Designing & Building award winning landscapes has been a very rewarding, satisfying, fun filled occupation, of course there have been days one prefers to have skipped or passed by, yet more where looking back it was quite amusing now – I’m sure you too have a few you could share with the growing readers too.
So Ann and Chris are making you an offer you cannot refuse? – well perhaps you can !
Here is the challenge. If you have an amusing enough incident and you share it here by way of a comment,
Ann & I will call you ( we will have to keep this to an English conversation for now) , we will give you at least 5 minutes to describe in your own words the Opps! moment, you may also give your business a gentle plug!
Hows that ?
So let’s get the ball rolling with some of those Opps ! or “Out take” moments that have happened to me.
“Hook – Up”
The first that I remember wasn’t actually related to horticulture it was whilst working during a summer recess from college, working as a summer assistant lock keeper,on the River Thames at Mapledurham, which I think is in Oxfordshire, as I recall a quite well known movie was being filmed at the time called “The Eagle has Landed”, just across the reach from the lock.
On this particular day, there was lots of action and noise from the film set, lots of tourist and regular cruisers plying up and down the Thames. The lock is quite large – from memory nearly 200 ft long and about 16ft wide with a 5 ft rise and fall. Because we were busy we were packing in the boats. Anyway, having filled the lock with boats I opened the sluice gates to let the water out and let the lock water level fall around 5 ft, as this happened I was distracted by the filming. the next minute I turned to see all the boats hooked up with no water beneath! … not a good position to be in !
It took some time to undo the resultant mess….
“Splash”
Client Pool
Sticking to water… one night I was making a visit to a potential client on the way home, it was around dusk, the home owner was a banker, they had a lovely home in Chislehurst, Kent. After a brief talk we took a short stroll around the garden as dusk was fading, it was a long time but it was quite dark by the time we headed back to the house.
For some reason, I was talking to the client side by side one moment and the next I was treading muddy water, tearing though a rather decrepit swimming pool cover having missed the dog leg steps on the poolside.
The water soon reached my waste, and my suit took on a rather unusual color and smell..meanwhile the client rushed indoors exclaiming I had fallen into the pool, which brought the whole family out giggling !.. somewhat soaking I drove the last 15 miles home. We ended up completing the project, one of the requirements was to break out the miscreant swimming pool !
“Mud Slide”
On another occasion we were contracted to dredge a small lake and construct a weir. ( a pond is in my definition an area of water in which you can throw a stone over it to land on the other bank. A lake is where the stone falls into the water). So dredging a lake is a task, requiring a variety of big toys… in this case we arranged with the local waterways folks to block ( legitimately) the upper inflow channel, allowing the water in the lower lake to fall around 8-12 ft which would allow the use of a piece of equipment similar to a dragline.
Unfortunately, whilst we knew the plan, the water folks knew the plan and the parks department knew the plan, nobody had told the security guys – who “unblocked’ the upper lake outfall late in the night, thinking some vandal had blocked up the outfalls !
So after about two days of working we returned in the morning, to find the lake full of water , the equipment marooned 50 ft out in the lake,with their tracks buried and the mud slowly engulfing the cab.. some drastic action was needed, a very heavy lift truck was used to winch out the equipment, and we changed our method of removing the silt,to pumping the now slurry into a temporary lagoon to dry out before carting away.
“An up-lifting experience”
The next was a tad more mundane, well it started that way at least. We had just completed a large ‘cut & fill’ project covering many tens of acres on a setting out ground for a new power station, we were preparing one area of about 30 acres for seeding when suddenly the bomb squad pulled up, I kid you not…
Here is an English sapper exploring on the site !
Apparently they had been told that a lady across the way ( about 1/4mile, you can see the block in the distance) had just recalled a flight of German bombers had dropped their loads of bombs in the 2nd world war ,just where we were working some had failed to explode…
so they dug around for a few days, messing up our seed bed and left, when they failed to find any …..
Some ten years later, whilst preparing for the new Queen Elizabeth II, Dartford bridge, the said 15 or so unexploded bombs were indeed found in the hedge row not 70ft from where the bomb squad had poked around !!!
It was a very useful do not ASSUME moment … you know the meaning don’t Assume as it makes an “ASS out of U and ME”
Let’s dance !When Ann & I started ‘Growing Trends’ the web site, blog and radio show, we weren’t sure how to engage all of you. It seems a little wit, the odd anecdote and should I say a touch of knowledge has helped us enormously.
In a very short time we have built an audience of readers, listeners and fellow Horticulturists, they have come from :-
United States, Canada, Venezuela, Argentina, Columbia, Germany ,United Kingdom, Spain, Ireland, Italy, Hungary, Denmark, Romania, France, Netherlands, Jamaica,Barbados, Egypt, New Zealand, Australia, Malaysia, Japan, India, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Republic of Korea,
We are just stunned… thank you all so much. Please if you have time send us a picture of your favourite space, garden or landscape with a few notes, we would love to hear from you.
Today, as we have a holiday weekend here in the USA, it seems that our blog should be a little in this spirit, so I’m going to try and find a bunch of pictures of projects we’ve completed along with pictures of unusual items used in the urban landscape that perhaps some have not seen before.. hope you enjoy them..
So let’s start with a really big tree being moved, it was one of many on this site, weighing some 600 tons and approximately 60ft tall!
One of my favorites a flower clock in Geneva, Switzerland.Geneva, Switzerland
This one was ‘snapped’ in Amsterdam, it’s an old cannon, now serving as a vehicle bollard !
The next is fairly common – creating a bubble fountain using an old natural millstone wheel.
Original granite millstone fountain
This method completely softens a brick pier and makes it look ageless – we used a single canted brick on each corner, and added a double layer of tiles ‘Creasing Tile’ before the soldier course, the resultant ‘shadow line creates interest and helps the wall to ‘weather’ much better.
Brick Pier with creasing tile
This one is much harder to do, it’s a circular patio of natural setts – they tend to be slightly different sizes. When laid like this, in a circular pattern creates a feeling of movement and space, in what is a fairly small area.
Small setts laid in a radiating pattern
When you have a natural random wall it is always hard to create a ‘finish’ , we solved this by bonding a brick coping to match the drive brick edge.
Brick Coping Course
What is really interesting is, if you look really carefully you can see the brick coping running into the driveway as the wall ends, this looked so good, the red tarmac ( which is quite expensive) helps with the overall effect.
Driveway
Many years ago, we needed to find away to create ‘Raised planters’ on a roof that were exceedingly light weight, contained and yet attractive. We think we succeeded with these specially made by us artificial rock faced grp planters. – we won an award for the project , which was fun !
Artificial Rocks
Some 30 years ago we started building gravity walls with ‘TimberGrid’ , then we thought let’s add some plants, it worked great..!
Treated Structural Green Wall
It wasn’t long before they started to ‘Grow’ well you know if you try hard enough it becomes a ‘Trend ‘
Tall timber gravity wall
Sometimes it’s fun to experiment, so here we came up with a ‘curved’ wall
This classic park surrounding the simply stunning Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art is in Kansas City.
It is a great place to start – as long as the temperature are being kind !
Anyone for Badminton?
The museum has an exhibit which kids would really enjoy, as long as they are accompanied, it’s a glass Labyrinth.
Picture credit to Chris Smart
In other countries..
Alternatively, if you were across the pond in say Paris, France. You could visit a more modern looking park. I think this is Parc de Villette
Porte de Villette, Paris
or perhaps a more tropical park in say Honolulu.
Honolulu
Sometimes just the local school has a pleasant surprise in store, as this school in south London achieved.
A school quiet garden
Most parks are designed and built to a high engineering standard. They can last a long time without needing costly repairs.
Over the years we designed & built a huge array of children’s play areas, mostly in parks or on community housing sites, occasionally in a school, the one above was a really fun project, quite a few years ago now.
The idea was to have a theme for the closed in ‘quiet’ area, so the architect suggested a ‘Kentish Riverbank’ We developed a dry river bed using kidney stones set in a flowing pattern, added a jetty to link the ‘Oast’ house from the ‘Kentish Barn’ , included a loading ramp – to enable wheel chair access.
Then created a few sail boats with trees for masts and sails. All the planting was native to a Kentish riverbank along the dry river, with more architectural plants around the edge.
We added a ‘hump back bridge’ in natural stone & a fallen oak tree, from years back when there was a very large storm.
School Garden
One of the art teachers had the kids create a whole series of ceramic fish which we set into the river bed, they make excellent brass rubbings !
Ceramic Fish for Riverbed.
Children love to interact with nature, they also enjoy movement. They oddly like some risk. You will notice though that here we kept away from moving objects as this was a ‘Quiet Garden’ .
City parks in recent years have tended away from moving pieces of play equipment, mainly due to the liability from accidents, they use a more static type of play equipment, although the classic swing is still in evidence in many parks to this day.
More awareness of other dangers has lead to many play areas being fenced in, to protect the children playing.
Visiting a local farm is yet another wonderful experience “Pick you Own’ farms can be a wonderful treat for the kids..
Fruit picking
Here in Weston, Missouri we have a classic old style farm that is just enchanting.
Early one morning , Weston Red Barn Farm
Ann & I, interviewed Farmer Steve last week he will be on our show very soon, to tell you how busy he is kept with all his animals and field of fruit and pumpkins not to mention around 15,000 kids visiting his farm each year !
Could you grow these?The Victorians, were an inventive bunch, they invented and developed so many things, today we seem to spend more and more time with new technical inventions rather than try and solve the many issues facing us with the environment.
Perhaps its simply we do not spend enough time outside to enjoy the sun, stars,landscape and the water?
Going back to the Victorians, they have been credited with developing the regimented summer bedding displays, they developed huge estate layouts with ponds or should I say lakes, they were instrumental in cut formal lawns, I think Ransomes was one of the first with a horse drawn mower?
What they also did was include vegetables within the garden landscape,as did the Germans and French, it’s a great way to grow veggies and herbs as it is almost invisible, yet so effective and pleasing to grow your own.Plus invariably the food is both fresh & free of those pesky pesticides.
Have you included herbs & veggies in your design? – a question for your landscape designer perhaps?The marigolds help reduce the bugs
Our first interview for our Growing Trends radio show,was with a couple that do just that, – we are due to return shortly to see how the fruits of their labour has gone..
Their garden has between 350 – 400 Trees,Shrubs, Perennials, Annuals, and at least 75 Herbs & Veggies. It still has this beautiful pool to relax in !
Can you spot the herbs & veggies?
Even if you only have a small area it is very beneficial to grow say just a pot or two of herbs, not only are they fresh, they keep on producing throughout the season, (saving lots of money) all you need to do is water, and take any seed heads off as they form.
Stacked herb pot.
For the more adventurous a larger area can be created, this requires more commitment, the rewards are much greater with more produce grown and the satisfaction of growing your own food.
An example from a Chelsea Flower Show exhibit
Of course you could get completely carried away, employ a full time team and develop a world class garden, that attracts thousands of visitors a year.. feeding an awful lot of folks into the bargain !
Simply stunning !
How do I start ? I hear you say. Well the best way is always start in a conservative way, the easiest is probably to start with herbs, which will grow throughout the growing season, once thats mastered, try a quick growing veggie such as lettuce, it has a short cycle and is relatively easy to grow. If you don’t want the hassle of growing from seed initially, it’s possible today to buy ‘plugs’ that are pre started and likely to produce quite quickly, then progress from here, adding interesting varieties of say garlic, carrots, tomatoes, potatoes….
Weekend Garden Kit from Picagardi
This garden was planted just 2 weeks earlier with pre started plants. The trick if you haven’t grown many plants yourself is to start small, then as you find that the weather and conditions are unpredictable, you can try a more adventurous approach. Remember though that even hardened gardeners find that some plants some years just do not flourish as expected.
The rewards are so worth the effort, producing your own food, saving money and having a healthy outdoor activity.
Hort Cuisine anyone ?
Ann & I will be talking to some new gardeners, along with some seasoned,experienced gardeners in the next few weeks… the trick is always to have fun and experiment just a little !
“The commitment & sheer hard work required to achieve career success nowadays takes a heavy toll on our lifestyles. All of us need to counterbalance a busy working schedule with the right level of relaxation. For centuries gardens have been places of retreat and contemplation where our minds, detached from everyday problems, can resolve conflicts and plan confidently for the future.”
“A rare moment of peace in the perfect haven of a garden brings us renewed harmony with nature”
A short stroll to the patio
There is something rather special about returning home from work , seeing your beautiful landscape, perhaps pouring a glass of wine, or beer, then taking a walk around your landscaped garden enjoying the trees, flowers, shrubs, all whilst listening to the insects & birds, before an evening meal.
This tends to be a bit of a chore when the temperature is over 90f with sweat dripping off your forehead with each sip, however once the temperature falls to below 80f it is very much more relaxing.
It’s a great time to water the container plants ,dead head the flowers, check on the veggies , check on the water levels of the ornamental ponds, maybe even pull the odd weed from your immaculate borders. You do have immaculate borders? I mean what would the neighbours say ?
Garden Pond
Finally stroll back to the main terrace to complete or restock the beverage..mmmm ‘if only’ I hear you say, alternatively pop into a nearby park at lunchtime for a few minutes peace and relaxation.
Unexpected benefits of gardening
Research is now emerging that suggests that digging in the soil is actually beneficial, as the microbes found in real soil are the very ones that help us feel good . – Perhaps its time for us to develop adult sand pits? No just kidding, all that yucky sand traipsed indoors would wreak havoc with the carpets, “She who must be obeyed” would read us the riot act.
I do think that , garden landscapes are for using, they are not like a trophy, or picture hanging on the wall, they are alive, constantly changing ,constantly in need of nurturing, feeding, watering ,tending but above all else enjoying.
What better way to enjoy than to actually get into the midst of the garden and soak up all those positive ions?
A maturing landscape
This beautiful award winning garden was developed some years ago for a very busy client, who had a passion for orchids , immaculate lawns, with filled to the brim shrub borders.
We were often asked how it was that most lawns had these long lasting “stripes”. The secret is two fold, first the mower used has to have a roller behind the cutting blades, it can be a rotary mower, although the best is obviously a cylinder mower, also the roller should be the drive method for the mower .
The second is to make sure that each time you cut , you turn 90 degrees from the last.
The advantage of the cylinder mower is, usually you are cutting finer grass, and it needs to be quite short, a rotary mower tends to tear the grass blades and thus causes bruising, so it never looks as good, but it is able to cut much tougher grass which is usually also much higher in length.
A large main lawn
Sometimes when I wished to get away from the constant ringing phone , a product of having great teams, being in constant demand and being easy to contact, I would head out to a clients garden and actually spend an hour or two cutting their lawn for them, although it earned me the reputation of ‘The Gardener in a Suit” as I always wore a suit and tie to work !
It was a great way to recharge the batteries !
The complete lawn
Come listen to our interviews at Growing Trends they are all about these amazing folks with a passion for landscape gardening, the experts that help them and the wonderful folk that create them.
We would love to hear from you too….if you visit us at www.growingtrends.org please spend a moment to click our Facebook Like !
When were you last seen walking around a garden, a city park, or through the woods?Rodin’s The Thinker 1880, probably cast 1949.
“The Thinker” – from one of our latest interviews…
Having always been a little ‘cheeky’ , I turned Descartes words around a little from ‘ Je pense, donc je suis’ to ” I think therefore, am I?” – my reports from school often said ‘ if – and then went on about my impish sense of humour’
Back to Growing Trends, our fun, friendly, internet radio show – our latest interview was from this superb Museum in Kansas City and the Kauffman Memorial Garden
Henry Moore Sculpture, Nelson Atkins Museum of Art
Ever since Ann & I started our internet radio show we have had fun, sure it’s hard work to find the folks to interview, then arrange the best time to interview, especially with differing time zones.
We try and interview ‘on site’, so listeners can get a feel for how it really is, this proves challenging in windy conditions or inside cavernous stone buildings – the Museum springs to mind here.
The payback is simply stunning landscapes, interviewing amazing people!
Absolutely stunning at this time of year !
Our main goal is a desire to create interesting informative interviews that grab your attention and keep you interested – fortunately so many people in our industry have really interesting stories ,it’s really a matter of us letting them tell their story.
The hardest part is finding enough sponsors to cover the myriad of costs for doing this. It’s a real chicken and egg situation, the sponsors want listening numbers before committing, the show needs sponsors before promoting more, and the merry cycle of business life continues.
Light at the end of the green tunnel ?
In the meantime, we are steadily building an audience, developing a really informative web site at Growing Trends with a soon to be added link to youtube short videos of where we are interviewing. Please , if you get a chance to listen, do so, and maybe tell your friends there is this really different show out there to listen to..
In the short time we’ve been doing this we have learned that there is a real desire for folks to reconnect with other folks, for buyers to talk to growers, for gardeners to talk to the gardener, for the sports person a bracing game of tennis or a round of golf. I confess to liking a few hours sailing, but then I am surrounded by green most days.
For the lucky some, that develop a lifelong passion it becomes a relaxing daily exercise, for others a calming walk in the woods is enough, for our children a healthy carefree romp in a playground, or just to sit outside reading a good book is enough. What is just right for you?
If only we could all enjoy everyday scenes like this !
Cities absolutely need green spaces for the people to unwind , connect with nature, report after report shows the benefits to this, even patients in hospitals benefit from gardens, we know how much kids love to play in a well laid out playground !
Our next group of interviews are going to be exciting, we’re interviewing a couple whose passion was to recreate a working farm, they have succeeded, it’s a magical place full of wonderful sights, smells, happy people and a great day out.
The nelson Atkins Museum of Art , Sculpture Park
Then we are interviewing a competitor of mine, who has had the most amazing time, building show gardens for the worlds most prestigious flower show, as well as designing & building award winning residential gardens, then as a head gardener at a famous English estate, whilst forming specialist trade organisations and now turning his hand to writing books… watch this space as they say !
We pre-recorded both of these interviews a few weeks ago, each is really quite special, and is the start of a series of Horticultural interviews with a Different Perspective.
We have to thank Dr. Richard Benfield for this, we interviewed Richard in Australia – he will be on the show shortly. Richard was fresh from watching three kangaroos demolish a fence in front of his vehicle as he drove in Western Australia.
Richard is a professor whose research has revealed some fascinating facts – for instance food & garden tourism attracts over 78 million visitors a year across the USA !
So here is the first in this series, we hope to add one a month within the programming, please do let us know what you think, any ideas or requests.“Did I say that ?”
This weeks show is from two truly outstanding places –
The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art’s superb Sculpture Park.
Being a transplanted ‘Brit’ , living in Kansas City, I was amazed to find 13 Henry Moore statues in our midst, they are like a place of inspiration, and just get the creative juices flowing for this designer.
The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art is a gem, here in the American heartland.
Anyone for Badminton?
The sculpture park is celebrating 25 years this year, it is a must see attraction in Kansas City. So on a rather windy evening Ann & I called in to interview the Sanders Sosland Curator, Jan Schall, Ph.D.
The park covers some 22 acres, in the middle of Kansas City, just along from the Plaza. It was opened in 1989, designed by Dan Kiley & Jaquelin Robertson, there are more than 30 sculptures.
The Sculpture Park is FREE to the public, open year round during daylight hours, and a wonderful place to have a picnic!
One of the many Henry Moore Sculptures
The Kauffman Memorial Garden
This is a truly beautiful garden, superbly maintained by Duane and his volunteer staff, the garden has so many wonderful plants in this walled garden’s micro -climate, the attention to detail , the care make this probably one of the best gardens in Kansas City
Absolutely stunning at this time of year !
The Ewing and Muriel Kauffman Memorial Garden draws inspiration from the couple’s journey through life and their commitment to share with others. It is an enduring gift for Kansas City that extends the legacy of a gracious couple and welcomes visitors to a vibrant landscape throughout the year.
The Kauffmans’ world travels inspired the creation of a space comparable to parks throughout Europe. The garden features bronze sculptures by Tom Corbin among lush and colorful annual and perennial plantings, pruned foliage framed by stone walls, brick walkways and playful fountains.
Some of you may know that Ann & I have started a daily radio show, we call the show Growing Trends, it’s on at 1pm & 7pm daily at www.cravingtalkradio.com it’s really an extension of this blog, where we talk to people who are connected with our industry or homeowners that have a special interest or just an interesting landscape, or perhaps just a passion for gardens.
This past week we have been really fortunate to find some exceptionally gifted folks, our first was a rose grower, who in addition to working a very busy day as an executive still managed to come home and relax by working in his rose garden until late at night, he has a really interesting twist to this but you will have to wait until we broadcast the interview to hear it.
As our heading says this week is National Farmers Market Week, so Ann & I decided to take an early morning trip to one of our local farmers markets last Saturday morning. Well ok, a quick confession, Ann was early, I was late. We were both much later than the first customers who arrived long before 7am to buy the pick of this very fresh crop – some of the farmers were up at 3am to make sure they brought their produce to market!
Parkville, Missouri
The growers and customers were a very happy group, many were regulars who knew all the growers and would talk with real enthusiasm about the produce they were buying, you will hear this in the interviews.
All the growers had a wealth of knowledge and experience, which was one of the main reasons the customers came back week after week, they liked the idea of talking to the growers, understanding their efforts to produce good quality despite the variable weather conditions we all experience, some came because they had tried to grow crops themselves but just couldn’t quite succeed.
Everyone felt that they were obtaining value for money, and just loved the freshness, flavorsome and at times unusually shaped produce.
We talked to at least half a dozen or so growers and could have if time had permitted talked to many more, we also talked to a number of customers who were clearly regular visitors to the market.
What struck us most was that everyone was there because they enjoyed meeting each other,the customers liked talking to the growers and the growers really liked meeting their customers, it seems that more and more we see this as we broaden our interviews.
We wrote to some of our friends and colleagues this week to ask if they would listen to our new internet radio show ‘Growing Trends’ on www.cravingtalkradio.com , it’s on air daily at 1pm and 7pm central time. You can also find us on LIve365 if you have the free app, or you can download a broadcast from the site to listen to it as a podcast.
The next ‘Big’ media is Digital radio
We made it this flexible, because unlike most radio shows you can hear us anywhere, so the shows time might be great in the USA but a little different in say England 7pm and 1am GMT. – I know we are good but, staying up until 1am to hear Ann & Myself is a bit of a stretch.
Digital Radio, always on, step through and listen now !
What I really wanted to write and say was thank you, thank you for listening, we gained a huge number of new listeners this week, which enabled us to sign new sponsors – yes we need sponsors like everyone else. The sponsors are great, they agree to sponsor us for a modest monthly fee, we in turn give them at least four free interviews a year, and mention them at least once a month when they are not being interviewed.
Listen to our digital library anytime
If this sounds interesting and you would like to be a sponsor, drop us a line we would love to hear from you. If you are passionate about your garden landscape and you would like to talk about it, drop us a line
Have you taken a trip to the woods today?
The Japanese have discovered that trees give off scents that actually have a calming effect on us, listen to Kelly Daniels ( the picture above is one from her gallery – The Kelly Gallery) talking about this in her interview airing at 1pm & 7pm daily.
I read today that antidepressant microbes in the soil have been discovered, called Mycobacterium vaccae, it’s been found to mirror the effects on neurons that drugs provide.
Which reminds me, I was digging in the soil today and I came across this large black disc with grooves all over both sides, I put it to my ear but I couldn’t hear anything…. if you get time do tune in and let us know what you think, or if you have some suggestions, we want to make the show about the all the wonderful people connected to our industry.
Ever since we started our radio show, I’ve come to realize how diverse, passionate and simply fascinating today’s gardeners really are.
Whilst still at school, working in the vacations a friend and I would plant new woodlands in England, we planted well over 1 million trees in that period – of course at the time they were tiny 2+ 2’s ( thats two year old twice transplanted). In subsequent years, I’ve designed hundreds of gardens and commercial properties with the team planting many hundreds of thousands more trees, shrubs, annuals, perennials, herbs, bulbs and corms. The most amazing sight , during this time was , seeing a chap in America transplanting trees ( about thirty or forty actually) some weighing over 650 tons, that were 60ft tall, with a 15ft deep x 45 foot wide rootball – now that is impressive, requiring a multitude of additional skills, not least irrigation some 40ft high into the tree itself!
Over the years we have met some truly wonderful people, who have a real passion, for flowers, or just orchids, or roses, or lawns, or even garden structures.
I remember building a gazebo for a client, who then asked for a copper roof, we then had to weather it so it went green quicker.
Or the client who’s passion was a weed free lawn – he would ‘swish’ the dew off the lawn every night before he went to bed !
Or the client who always tried to ‘scalp’ his lawn – the solution was to quietly add some washers to his mower settings and thus prevent the blades being set to low – not sure if he ever figured that out.
Or rose grower who tended his roses at night using a miners type lamp..
Or a lady who spent more than 8 hours everyday in her absolutely stunning perennial garden.
The one thing in common was that they derived a huge amount of peace and relaxation, working in the garden in touch with nature, it was like the ultimate stress release.
One of our radio show interviews touched on this when we discovered that research shows that woodland trees give of a chemical that we find calming as we walk through a woodland.
The point is they all had a passion that drove them to achieve results most of us would struggle with in all walks of life
In other words they got the maximum achievement out of each and everyday, and the garden helped them recharge their batteries just as a good nights sleep does !
I’ve always believed in attention to detail, striving to find the easiest yet pleasing on the eye finish to areas, using where ever possible natural materials, such as bricks, timber, wrought iron ( if you can find it), etc. to complete projects. When it comes to planting you cannot beat using a color wheel to develop contrasting colors schemes and have them blend with one another to create a complete picture.
If this all sounds familiar and you have a passion for gardening, no matter where, drop me a line and we will try and interview you for our show. It can be as short as a hello or as long as an hour, that’s really up to you.
In the meantime do tune in, as it’s digital radio you can listen anywhere, you will find Growing trends on www.cravingtalkradio.com daily at 1pm & 7pm central US time, or if you prefer using an app were on Live365.
If this year is anything to go by we are definitely experiencing some changes to our weather patterns. We have more rain than I can remember, I know this because the power has gone out an amazing 13 times in the past 6 weeks ( yeah I hear you say why are the lines not buried, and how can a squirrel knock out power to a whole town, well the same way a dump truck can when it tips it’s load, or too many birds take a break on a power line and it shorts out).
Back to the weather, instead of 90f plus temps they have been 75f and at night instead of 75f they have been 55f, it’s almost English weather, except over there the temps have been much higher.
We have also had nearby, a huge increase in Earthquakes ( by this I mean hundreds of small quakes) this year, many place the blame on this, to the new habit of ‘Fracking’ , which I’m sure isn’t helping.
We’ve a serious issue with lack of bees to pollinate the crops , it’s not just the honey bees the wild bee population is suffering as well, as is the bird population, which probably means that the insect population is affected as well. In sure mother nature doesn’t like it when us humans mess with what was once a very balanced eco-system.
Some areas of the country are experiencing record droughts, which if it continues will have a far reaching impact on food production and where folks chose to live.
So with all this turmoil around us, a couple of friends and I decided it was time to change how we grew herbs & veggies…
So today we are launching Hort Cuisine something we have been working on for a few years now, it’s a rather fun way to grow at home.
It starts with our Hort Cuisine patented grid system
Here’s an example Hort Cuisine, herb garden
and here’s the beginnings of a Hort Cuisine ‘Knot Garden’
here’s the Knot Garden sector planted
We are going to make smaller ‘Balcony’ sized versions too
Which should be an ideal size for balconies.
In the next few days you will see just how easy these kits are to do yourself at home.
if you need some inspiration for a small landscape or garden project read on….
We’ve been designing & building dream gardens for homeowners for 40 years now, winning awards, being creative and watching various trends come & go, customers desires and generally listening to clients wishes.
Some have been quite modest… as below.
others rather more ambitious..
Almost all the clients, wanted to complete some of the work themselves. The part they most wanted to do was the planting, either spring, summer or fall bedding, bulb planting, or perennial , shrub and herb planting. Recently we have seen an interest in vegetable growing.
Being folks that listen to our customers , it’s how we win awards, we also understood that we would have to make it much easier for folks, than a traditional planting plan we started out a few years ago to develop a new easy way to layout a planting scheme- we consulted other experts , eventually settling on one method with two products ( one a normal version the other an eco friendly version). inspired we then applied for a patent.( this in itself should be the subject of a blog all on its own)
Last week I am very happy to say we picked up our patent for the “Weekend Garden Kit”, which I have to confess was exciting, a big thank you for all who helped us, of which there were many.
Here’s how it works.
This simple to use system enables you to place the plants & features in the correct position without the need for time consuming setting out or measuring.
By using a grid system , we can add the position on the pot label, it makes the whole process much faster, and less likely for error. – they actually come as part of the kit.
so to set this out all you need is the special landscape fabric and where to plant or place the feature.
The result should then be this
To make this even easier we developed a free app called “PicaGardi” available on iTunes, Google play and Kindle to enable you to see ‘How ‘ an idea might look in your own project before you buy, take a look it’s fun and free and works on Phones and Tablets.
You can either select a picture from your ‘Gallery’ or take a new one with the ‘Camera’ button, then press ‘Ideas’ to see and idea float across the screen, tap it, pinch, scale and place to see how it would look on your project.
If you would like to make some comments or suggestions or just receive more information please fill in the form..
