Garden News May 23

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BUMPER CHELSEA ISSUE! May 23, 2015

B rit a in'sed st m o st t ru in e vo ic g a rd e n in g

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simple steps to make more border plants

✔ Do the Chelsea chop & get more fowers ✔ Plant a container inspired by the show ✔ Sneak peek of Chris Beardshaw’s garden

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S D E E S E E 2xFR £4.68

Worth

Get your patio ready for the weekend!

VARIEGATED PERENNIALS

No more dull borders with these light, bright plants

Carol Klein “How to plant" a super-stylish "white garden” ASPARAGUS Savour every spear with our recipes & harvesting tips

Grow

MS ALLIhU elsea for C glamour!

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easy ways to get the Chelsea look this bank holiday! t s ju n i n e d r a g l u f i A beaut

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D N E K E E ONE W

CHRIS BEARDSHAW

Gold Medal

MASTERCLASS

Award-winning garden designer, Chelsea Gold medallist, radio broadcaster and Beechgrove Garden presenter

The drama’s in the planting How I’m creating a community garden at Chelsea we can all aspire to

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ver the years, the Chelsea Flower Show’s reputation as a premium piece of horticultural theatre has been stretched to the point of fantasy, where just about anything goes – manipulation, coercion and fakery. This is in contrast to my view of what the premium flower show should concentrate on. My feeling is that you convey the client’s message as clearly as possible, but with as much realism within the accepted conditions of it being a show.

What you see should be achievable at home.

Therefore, the plants may be pampered but not adulterated or forced, and the planting combinations should demonstrate genuinely good associations for the assumed environment the garden represents.

This year’s Morgan Stanley Healthy Cities Garden sees us creating a garden for a community. We’ll be donating it in almost its entirety to Poplar in East London immediately after the show. The garden takes much of its inspiration from the once common riverside conditions that historically occupied the area

known as Poplar. As a nod to the previous common practice of pollarding and coppicing, the garden is punctuated by pollarded trees with 2m (6½ft) clear stems, which are somewhere in the region of 25-40 years old. The trees are seeing a second lease of life – they were originally used as living posts in an Italian vineyard before a far-sighted nursery salvaged them – and they are joined on the garden by smaller coppiced specimens.

Both of these techniques of pruning trees are a great way to contain top growth and potentially invasive roots.

It makes them ideal in small spaces, even in large containers, and the manipulation brings about the formation of characterful specimens that almost become sculpture in their own right.

I’m keeping the herbaceous understorey planting deliberately relaxed in its orchestration and there are several plants that are key players within the

Perfect planting in Chris’s 2013 Chelsea garden, which won a gold medal

Another gold, this time for the Furzey Gardens entry with acid-loving plants in 2012

C H E L SE A SPECIAL

Chris’s 2015 Chelsea garden

Vibrant fern Ma euccia struthiopteris provides upright accents

structure. One way to create distinct upright accents is the use of the vibrant fern matteuccia, as they are invaluable at moving informally through anywhere with heavy soils and lots of organic matter. The fresh lime green of these glorious ferns partners well in the spring sunshine with the flowering spikes of azure blue camassias, themselves a gregarious and robust plant from North America and wetland meadows.

In addition to their stature, they exhibit

Garden World Imag es

Tangerine Primula bulleyana will feature

wonderful naturalising and colonising skills that suits informal planting.

One of the most hardworking plants in terms of flowering at this time of year are the candelabra primulas. They are so undemanding, and thrive in sunshine or shade as long as there is sufficient moisture and reasonable fertility. The reward is colour to suit any taste or scheme, from the almost tangerine P. bulleyana to the cerise P. beesiana and the delicate and reserved

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Camassias are a key part of the under-planting

shades of ‘Apple Blossom’. They flower for a couple of months, creating a series of whirls on an ever-increasing stem.

In the 25 years that I’ve been visiting and exhibiting at Chelsea, my overriding feeling is that the drama, theatre and spectacle should be created by, and enjoyed from, the flowers and plants. We have a huge diversity of plants at our disposal, and this year’s garden is no different for me in trying to achieve this.

May 23 2015 / Garden News 25

EA S L E H C SPECIAL

Allium sphaerocephalon often features in Chelsea designers’ planting schemes

Plant

OF THE WEEK

5 varieties ft for a show garden

Alliums!

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Keep them happy Alliums need free-draining soil and a sunny site to flower well.

Like all bulbs, they do best if planted deeply, at least twice the depth of the bulb. In heavy soils, grow them in pots of gritty compost. Plant the bulbs in autumn but take advantage of summer flower shows such as Harrogate and Chelsea to see alliums in flower and choose which varieties you want.

Spent allium flowerheads sca ered on areas of bare soil help prevent pets and mammals from scratching up seedlings.

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‘Pink Jewel’ These tall alliums create a froth of pure pink around early summer perennials. Height: 75cm (30in).

Walkers Bulbs

Fa ct

tall-stemmed, drumstick alliums look amazing weaving through a border or grown in pots. Allium giganteum is arguably the tallest at around 2m (6½ft), or choose varieties such as ‘Gladiator’, white-flowered ‘Mount Everest’ or purple ‘Globemaster’ – all reach a metre or more. Allium hollandicum ‘Purple Sensation’ is shorter but just as effective.

A. cristophii

A. caeruleum

Stout stems support the large fowers, each with a metallic sheen.

Height: 60cm (2ft).

What these slender alliums lack in height they make up for in true blue colour!

Height: 50cm (20in).

Walkers Bulbs

ever has the onion family looked more beautiful!

Alliums’ foliage unfurls well before the flowers appear – it ranges from slender and grass-like, to thick and fleshy.

Allium karataviense is actually grown for its broad, red-tinted foliage. But alliums’ main attraction is undoubtedly their flowers, which appear in early summer and grace many a Chelsea show garden.

From the tiny yellow drooping blooms of Allium moly or brilliant blue A. caeruleum, to showstopping A. cristophii or A. schubertii with ‘firework’ blooms, these see-through flowers make an impact while still appearing light and airy. Allium sphaerocephalon often looks great teamed with grasses, and in naturalistic planting schemes.

For a real sense of rhythm,

Walkers Bulbs

Chelsea favourites add rhythm to borders as well as plenty of style

‘Mount Everest’

A. sphaerocephalon

Huge white globes emerge in June and last for a long time, great teamed with purple. Height: 1.2m (4ft).

This tall but dainty allium fower emerges green and gradually turns purple.

Height: 90cm (3ft).

May 23 2015 / Garden News 5