and delphinium growers Blackmore Langdon’s.

Natives

It’s a trend that’s been building for a few years, but 2013 may be the peak of Chelsea’s obsession with native plants. From pongy wild garlic in Jamie Dunstan’s garden to the rare, green-winged orchid (Anacamptis morio) in Robert Myers’s, they’ll be everywhere.

One hundred years

It’s the show’s centenary, so expect nostalgia all round, but don’t expect many replicas of the rock gardens that dominated the first few decades. However, rhododendrons, much favoured in Chelsea’s early years, are undergoing a revival: R. yakushimanum is one of the contenders for the RHS’s plant of the centenary award, and R. macabeanum will be on show in the East Village garden designed by Michael Balston and Marie-Louise Agius.

Pleaching

Last year’s Laurent-Perrier garden made the most of topiary and pleaching. Photograph: Alamy

You may not know your pleaching from your cloud pruning, but spend any time at Chelsea and you’ll see the range of ways to train a tree, from balls of box to espaliered apples. The trend seems to encompass the current enthusiasm for native plants: Myers is pleaching (training trees to produce a narrow screen or hedge) the humble field maple (Acer campestre), Paul Hervey Brookes has hornbeam (Carpinus betulus) “cubes” in his BrandAlley garden, and Bradley-Hole promises hazel (Corylus avellana) in a new “designed” form, whatever that means.

Queen

The show is forever wooing its patrons, the royals: the RHS sent the then Princess Elizabeth, aged 10, tickets to Chelsea after hearing that she had started to plant a little garden of her own. The tradition continues: the Sentebale charity founded by Prince Harry has a Lesotho-inspired garden designed by Jinny Blom, so we can expect a visit from the red-haired one.

Rain

The show can stand or fall on the weather – quite literally. In 1932, a summerhouse on display fell to pieces in heavy rain. One year, a particularly wet and disgruntled nurseryman called Clarence Elliott declared that the show should be renamed the Chelsea Shower Flower; 1971 and 1995 were particularly wet, while 2010 was blazing hot. If rain does arrive, it’ll be good news for the Trailfinders Australian garden, which is packed full of water-saving features, including a tank for collecting rainwater and a billabong that doubles as swimming pool.

Sponsors

There would be no Chelsea without sponsors willing to splash the cash (roughly £150,000 to £300,000, depending on plot size) to build a show garden. They vary from the glamorous (Laurent-Perrier) to the mundane (pipeline manufacturer Stockton Drilling). Some sponsors give designers a free rein; others have a specific brief and want them to include plants that can be sold to the public.

Titchmarsh

It’s hard to imagine Chelsea without Alan Titchmarsh on TV – he started co-presenting the show way back in 1983 and hasn’t missed a year since. At least you can say he knows how it feels: he’s made two show gardens, and won a gold in 1985 for a country kitchen garden.

Umbellifers

Anthriscus sylvestris ‘Ravenswing’ – that’s posh purple cow-parsley to most of us – is a Chelsea staple. The show has been awash with umbellifers the past few years, from Tom Stuart-Smith’s favourite Cenolophium denudatum to two-time best-in-show winner Cleve West’s parsnip flowers. Why? Because they’re semi-transparent, a handy quality in a garden that visitors can see into only from the side, and because they chime with the zeitgeisty mood for “wild” flowers.

Volunteers

Nicking a successful formula from the London Olympics, the RHS has recruited 130 volunteers as “show makers”, to greet visitors and “create a buzz”.

Women designers

Gertrude Jekyll, Vita Sackville-West, Margery Fish – there’s no shortage of influential women in horticulture. Women also outnumber men more than two to one in the Society of Garden Designers. Yet when it comes to designing a garden at Chelsea, it’s a bit of a boys’ club, with a few notable exceptions such as Kate Gould, Jinny Blom and Jo Thompson.

X Factor

Alan Titchmarsh warned earlier this month that Chelsea is in danger of dying out because young people brought up on a diet of The X Factor and Britain’s Got Talent are unlikely to pick horticulture as a career. He may have a point: scan the crowds at Chelsea, and you’ll find a lot of grey hair in evidence. The Chelsea Fringe festival, now in its second year, may help by offering younger gardeners a hip alternative.

Yew

Topiary was everywhere in 2012, but will 2013 be another bumper year? Such a staple is unlikely to disappear completely, but this year it’s all about fruit trees: from the crab apple ‘Evereste’ in Roger Platts’ MG garden to the apples and pears in Adam Frost’s family garden.

Zoology

Lions, goblins, prancing children… If you’re looking for a piece of sculpture for your garden, you’re spoiled for choice at Chelsea’s array of trade stands. There will not, however, be live animals on display. Chelsea’s “no livestock” rule is waived only on exceptional occasions: 25 koi carp were permitted in 2002 for the World of Koi garden, and last year a corgi called Cawdie modelled a dog kennel in Thompson’s romantic garden for the Caravan Club. RHS historian Brent Elliott reports a legend that the models in swimsuits posing in one of Winkfield Manor Nurseries’ show gardens in the 1950s were removed on the orders of the RHS’s assistant secretary, who invoked the no livestock rule. How times change: these days, no Chelsea press day is complete without several women clad in little more than a thick layer of body paint.

• For more information on the Chelsea flower show, visit rhs.org.uk, and for full coverage go to guardian.co.uk/gardens

Click photo to enlarge

Marin

• California Orchids’ spring sale is from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. at 515 Aspen Road in Bolinas. Call 868-0203 or go to www.californiaorchids.com.

• Glenn Smith of Marin Master Gardeners speaks about “Basic Irrigation for Home and Container Gardens” from 9 to 10:30 a.m. May 11 at the Falkirk Cultural Center at 1408 Mission Ave. in San Rafael. $5. Call 473-4204 or go to www.marinmg.org.

• A Marin Master Gardeners “Beekeeping Introduction” seminar with Serge Labesque is from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. May 11 at the Indian Valley Organic Farm at 1800 Ignacio Blvd. in Novato. $50. Call 473-4204 or go to www.marinmg.org.

• The 17th annual Ross Garden Tour, “Beyond the Garden Gate,” is from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. May 11 starting at Ross School at Lagunitas and Allen avenues in Ross. A free shuttle departs from College of Marin parking lot 15 on Kent Avenue in Kentfield. $40 to $50. Call 457-2705 or go to www.ross gardentour.org.

• The Marin Chapter of the California Native Plant Society’s plant sale is from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. May 11 at Green Point Nursery at 275 Olive Ave. in Novato. Call 892-9148 or email torgovitsky@comcast.net.

• The Sonoma Marin Saving Water Partnership’s third annual

free self-guided eco-friendly garden tour is from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. May 11. Go to www.savingwaterpartnership.org/programs/eco-friendly- garden-tour to register. Call 707-547-1933 for details.

• In Spirit’s annual plant sale, benefiting local quadriplegics, is from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. May 8 at 2 Grant Ave. in Woodacre. Call 488-0477 or go to www.inspirit-marin.org.

• A free Marin Bee Company workshop, “The Basics of Beekeeping,” is at 11 a.m. May 11 at Whole Foods Market at 790 De Long Ave. in Novato. Call 878-0455 or go to www.marinbeecompany.com/work shops.html.

• The Marin Rose Society’s annual spring rose show is from 12:30 to 4 p.m. May 11 at the north end of Northgate Mall in San Rafael. Enter your own roses in the show from 7 to 10 a.m. Call 457-6045 or go to www.marinrose.org.

• West Marin Commons offers a weekly harvest exchange at 1:30 p.m. Saturdays at the Livery Stable gardens on the commons in Point Reyes Station. Go to www.westmarin commons.org.

• The Marin County Outdoor Antique Market, with antiques, collectibles, books, jewelry, art, rugs and vintage furniture, is from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. May 12 in the parking lot of the Marin County Veterans Memorial Auditorium at 10 Avenue of the Flags in San Rafael. Free. Call 383-2552 or go to www.golden gateshows.com.

• Volunteers are sought to help in Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy nurseries from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesdays at Tennessee Valley, 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Wednesdays at Muir Woods or 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. Wednesdays or 9 a.m. to noon Saturdays in the Marin Headlands. Call 561-3077 or go to www.parksconservancy.org/volunteer.

• Master rosarian Barbara Gordon speaks at Marin Rose Society program at 7 p.m. May 14 in the Livermore Room at the Marin Art Garden Center at 30 Sir Francis Drake Blvd. in Ross. $5. Call 457-6045 or go to www.marinrose.org.

• A Novato Community Garden kick-off event is from 7 to 8:30 p.m. May 16 at All Saints Lutheran Church at 2 San Marin Drive in Novato. Call 897-2302 or go to www.novato communitygarden.org.

• The SPAWN (Salmon Protection and Watershed Network) native plant nursery days are from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Fridays and weekends. Call 663-8590, ext. 114, or email jonathan@tirn.net to register and for directions.

• The AIA Marin Living: Home Tours event is from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. May 18 at homes in Mill Valley, Ross, San Rafael and Tiburon. $60 to $85. Call 362-7397 or go to www.aiasf.org/hometours.

• The Marin Municipal Water District’s free self-guided Marin-Friendly Garden Tour is from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. May 18. Call 945-1521 or go to www.marinwater.org to register.

• Elizabeth Ruiz teaches “Spring Pruning of Japanese Maples” at 10:30 a.m. May 18 at Sloat Garden Center at 401 Miller Ave. in Mill Valley. $5. Call 388-0365.

• Marin Open Garden Project (MOGP) volunteers are available to help Marin residents glean excess fruit from their trees for donations to local organizations serving people in need and to build raised beds to start vegetable gardens through the MicroGardens program. MGOP also offers a garden tool lending library. Go to www.opengardenproject.org or email contact@opengarden project.org.

• Marin Master Gardeners and the Marin Municipal Water District offer free residential Bay-Friendly Garden Walks to MMWD customers. The year-round service helps homeowners identify water-saving opportunities and soil conservation techniques for their landscaping. Call 473-4204 to request a visit to your garden.

San Francisco

• The Conservatory of Flowers, at 100 John F. Kennedy Drive in Golden Gate Park, displays permanent galleries of tropical plant species as well as changing special exhibits from 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Tuesdays through Sundays. $2 to $7. Call 831-2090 or go to www.conservatoryofflowers.org.

• The San Francisco Botanical Garden Society, at Ninth Avenue and Lincoln Way in Golden Gate Park, offers several ongoing events. $7; free to San Francisco residents, members and school groups. Call 661-1316 or go to www.sf botanicalgarden.org. Free docent tours leave from the Strybing Bookstore near the main gate at 1:30 p.m. weekdays, 10:30 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. weekends; and from the north entrance at 2 p.m. Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays. Groups of 10 or more can call ahead for special-focus tours.

Around the Bay

• Cornerstone Gardens is a permanent, gallery-style garden featuring walk-through installations by international landscape designers on nine acres at 23570 Highway 121 in Sonoma. Free. Call 707-933-3010 or go to www.corner stonegardens.com.

• Garden Valley Ranch rose garden is open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Wednesdays through Sundays at 498 Pepper Road in Petaluma. Self-guided and group tours are available. $2 to $10. Call 707-795-0919 or go to www.gardenvalley.com.

• The Luther Burbank Home at Santa Rosa and Sonoma avenues in Santa Rosa has docent-led tours of the greenhouse and a portion of the gardens every half hour from 10 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Tuesdays through Sundays. $7. Call 707-524-5445.

• McEvoy Ranch at 5935 Red Hill Road in Petaluma offers tips on planting olive trees and has olive trees for sale by appointment. Call 707-769-4123 or go to www.mcevoy ranch.com.

• Wednesdays are volunteer days from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. at Occidental Arts and Ecology Center at 15290 Coleman Valley Road in Occidental. Call 707-874-1557, ext. 201, or go to www.oaec.org.

• Quarryhill Botanical Garden at 12841 Sonoma Highway in Glen Ellen offers third Saturday docent-led tours at 10 a.m. March through October. The garden covers 61 acres. The garden is open for self-guided tours from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily. $5 to $10. Call 707-996-3166 or go to www.quarryhillbg.org.

The Trowel Glove Calendar appears Saturdays. Send high-resolution jpg photo attachments and details about your event to calendar@marinij.com or mail to Home and Garden Calendar/Lifestyles, Marin Independent Journal, 4000 Civic Center Drive, Suite 301, San Rafael, CA 94903. Items should be sent two weeks in advance. Photos should be a minimum of 1 megabyte and include caption information. Include a daytime phone number on your release.

Students all over Swampscott should be prepared; gardening will be the next big thing if teachers at the high school have it their way.

Joseph Bennett, a Special Education teacher at Swampscott High School first came up with the idea of creating a garden behind the high school building after watching a report on creating gardens in schools broadcast by the television show “60 Minutes.”

“My [class]room overlooks the space,” Bennett said. “It was a patch of grass that was completely underutilized. I spoke with [Joanna] Ganci [the English department head], and we decided to apply for a grant from the Swampscott Education Foundation.”

The SEF initially rejected the application, citing that more of a tie-in with education was necessary, Bennett said. Bennett and Ganci then turned to Brandy Wilbur, the STEM (Science Technology Engineering and Mathematics) Coordinator for the high school.

“[Wilbur] has more experience with grants and a working knowledge of STEM,” said Bennett. “So we revamped the grant and we were given $10,000.”

However, the $10,000 is not enough funding to cover all that the trio hopes to create in the garden.

“We reached out to local landscapers and got in touch with Lahey Landscapers,” said Bennett. “They made the garden beds…we brought in a landscape architect who took pictures of the space and a created a whole design.”

The garden remains to be finished, and Bennett hopes that a local landscaping or construction company will help with the completion of the project.

However, more funding is necessary in order to complete the garden. On Thursday, May 9, the three teachers will be holding a ribbon cutting ceremony fundraiser to celebrate the beginning of the garden and to raise money for the yet to be completed aspects of the garden.

The event is sponsored by Lynn Meatland, which is donating all food and services free of charge, as well as Treadwell’s Ice Cream of Peabody. Dinner will be provided for $10 a person, and sundaes for $5.

The garden was presented to the School Committee at a March 27 meeting, where it was described as an outdoor classroom consisting of picnic tables and chairs, an amphitheatre, a meditation garden, the garden beds, and a work table and classroom area.

Other fundraising efforts were mentioned, including a memorial brick project, in which participants could pay to have their or another’s name engraved on a brick, which would then be placed as a part of the garden.

Classes have already begun working on the garden, completing tasks such as soil testing.

“We want to cultivate relationships with teachers,” said Bennett. “It’s up to them to use the space…and not just high school teachers, but teachers from every school in the district.”

For more information, visit highschool.swampscott.k12.ma.us and visit the Outdoor Classroom page

She’s there in the vintage vase you set on your dining room table. And in the lilacs you pick from the bush you planted together.

Moms have a way of leaving their touch on the homes and hearts of future generations. To celebrate Mother’s Day, we asked readers to share stories about how their mothers influenced their own decorating or gardening styles.

Here we share just a few of the many stories we received, all of them filled with memories and love. Sit back, read them and think of Mom.

 • May Klisch, Milwaukee:

I grew up in equatorial Singapore, with a lush garden full of fruit trees and Asian herbs in our first home. As long as I can remember, we had two tall trees that gave us shade, but the rest of the garden was chock-full of all things edible: three mature rambutan trees yielding sweet, juicy fleshed fruit like lychees, except they had red or yellow hairy skins. These were favorites of my mother’s, as she grew up in a well-to-do family in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, with all sorts of exotic fruit available from their private garden at any time, and no doubt she and my father were determined that our relatively small suburban plot would yield whatever it could. . . .

I never saw my mother garden, meaning that she wasn’t ever bent over the beds putting seeds or plants down, nor do I recall her ever having dirt under her always perfectly manicured nails. However, she certainly knew how to make the most of the garden’s harvest, and it seems now almost effortless how she either directed (my father) or others to coax so much from our limited space.

In my own kitchen garden, I always hold great optimism that I can get just a couple more seeds or plants in that raised bed. Abundance and fertility – I think these are two of my mother’s gifts to me, in the literal garden and in the garden of life.

 • Cynthia Zarazua, instructor, International Learning Center, Neighborhood House of Milwaukee:

I’m a very eclectic person. I inherited this trait from both my parents, but mostly from my mom. I grew up poor in Milwaukee with eight siblings. With few resources, my mother limited her enormous creativity to indoors. My mother would crochet her own lace curtains, form/color her own pottery, and whenever she would find cheap paint, we would come home to our living room being a whole new color. We had at least 10 plants to each room, all of them different colors and impeccably cared for.

At first, my mother’s taste embarrassed me. But as I grew up, I learned that her ability to be creative while being broke is a tremendous and viable skill. She would teach us how to make all of our own clothing. In high school, I got kicked out of school for wearing a halter top. The teacher said, “I’m going to tell your mother!” I said back, “Go ahead, she taught me how to make it. . . . “

Today, I have about 17 plants to each room, most of them housed in pots that either myself or my mother made. You learn a lot from being broke, and my mother lives on in every bright color and bloom that I now live in. 

 • Dawn R. Mackey, Pewaukee:

How does one know what traits are inherited or which are learned behavior through personal experiences? I believe it’s a little bit of both. I can say this because my mother has been deceased for the past 34 years. She died on my 15th birthday, yet I feel her presence, wit and style on a daily basis.

My memories are many of her beauty and fashionable style shining through, even as she fought her battle against juvenile diabetes. She lost her eyesight when I was in second grade but never failed to have my brothers and me make sure her nails were painted. She wore perfume with beautiful nightgowns, always a lady.

Through pictures, I see her sense of style: Furniture placed perfectly and maybe a little over the top. Everything matched and had its place, as is true for my own sense of decorating. My oldest daughter states I am “froo-la-la” in my tastes. To me, I am just girlie and love to do my own thing, which I do believe comes from my mother. I was left some of her personal items, such as Depression glass, and beautiful rhinestone costume jewelry that I wear and decorate with today. It fits my style, and I feel this is a way to always keep her in my heart.

 • Katie Zapfel, Milwaukee:

I hate gardening. When I was a teenager, my mother (a farmer’s daughter) filled my summer vacation with forced labor. Helping her dig flower beds and pull weeds until the wet dirt planted itself under my perfectly polished fingernails. Sometimes she even interrupted my lounging on the lawn chair to actually mow the lawn.

But our work was beautiful. Hearty hostas led to the front door, where purple petunias welcomed us home. Mom’s garden stocked our kitchen with red ripe tomatoes, snappy green beans and buttery sweet corn.

Soon I left for college. And when I returned home for the summer I vowed not to lift a green thumb in my mother’s garden. I was an adult now. I had rights. But then, something unexpected happened.

One morning, peacefully in her sleep, my mother died. Brain aneurysm. She was 51. And I was right; her flower beds went untouched that summer. Decades later, I’m a mom with, gasp, a garden of my own. I have pink gloves, a green plastic watering can and the relentless weeds. All just like my mother’s.

I still hate gardening, but I finally understand the joy of working the earth and the quiet satisfaction of feeding my family with food grown by my own hands. I feel my mother’s love. I see the excitement in my children’s eyes as they help me plant perennials and pick strawberries. And I savor it, while it lasts.

 • Heather Gergen, Pewaukee:

When I moved into my first college apartment in Rochester, N.Y., I heard a knock at my front door. Imagine my surprise. My grandparents (from Ohio) were standing there with toolbox in hand and smiles on their faces. Every time someone in our family would move into a new place, Grandma would arrive as the boxes were being unpacked to work her magic, and I was no exception.

My grandmother was an interior designer who trained in Paris, but don’t get me wrong, she wasn’t a design snob. She figured out practical, do-it-yourself solutions for everyone on a tight budget and passed those skills on to me from a young age – before HGTV. When I was 8, we decorated an old Victorian-style dollhouse together. Our pièce de résistance was making fancy Paris-style salon chairs out of toilet paper rolls covered with satin and beaded with faux pearls.

The summer before I was married, we reupholstered my parents’ 20 year-old couch into a piece that lasted another 10 years. She taught me that a piece with “good bones” is worth fixing up . . . (and) how to arrange a grouping of photos on a wall. . . .

When we moved into our most recent house 10 years ago, she came and sewed curtains for our bedroom. They look as beautiful today as they did when she hung them on the windows. She passed away two years ago, but when I see her beautiful touches throughout my home, I think of the love showed to all of us by teaching us to live by her example.

 • Jim Bartelt, Milwaukee, owner of Jim Bartelt Interiors:

My mother died when I was a teenager, and eventually my father remarried. I did menial jobs and was so unhappy.

My stepmother said, “Any room or décor you put together is always so good and unique. I think you should go to interior design school.”

For the first time in my life I actually listened and went to design school in Chicago, and here I am.

Thanks, Alyce.

 • Barbara Johnson, West Bend:

My mom is one of those people who seems to have been born with what some would call “effortless style. . . . ” When I was about 5 or 6, I began to notice Mom’s skill in creating appealing vignettes throughout our home. . . . The little odds and ends she found to accessorize the room were placed on tables, shelves and walls in ways that compelled you to examine them more closely. . . . To this day, when I set something on a table or shelf or hang something on a wall in my own home, I think of Mom and the care and consideration she’d take in its placement. After decades of contemplating what skill it is that she possesses or process she employs that allows her to achieve these desirable effects, I’ve come to the conclusion that it boils down to the fact that everything that my mom does is done with love.

 • Kathie Bernstein, executive director, Jewish Museum, Milwaukee:

Mother and I loved to visit Goodwill, and I have a couple of pieces of furniture from there as well as some true heirlooms from my family. My decorating style is really eclectic because I also have some contemporary pieces, too. I appreciate having well-used pieces. For me, the history of an object is so interesting and nearly everything has a possibility.

 • Brian Brehmer, Milwaukee:

I thought I would write not about my mother but about my grandmother instead. My grandmother was more of an influence on me and my life than even I knew. When she passed away, there were various things that I incorporated into my own house and style.

The most important reminder of my grandmother sits in my living room in the form of a 19th-century reclining chair that sat in her home my entire life and which she gave to me for Christmas in 1998. I refer to it as my grandma’s chair, and no one is allowed to sit in it. At Christmastime, I decorate the tree with, among other things, ornaments that once sat on her tree.

Even some of my collections can be connected to her. I collected Nativity scenes because of the one I remember her having when I was a child. I collect an assortment of figures because I remember her having various little figures on display in her house. On my wall above my desk is a framed collection of 1893 cards from the Columbian Exposition which I uncovered after her death, and pictures of my late grandfather and father nearby.

How did my grandmother inspire me? She showed me that what you surround yourself with should not only make you happy but remind you of the important things in your life.

 • Susan Finco, De Pere:

Geraniums. Big, red geraniums in pots on the patio. My mother, Rita Finco, always asked for geraniums for Mother’s Day because they were colorful and could stand up to the cool summer nights (she was a longtime Cudahy resident). But it wasn’t until we visited her birthplace in Asiago, Italy, that I realized why she loved geraniums so much.

Everywhere you look in Asiago, there are red geraniums in flower boxes, in pots and in gardens; literally thousands of them! My mother left Asiago with her mother in 1929 at age 13 to come to the U.S. I am sure the geraniums reminded her of Italy. Through the years, as I started to garden, I also planted red geraniums. Now, they are the main flowers in the pots on our patio. And every time I look at them, I think of her.

 • Michael Gaffney, Milwaukee:

My mother was Patricia Farrell, nee Gaffney. She was a schoolteacher, as am I, and had a great influence on many aspects of my life. My mother had a great sense of interior designing and a great sense of personal style. While her preferred style was Colonial and mine decidedly modern, I learned from her that everything has its place and a great combination of shapes and colors makes a beautiful room. Everything was neat, clean, tidy and arranged in proper pleasing order.

It’s these observances around me, I think, that led to my very precise, almost formal styling to my career in flower designing. As a beginning designer, I often said to myself, “maybe I should have been a teacher.” Now I’ve combined both designing and teaching with eight schools around the country . . . and I “blame” it all on my mother’s love and “designer genes!”

 • Susan Blink Patrick, Mequon:

We all have a hallway closet
I remember mine of old
My mother stored her magic there
and so as each season would unfold.
She’d pull a vase for pussy willows
When Spring was on its way,
And birthday candles
would appear for brother’s Midsummer special day,
When Fall arrived in burnished hues
a shock of wheat appeared,
upon the mantel it would go
for harvest time was here.
And Christmas brought forth candle rings
from depths of closet store,
and wooden Carolers also made their way
outside the closet door.
Our holidays and seasons passed
with beauty in our midst,
the little things,
the simple truths,
traditions never missed.
Today I’ve grown and in my home
magic still escapes.
My mother’s touch has passed to me,
my closet door awaits,
an opening for each season,
a touch of cheer to all,
dear memories surround me
as my footsteps near the hall!

 • Karen Muth, Menomonee Falls:

My mom, Barbara Dohr Muth, has most definitely influenced my decorating style. Most notably, she instilled in me a deep appreciation for original artwork. Look at her house, and you will see walls covered with local (and national) artist works. . . . Come to my house, and you’ll see that influence. In fact, we both often buy from the same artists.

We cover local art festivals during the summer. And this culminates in September every year, the Sunday after Labor Day, when we both volunteer as alums . . . at the Mount Mary College Starving Artists Show. Mom influenced my decorating style, my appreciation for original artwork, my sense of volunteerism and so much more. I am eternally grateful for and proud of her style, and immensely glad I share that style.

 • Terry Magestro, Oak Creek:

August always sets me into memory mode when I get the fresh scent of dill. That was pickling time, and the small cukes in the garden were ready to be made into dills and bread-and-butter pickles. The dill stalks were leaning to be cut . . . and the scent of dill could be smelled for days.

That was also the place Mom would have us go if we wanted to snack on something before dinner. She’d always say that if we were hungry, “go sit in the garden.” And to this day I will sit in the garden. Nothing tastes better than fresh-picked green beans! Because of that, I always had to have a garden no matter where I was living. Dill and cukes are the number one thing to put in so I can keep that memory alive. . . . Even when I go shopping, I will stop in the produce section and search out the dill just to relive that moment, that special time. A time I wouldn’t trade at all!

 • Lori Van Meter, Muskego:

Although I love my mother dearly, if I adopted her gardening style, my home would be filled with last year’s straggly geraniums that weathered the winter hidden in my basement. (Sorry, Mom!) Somehow the joy of gardening skipped a generation, and it was my grandmother who instilled in me a love of all things green and growing.

As a child, I couldn’t wait to get to Neillsville to see what was blooming in Grandma Pearl’s garden. Her flower garden was the envy of her neighborhood and a source of constant wonderment to me as a child. Of all the glorious colors and shapes to emerge from her garden, it was the brilliant orange poppies that became my favorites.

As we both grew older and it became more difficult for Grandma Pearl to continue gardening, I would visit every spring to help with her garden. All winter long we would plan and scheme together over the miles to decide what should be added when the weather warmed. I’m not sure who looked forward to that last week in May more, but every visit lingers in my memory.

Grandma Pearl died in January, just shy of her 99th birthday. Her funeral was filled with all the glorious colors and shapes that had been so much a part of her life. Just for fun, there was even a silk flower hidden among the real ones. That, too, had become a part of our spring ritual: hidden silk flowers for Grandma to find over the summer.

Although Grandma Pearl is now gone, her memory is alive in the orange poppies that will soon bloom in my front garden and in the Georgia O’Keeffe poppy print hanging over my fireplace. And who knows? Perhaps a silk flower or two will be hiding in the garden for my grandchildren to find this summer.

 • Nancy Hilrich Mueller, Mequon:

My mom always loved gardening for as long as I can remember. I didn’t get it. Why would anyone spend that much time digging around in the mud for a bunch of flowers? When I finally bought my first home, complete with my own mud, I started to take an interest in gardening. My mom came over all the time to help me figure out if that thing growing in the garden was a nice flower-to-be or a weed. One of our favorite ways to spend time together was to visit each other’s gardens and transplant bits from one to the other.

When my parents had to move from their home and into a senior apartment, we spent time driving around, appreciating gardens that we saw from the road. Our first drive every year was to see the scilla. . . . Last spring was the most beautiful spring I can remember. Nikki, my mom’s wonderful caregiver, made sure that she sat outside to feel the warm sun and see the beautiful flowers each day, but Mom didn’t feel up to driving around. She didn’t even want to come over to see my garden, as she always had. Mom died a few weeks later. My heart is broken, and I’m watching the scilla come up alone. But I will tend my garden, moving things from here to there and share what she taught me with my sons, grandchildren (some day) and friends, as she did.

 • Barb Wisneski, Waukesha:

My sister, two brothers and I picking bouquet after bouquet of dandelions and leaving them by the front door after ringing the door bell and hiding. Then coming in after playing outside and seeing all the dandelions now lovingly arranged in a vase on the kitchen table.

Why, to this day I still think of dandelions as flowers rather than weeds!

 • Margie Klein, Richfield:

When I look around my yard, I feel my mother’s influence in my gardens. Her love of gardening and flowers inspires me to create a beautiful yard for my family.

Growing up in the Depression era, gardening for her was probably more for sustenance than for leisurely hobby. Married in 1940, my mother lived in the same house and enjoyed gardening there for the next 49 years of her life. Looking back on my childhood invokes memories of playing in our backyard surrounded by her climbing roses, delphiniums, sweet peas, lupine, phlox, peonies and lilacs enveloping the yard with beauty and fragrance.

Photos of her five children were often proudly taken in front of her favorite blossoming flowers.

When I married in 1977, flowers from her garden graced our wedding reception tables. After purchasing our first home, Mom was happy to provide me with many shoots from her perennials and raspberries to begin my own gardens. Each of my subsequent moves to new homes included moving my cherished plants, which came from the gardens of my parents. The fragrant lilacs in my yard came from the farm of my paternal grandparents.

My mother not only loved the flora of her gardens, but the fauna as well. My dad built wren houses which were meticulously mounted on the picket fence near her flower beds. She loved to watch them build nests and listen to their song, as well as her beloved cardinals and chickadees.

When I weed my gardens using my parents’ hoe and spade, their memory and love of gardening warms my heart. As the wrens and cardinals sing their melodies around my gardens, I am reminded of one of my mother’s and grandmother’s favorite hymns, “I Come to the Garden Alone.” I have recently become a grandmother, and I hope to pass my love of gardening on to my granddaughter.

 • Linda Suminski, New Berlin:

Today is April 15. For most, the significance of this day is filing taxes. For me, it would have been my mother’s 96th birthday.

Although she is no longer here with me physically, she is with me all over my home. I, like her, have my own collection of cards from her, my children, and my husband that are just too beautiful to toss into the garbage.

I see her in each holiday, like Easter, when I decorated the dining room table with bunnies she had given me through the years. The light that gleamed from her silver candlesticks surrounding those bunnies reflected the spark she added to my life in so many ways. The chair where she sat and enjoyed meals for 40 years’ worth of celebrations will always be hers. Walking by the china cabinet, I find several of her small vases that will soon hold lilies of the valley transplanted years ago from her garden into mine. . . .

She not only has helped me decorate my house and yard, but also my heart.

• Jessica Staff, Wauwatosa:

My mom has great style – always has, always will.

Due to the nature of my dad’s job, my parents found themselves moving to a new Midwestern city every five to 10 years. My mom has such a good attitude about each move. She looks at each new house as a blank canvas on which she can express her style. As a farmer’s daughter, she’s always on the lookout for a bargain. . . .

My husband and I bought an older home in Wauwatosa a few years ago. Although the house had “good bones,” it still needed lots of TLC. Thankfully, my mom came to our rescue. She helped us decorate it inside and out, and gave us priceless tips and tricks on how to update on a budget. She was happy to help us and ended up donating endless hours of free labor painting and landscaping.

Although not every paint color choice worked out (“pyramid gold” turned out looking like “cow poop”), and several plants have perished under our numerous black walnut trees, my husband and I have enjoyed the journey of homeownership these past few years. I hardly recognize the house from the day we purchased it, with most of the credit going to my mom.

It’s comforting to see my mom’s touches around our house. She is such a thoughtful person. Hopefully someday, somehow I can pay her back for all of her help. In the meantime, hopefully a big “thank you” will do!

 • Stephanie Quinn, Glendale:

She has always loved rocks, pebbles, picking up special stones and beach glass while strolling the beach, and she would incorporate them into her little gardens, terrariums and pots. I have found that I do the same. My style is much more modern, but I love to find perfect organic-shaped stones or pebbles and place them in modern urns with cool papyrus grasses, or use tiny organic pebbles to place in the bottom of a vase with curly willow climbing and twisting out of it.

She also has always loved monarch butterflies and nature, and made sure to always plant native flowers in order to help preserve them on their journeys home and to Mexico, so she plants things such as milkweed, and coneflower and butterfly bushes.

Now, that I live on the river, it feels a little more “wild,” so I plan to add some of these plants to help preserve them as well. She also gave me 40 blue hyacinths when I turned 40, and that is my favorite flower, so it is special to see them pop up in the spring and reminds me of her.

She once gave me 38 white tulip bulbs when I was 38, and that was great to see them, too – but I moved from there, so now someone else gets to enjoy them. Maybe a 38-year-old!

 • Leslie Huber, Milwaukee:

My mom influenced my decorating style by always taking pride in her home. Although Mom has never had any formal training, one would think our home had been decorated by a professional. Growing up, we would spend a Saturday morning going to rummage sales to look for great finds. . . . Mom knew how to create style on a tight budget. . . . If the color wasn’t just right, she’d fix that with a little paint. . . . A natural trendsetter, she was “recycling reusing” way before the Go-Green initiative. I see Mom’s style shine through me in something as simple as how my throw pillows are placed, how my pictures are arranged and how everything flows just right in my home. She taught me to always take pride in my home, find things that reflect my style and add my own personal touch.

***

And our winner is . . .

Thanks to all who sent in stories of how their mother inspired their gardening or decorating style.

Susan Finco of De Pere was randomly chosen to receive a collection of decorating and gardening books.

<!–

• 
  
  Text Size
• Print
• Reprints

–>

We observe many unconventional holidays here at the Going Out Guide — who doesn’t love National Taco and Vodka Day? — but today we celebrate an especially important one: National Public Gardens Day.

There are plenty of gardens within the city, but if you aren’t lucky enough to enjoy one of Washington’s green nooks today, never fear. Not only do we have a lovely, early-summer  forecast this weekend, but there are plenty of garden-themed events going on as well. Need more inspiration? Check out our best bets list and our gardens gallery:

View Photo Gallery —Visiting over-the-top extravagance in Northwest Washington, eclectic topiaries in Maryland horse country and mountain views in Virginia, Weekend spent time in gardens of all shapes and sizes from Annapolis to the Shenandoah Valley to bring you our top picks.

Smithsonian Garden Fest Sure, you have seen the museums indoor exhibits, but did you know that the landscaping around Washington’s museums is often just as interesting? Learn more about the Smithsonian gardens today until 7 p.m.

Capitol Hill House and Garden Tour Take a peek inside the homes and gardens of one of Washington’s most historic neighborhoods on Saturday and Sunday.

Georgetown Garden Tour Explore the secret gardens of Washington’s most wealthy during this tour on Saturday.

Mother’s Day in the Garden On Sunday, Riversdale House Museum in Prince George’s County won’t just show your mom around their gardens; they’ll let her in free with your paid admission — a mere $3!

Kentlands Home and Garden Tour The Gaithersburg neighborhood opens its doors to visitors Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Wings of Fancy Live Butterfly and Caterpillar Exhibit Brookside Gardens has filled its conservatory with colorful, fluttering creatures. The exhibit is open daily, but you will want to be sure to visit Saturday when the Silver Spring Garden Club sets up its annual sale outside the visitor center.

BY AMANDA LEIJA
BROWNWOOD BULLETIN
amanda.leija@brownwoodbulletin.com

Community Garden feeds people

Daniel Graham, garden coordinator at the Brownwood Area Community Gardens, holds up carrots he harvested in April from the pantry boxes that was later donated to the Salvation Army’s Loaves and Fishes program.

Posted: Wednesday, May 8, 2013 4:23 pm
|


Updated: 6:29 pm, Wed May 8, 2013.

Edible Landscaping topic for Community Gardens’ class Saturday

BY AMANDA LEIJA
BROWNWOOD BULLETIN
amanda.leija@brownwoodbulletin.com

Brownwood Bulletin

The next class in the series offered by the Brownwood Area Community Garden on edible landscaping is set for 11 a.m. Saturday in the shade arbor of the gardens, which is located at 1514 Dublin Street.

“This class serves as an introduction to the topic and to get people thinking about growing food — not lawns,” class instructor Debra Mathis said.

Subscription Required

An online service is needed to view this article in its entirety.

You need an online service to view this article in its entirety.

Have an online subscription?

Login Now

Need an online subscription?

Subscribe

Login

Or, use your
linked account:

Choose an online service.

• 
  1
  
  1-Day Online Access Pass$1.00 for 2 days
  

  Choose this option if you just need short-term access.  This option will give you full access to the entire website plus archives, along with e-Editions going back 30 days.

• 
  2
  
  Free 7-Day Trial Online SubscriptionFree!
  

  If you would like to try full access to our online services, try our 7-Day Free Trial subscription.  When the trial is finished, you have the option of signing up for a full subscription.

• 
  3
  
  Online Only Subscription$69.00 for 365 days$50.00 for 182 days$9.95 for 28 days
  

  If you would like to become a new online only subscriber, please choose this option.

• 
  4
  
  Online Only Subscription – AUTO RENEW$6.95 for 28 days
  

  If you would like to become a new online only subscriber, and have your payment automatically charged each month, please choose this option.

• 
  5
  
  Print and Online Subscription$12.00 for 30 days$28.50 for 70 days$56.50 for 140 days$112.00 for 280 days$144.00 for 364 days$6.67 for 30 days$16.50 for 70 days$32.50 for 140 days$63.00 for 280 days$80.00 for 364 days
  

  The Brownwood Bulletin publishes Tuesday through Sunday.  Select this option for a new subscription to our newspaper along with online access. This selection is for delivery within our city delivery area only (Brownwood and Early CITY LIMITS ONLY, No PO Boxes). If you live outside our home delivery area, please call us for a mail subscription.  If you have questions, please call us at 325-646-2541.

Current print subscribers

• 
  1
  
  Add Online Access for Print SubscribersNo additional cost.
  

  This is for all print subscribers who wish to add online access to their account.  There is no additional charge for this service. You will need your full seven-digit account number in order to set up your online access.

Need an account? Create one now.

You must login to view the full content on this page.

Or, use your
linked account:

Follow me on Twitter @Amanda_in_bwdtx.

Thank you for reading 6 free articles on our site. You can come back at the end of your 30-day period for another 6 free articles, or you can purchase a subscription at this time and continue to enjoy valuable local news and information. If you need help, please contact our office at (325) 646-2541.

You need an online service to view this article in its entirety.

Have an online subscription?

Login Now

Need an online subscription?

Subscribe

Login

Or, use your
linked account:

Choose an online service.

• 
  1
  
  1-Day Online Access Pass$1.00 for 2 days
  

  Choose this option if you just need short-term access.  This option will give you full access to the entire website plus archives, along with e-Editions going back 30 days.

• 
  2
  
  Free 7-Day Trial Online SubscriptionFree!
  

  If you would like to try full access to our online services, try our 7-Day Free Trial subscription.  When the trial is finished, you have the option of signing up for a full subscription.

• 
  3
  
  Online Only Subscription$69.00 for 365 days$50.00 for 182 days$9.95 for 28 days
  

  If you would like to become a new online only subscriber, please choose this option.

• 
  4
  
  Online Only Subscription – AUTO RENEW$6.95 for 28 days
  

  If you would like to become a new online only subscriber, and have your payment automatically charged each month, please choose this option.

• 
  5
  
  Print and Online Subscription$12.00 for 30 days$28.50 for 70 days$56.50 for 140 days$112.00 for 280 days$144.00 for 364 days$6.67 for 30 days$16.50 for 70 days$32.50 for 140 days$63.00 for 280 days$80.00 for 364 days
  

  The Brownwood Bulletin publishes Tuesday through Sunday.  Select this option for a new subscription to our newspaper along with online access. This selection is for delivery within our city delivery area only (Brownwood and Early CITY LIMITS ONLY, No PO Boxes). If you live outside our home delivery area, please call us for a mail subscription.  If you have questions, please call us at 325-646-2541.

Current print subscribers

• 
  1
  
  Add Online Access for Print SubscribersNo additional cost.
  

  This is for all print subscribers who wish to add online access to their account.  There is no additional charge for this service. You will need your full seven-digit account number in order to set up your online access.

Need an account? Create one now.

More about Gardening

• ARTICLE: Community Garden celebrates Third Annual Spring Festival April 20
• ARTICLE: Greenhouse is a ‘real-world setting’ for horticulture students

• 
  Discuss
  
• Print
  
  
  

Posted in
Local

on

Wednesday, May 8, 2013 4:23 pm.

| Tags:


Community Garden,

Debra Mathis,

Gardening

Hampton Court Palace Flower Show had a minimalist “naked garden”, while Chelsea Flower Show paraded a “healing garden” dedicated to the Queen Mother.

This year the government is even creating a “dead tree garden” at Chelsea to highlight the impact of Ash dieback disease.

And
next week’s Malvern Spring Gardening Show won’t be without its unusual touches either, as one of the show plots will be recreating a natural burial ground garden.

Natural
burial has grown rapidly in the UK, with more than 270 sites having been created over the last 20 years, and Malvern’s show plot will be a replica of one of the country’s most recent, created by millionaire publisher Felix Dennis on land in Great Alne, south Warwickshire.

Landscape architect Ann Sharrock,
who designed the garden at the burial ground, is now recreating it in a
16×13 metre plot to go on display at the Three Counties Showground next
weekend.

Rather than emulating the actual burial ground, the show garden will mimic the ground’s garden where friends, relatives and anyone in the community can
go for peace and reflection. But that won’t stop Ann hammering the message home.

“I am going to have a coffin included,” she says, “but that’s just for a bit of drama!

“I
wanted it to be a shared space so it’s not just grieving friends and relatives but a place where walkers could pop in and visit.

“And I think the main thing was for there to be a journey.

“You
start with the grief, contemplation and thinking about your dead friend
or relative, but you move round the garden and then there would be more
hope.”

Ann, a recent graduate in landscape architecture at Manchester Metropolitan University, designed her first natural burial ground garden for her final degree project.

The
antithesis of a manicured cemetery, a natural burial ground respects its location by including few hard landscaping features and is designed to return to its natural state over the course of 50 years.

She says: “Natural burial grounds don’t have gravestones and don’t necessarily have any markers of a grave, except maybe a tree.

“After
50 years or so the land is left to become overgrown. It will revert to natural woodland and there will be just a few small signs as to what it might have been.

“That’s why this garden is a bit different.”

But for Ann, the main draw of a natural burial ground and its garden is its holistic outlook and respect for nature.

She says: “It’s about biodiversity, making good use of the planet and encouraging both humans and all kinds of wildlife species back to the land.

“So
whilst I’m not a screaming advocate of natural burial -– although I think it’s a brilliant idea – the main thing is all those other things that go along with that conservation.

“Secular or non-secular, there’s a respect for that land and for that graveyard.”

In place of hard landscaping, Ann will be using different types of grass to give a sense of structure.

She says: “The only hard landscaping in the garden is the bridge and the two benches.

“So it’s quite different from a lot of other show gardens which have five men and a dumper truck.”

The entrance takes visitors over a bridge over a clear pond, symbolising the bridge between life and death.

They then walk through a wet meadow and move into a spiral which gradually works its way down, lined by yew trees.

“I want it to be seen as a public amenity,” says Ann.

“With
most graveyards you rush in, cut the grass, leave some flowers and rush
out again. But you never see them in their wider context or enjoy the space.

“That’s what I hope people get from this, that this space can be enjoyed.

“And I hope there not going to think I’m burying a body in it!”

The RHS Malvern Spring Gardening Show runs from tomorrow until Sunday.

* For details visit: www.threecounties.co.uk/springgardening

0 comments

(BPT) – With many states facing drought this summer, homeowners across the country will be looking for ways to save their landscaping while conserving water at the same time. Even if you’re not in a drought-affected area, it pays to keep conservation in mind when it comes to watering outdoors. Using less water is good for the environment and your wallet.

Drip irrigation systems, like those offered by Mister Landscaper, can help you water more effectively. These systems deliver water as close as possible to plant roots, allowing you to achieve better results with less water used. You’ll also lose less water to run-off and evaporation. Place the system on a timer, and you can also ensure you’re watering at optimum times of the day to reduce evaporation and waste. A starter kit with 50 linear feet of tubing – ample enough to handle most gardens and planting beds – costs less than $1 per foot. Visit www.misterlandscaper.com to learn more.

• 
  Discuss

• Print
  
  

For evidence of the diversity of Malibu’s climates, one need only look at its gardens. The Malibu Garden Club’s 14th Annual Garden Tour will be held Saturday, May 18, including two gardens near Point Dume, one a short drive up Encinal Canyon Road and another in Malibu Colony. Each reflect the potential the climate can unleash in local horticulture.

“I think this will be one of the better tours this year,” Aaron Landsworth, a landscape designer and professional horticulturist (and recently retired Club president) said. “Guests will see what is possible in Malibu gardens in spectacularly different ways.

The annual garden tour allows Malibuites the opportunity to see how far gardening has come over the years in our city by the sea. In the early days, Malibu landscaping pioneers were faced with windy climates, salt-laced breezes and a paucity of experienced advice when it came to garden design. Young eucalyptus trees and myoporum shrub primarily represented local flora. Not anymore.

“People will find a lot to inspire them,” said Birute Anne Vileises, first vice president and chair of programming for the garden club.

The $30 tickets (if purchased before May 15 – $35 afterward) may be picked up by guests the morning of the event at Point Dume Marine Science School, and maps will be provided for the tour taking place between 10:30 a.m. and 1:00 p.m. Walking shoes are highly recommended and it is respectfully requested that children and pets stay home.

Whitesands House is one of the homes on the tour. The Louks family has been growing its own food at its Point Dume estate for five years now. An exploration of the terraced, organically maintained garden will showcase the extent to which a commitment to sustainability and healthful eating can be accomplished.

June Louks found inspiration in a holistic approach to eating after a debilitating health crisis that left her effectively, “an invalid.” Five years and pounds of organic fruits and vegetables later, Louks said she and her family are a picture of health and energy.

“The garden has truly never looked more amazing than right now,” Louks said. “It’s a perfect time for a tour. You won’t believe our white roses in front. And it’s all organic. I never spray with pesticides and I never use any chemical fertilizer.”

The secret is in the compost, Louks said. She runs a biodynamic composting operation to serve her acre of so of farmland. Her garden also accommodates a greenhouse, underground tanks that capture rainwater, solar panels to heat the house and pool, and a colony of bees.

Also on the tour is a touch of India overlooking the Pacific. Pravina Somanti has created a garden comprised of succulents, fruit trees and strawberries and says that gardening, for her, is a form of meditation and healing restoration of the spirit.

Somanti’s garden is rich with palm trees, mosaics, ferns and natural cubbyholes created from palm fronds and drought-resistant plants. Sculptures that evoke Indian deities are set in between flowerbeds, and flowered archways will invite you to find your own meditative moments on the tour.

Another home’s garden was started only two years ago and shows that easy, comfortable landscaping is achievable even right next to the ocean.

Several species of mature palms are surrounded by agaves (source for tequila), bromeliads, birds of paradise and philodendron, creating a private sanctuary for the homeowner. The back lawn is an unencumbered vista of cool ocean breezes and rustling palm trees. The turf, Seashore Paspalum, can take heavy salt content from coastal air, and shows how adaptable green can be—even in Malibu.

Finally, a Laura Knauss-designed beachfront home epitomizes coastal living at its best. Owner of Garden Visions of Malibu, Knauss responded to her clients’ request for a contemporary, low-maintenance garden that would create a retreat from the hustle and bustle of the outside world.

Landsworth said that Malibu’s many microclimates permit an astonishing variety of gardening approaches, with hedges operating as wind blocks that nurture “stuff you wouldn’t normally expect in areas like Malibu.

“The Garden Club is a good group,” Landsworth continued. “Mostly because you get so much information on what works here. There’s always something new and the more you know, the more you learn you need to know.”

More information on the Malibu Garden Club Annual Garden Tour may be found at www.malibugardenclub.org.

The city of Dalton Gardens wants to know what its residents think about deer. A survey was sent out last week to all 832 households, and included questions like, “Have you noticed an increase in the number of deer in Dalton Gardens in the last three years?” Or, “Have you or anyone you know had a deer-vehicle collision in Dalton Gardens?” In a letter that accompanied the survey, Mayor Dan Franklin said, “While this survey is voluntary, your input is valuable to our decision-making process and we encourage you to return it to City Hall.” The survey asks if residents believe deer are causing damage to crops, gardens and landscaping; if they are spreading noxious weeds and diseases to humans and livestock; and if they are attracting predators/David Cole, Coeur d’Alene Press. More here. (Coeur d’Alene Press file photo: Jerome A. Pollos)

Question: Do you consider the urban deer in the area to be welcome sight or nuisance?