Contemporary Gardens of New Zealand by Carol Bucknell, photography by Sally Tagg

Twenty three gardens by twenty one New Zealand designers – this book has certainly prompted a great deal of discussion here over the past couple of weeks. There is a heavy bias towards high budget properties with stunning views in or around Auckland, often with hard-edged modern, architecturally designed houses. The response is dominated by hard edged, angular gardens, pared back planting schemes largely stripped of colour and heavily dominated by native plants. Water features and swimming pools abound, usually with wet edges of the infinity style (so that the body of water melds into the sky or sea in front) and sometimes with the water lapping at the walls of the house. Generally, there is little evidence that the property owners want to garden themselves. Most want an exterior which will complement their homes, their lifestyle and, apparently, the environmental context of the property.

Two things stop this book from being any more than one for the coffee table book. One is the absence of critique or interpretative commentary. It is a showcase presentation of a narrow selection of modern NZ garden design. The second is the actual design of the book. Unfortunately, the decision was made not to caption the photographs. This of course gives a very clean, some might say contemporary, look to the book but it is not a lot of help to the reader. This is even more so where four photographs are placed on a page with no borders separating the images. We know they are artsy because sometimes one or two are in black and white and sometimes they are cropped so heavily that you are not even sure what the detail that is shown is. Sometimes features referenced in the text are not illustrated in the photographs and it takes frequent flicking backwards and forwards to try and match text to photograph. Given the calibre of the photographer, this almost certainly comes back to the book designer, as does the photo selection.

From the point of view of the reader and given the reportage style of most of the writing, showcasing the photographs with extended captions instead of wodges of descriptive journey around the properties might have integrated text and illustration better.

Sally Tagg is vastly experienced in garden and plant photography. She doesn’t cut corners and the photography throughout is of a very high standard. The author, Carol Bucknell, has faithfully recorded each garden and gives the landscaper’s framework for the decisions behind the design and construction of each. It makes an attractive coffee table book but is unlikely to contribute much to the garden history of NZ.

Contemporary Gardens of New Zealand by Carol Bucknell, photography by Sally Tagg. (Penguin; ISBN: 978 0143 56694 6).

For more thoughts on the topic, related more to the ideas than the book, check out: Modernist gardening, modern gardens and contemporary design

First published in the Waikato Times and reprinted here with their permission.

Plant Collector: Ananas sagenaria

Ananas sagenaria - hardier than a tropical pineapple

Ananas sagenaria – hardier than a tropical pineapple

My photograph of a ripe pineapple attracted considerable comment last week and I am pleased to report that it was tasty and sweeter than usual when it came to eating. We have had this pineapple growing in a warm spot against a brick wall for over 50 years now. Its productivity is closely linked to how much care we give it and that is negligible most years. It wants maximum heat, good drainage and plenty of compost but it will survive on benign neglect. It is fiercely prickly.

Pineapples are bromeliads and Felix Jury received A. sagenaria as part of a collection of bromeliads that he imported from Florida back in the late 1950s. It originates from large parts of central and eastern South America and is from the same family as the commercial pineapple – which is usually A. comosus. It is not as good to eat as the tropical pineapple, but it is hardier.

Ananas sagenaria was marketed widely a few years ago, but not by us. We had a wry smile as we watched a Northlander come in, brashly confident that there was a gold mine in it which we had failed to realise. He advertised it widely as the red pineapple and described it as hardy. To us, hardy means it will grow in Christchurch and Invercargill. All we would say about A. sagenaria is that it is hardier than the tropical varieties.

First published in the Waikato Times and reprinted here with their permission.

Garden lore

Subjugated gardens abound, and I can see why. Unless discipline is maintained from the moment the spirit-level is laid across the earth, you are nourishing a vast, tactile, heavy-scented siren which will keep you forever in its thrall.

Hortus by Mirabel Oliver (1990).

Choosing plant containers

While round bellied pots are often more pleasing to the eye, you will save yourself a lot of trouble if you only plant short term annuals or leafy plants in them. More permanent woody plants fill up the space with dense packed roots and it becomes very difficult to extract them for repotting when the root mass is larger than the opening at the top of the pot. All container plants need repotting at least every two years to stay in optimum health (and who wants an unhealthy looking container plant on display?) but to extract one from a round belly pot requires cutting the roots with a knife until you have it small enough to pull out. Too often you can end up breaking the pot. Straight sided vase shapes or cylinders are a much easier shape to work with for woody plants.

First published in the Waikato Times and reprinted here with their permission.

But where are the hollyhocks?

Bragging rights on the home grown pineapple

Bragging rights on the home grown pineapple

“But where are the hollyhocks? I can’t find any hollyhocks,” the garden visitor said last weekend. I can honestly say that that is a first here. Nobody has ever commented on the absence of hollyhocks before. But it is true. We have none. I haven’t tried growing hollyhocks since the children were young and school gardens were still a part of the gardening calendar. The problem with hollyhocks is that they are very prone to rust in our climate which spoils the look.

There are, of course, many other plants we don’t grow. I can’t think that we have any petunias and gerberas are notable for their absence. Sweet peas we lack. Ditto tuberous begonias and we are distinctly light on fuchsias. Some plants we do not grow because we don’t like them, others because they don’t like us. Some are not worth the effort and presumably at least some are because we have never even thought of growing them.

The cold border in the park with meconopsis and Inshriach primulas

The cold border in the park with meconopsis and Inshriach primulas

The challenge for many a keen gardener is to grow plants which are either very difficult or are well out of their natural zone. We certainly identify with this group. It is enormously satisfying to grow something which is not known in your local area. To this end, we are always trying to stretch the climatic boundaries and we do have options in a big garden. Mark put his cold border onto a south facing slope where temperatures are noticeably cooler and he has managed to get some of the plants which want a colder winter settled in. The blue poppies (meconopsis) from the Himalayas, less common but colourful Inshriach primulas from Scotland, the Chatham Island forget-me-nots and the deep coloured burgundy hellebores are all much happier in cooler conditions.

On the ridge above, the Marlborough rock daisy (Pachystegia insignis) and trickier forms of astelias perch in exposed conditions  compensating for our high humidity and mild temperatures. A different north facing slope gives us hotter conditions for the aloes and yucca plants that will rot out elsewhere.

Some highly desirable plants defeat us entirely. We’d certainly grow herbaceous paeonies if we could but they want low humidity, hot, dry summers and dry, cold winters to do well. There is no way we can simulate those conditions. Having had a Dunedin childhood, I loved the Bleeding Heart plant (now named Lamprocapnos spectabilis but formerly and widely known as Dicentra spectabilis). I bought several over a few years to try in different parts of the garden but they never returned for a second season. There was a little lesson there for me – just because garden centres sell a lovely looking plant in full flower does not mean that it is suitable for the local area. Oftimes they are shipped in from places where they do grow well. That is a lesson many others have learned, I am sure.

Where we draw the line is when it comes to having to spray in order to grow plants out of their normal climatic zone. We are not prepared to festoon sensitive plants in frost cloth either but that is because we can’t be bothered and we don’t want that ghostly presence of draped shapes in the garden. Chemical intervention is a step too far altogether.

I have never gotten over my shock when a very experienced gardener told me she kept her alpines alive in our conditions by drenching them in fungicide once a week. I can no longer look at her alpine area as an example of good gardening. Fungicides are not that good for the environment and in my opinion, good practice dictates they should only be used when absolutely necessary and not as a routine application. So no hollyhocks here – we are not going to spray to keep them healthy and we don’t want diseased plants sitting around festering.

If you are not a gardener who relishes the challenge of pushing climatic boundaries, then keeping to plants which are happy in your conditions is going to make life a whole lot easier. This does tend to mean you can’t have a sub tropical garden in Hamilton because winters get cold and frosty. Second daughter attended Waikato University a decade ago and she commented on the gardens she walked past which had clearly been “landscaped” in summer on a tropical theme. Come winter, the plants were blackened, looking very sad and often dead. If you are a novice gardener, take up walking. You can see much more on foot than you will ever see from a car window and noting what is growing well and is being repeated in gardens around your area is a good guide. It may also be an indication of what plants are available for sale.

For those of us who like a challenge, there is nothing quite like the bragging rights that come with… a pineapple! Yes, this was grown and harvested from our very own pineapple patch set against a warm brick wall. Not as sweet as a Dole one but not exactly a run of the mill crop for our area.

First published in the Waikato Times and reprinted here with their permission.

Plant Collector: Gesneria cardinalis

Gesneria cardinalis, or maybe Sinningia cardinalis

Gesneria cardinalis, or maybe Sinningia cardinalis

The tuber in growth. I have cut chunks from it to grow new plants.

The tuber in growth. I have cut chunks from it to grow new plants.

Gesneria or sinningia? We have always known it as a gesneria but it appears that Sinningia cardinalis is equally valid as a name. Whatever, this is a comparatively rare plant which comes from the same family as both African violets and gloxinias – the family having the near unpronounceable name of Gesneriaceae. Most hail from South America and cardinalis is from Brazil.

Unlike most members of the family (and there are somewhere over 40 of them), cardinalis grows from a tuber which pushes itself above the ground. We have described it in the past as developing a football-like tuber, but with the passage of time, ours are getting closer to exercise ball in size. The leaves are soft and somewhat hairy while the tubular red bells sit above the foliage and flower over a long season in late spring. Come autumn, all the leaves will fall off. This is a plant for dry shade but needs to be frost free.

First published in the Waikato Times and reprinted here with their permission.