Garden Diary: That Black & White Time of Year

... a bit of navel gazing  ...

This time of year the garden is almost totally bare, the grasses burned and the remnants of perennials either chopped to mulch or hauled off to the compost heap. This is the time to savor the emptiness of the garden ... the mysterious recession of life back into the earth.

The garden in early spring, after burning and cutting has removed all evidence of the masses of herbaceous perennials and grasses.

Over the next three months, hundreds of grasses and perennials will begin their inexorable rise into the light and, by midsummer ...

For contrast ... same view last August.

 ... will fill this space with a mounting sea of vegetation.

Taking Stock
This is also a good time to reassess the underlying structure of the garden. Using black and white makes it easier to do this.

In my effort to add structure, to create a garden for the "off season," to differentiate the garden from the surrounding woods, have things gotten a little too busy? Does the structure interfere with the “savoring of emptiness”?

Over the past year, paving all the paths with gravel has had a dramatic visual effect, giving them a heft and substance they lacked before, with bands of gray that bring a sense of motion, almost like a network of roadways, to this little field in the woods, punching up the shapes and curves, even foreshortening distances, making the garden appear shallower than in past years. Is it too busy? I don’t think so, not yet—not if I remember to keep a light hand. (Of course, much of this is invisible, or can be seen only in partial glimpses when the plants return, so the garden's structure, which can be seen like a picture now, can only be sensed as a journey in the summer, when you have to walk through it to understand how it's made.)

But the paths do work. They are a practical solution for walking over the very wet land, and their curved shapes, solidity, and width keep the naturalistic wildness-to-come within bounds. They provide access, make it possible to explore with ease, and give a sense of boundary and space that defines the planted areas and keeps them from becoming overwhelming.

So on balance, I think this is an improvement. I can work to refine it.

The meandering armature of the garden--the long, narrow pond in the lower right, the linear stone planting bed in the middle distance, and the curved sitting area in the upper right--suggests a series of S-curves, like a flowing stream.

Sense of Place
My starting point has always been sense of place ... to remember this is a garden for a modernist house in the woods ... a quite place in the gently rolling hills above the Delaware River, where centuries of rain and erosion have carved a modest landscape of subtle curves and slopes. I've wanted to take my queue from the natural processes that shaped this land ... thus the native stone walls, the curving gravel paths, the naturalistic wildness of the plantings, the clay pond.

This focus on sense of place is also the reason for another, more abstract feature that overlays the network of paths. This is the curvy diagonal running from the lower right to the upper left in the image above (pond, raised stone planting bed, paved sitting area). We have an unusual geology in this part of New Jersey, characterized by masses of fractured argillite bedrock just under the surface. When it rains, the water can’t percolate into the soil, so flows in copious flood across the land surface. It's a little like living in the midst of a shallow creek bed. I've noted before that my garden resembles a river delta, where the overland flow of water follows natural channels that form subtle flow patterns. This phenomenon is a defining feature of this land. (An Irish neighbor has a small sign in Gaelic in front of his house. When I asked it's meaning, he said, "Land of soggy feet"!)

I’m using the word armature in the sense of a framework as used by a sculptor to support a figure being modeled. Or rather I’m using that definition as a metaphor, a touchstone image. But I'm not at all sure it works, at least not yet.

My original intent was to develop structure that would give the garden more winter interest, as well as a structural meaning that makes the delta metaphor integral to the garden's design. The meandering diagonal does help carry the eye back to the corner of the garden, where a sitting area with bench and hydrangeas is gradually evolving. Behind this corner I’ve planted two hornbeam hedges meeting at right angles, so this will indeed be a “corner” with some oomph (if the hedge grows, that is). That hedge may be the answer to making this concept work as intended. I also may want to shape the existing plantings to direct the eye toward this diagonal line of flow. Time will tell.

So I continue fiddling, not yet sure it will turn out as I want, waiting for the hedge to grow.

But isn’t that a large part of what gardening is about? I’ve made the plan and I’m executing it. I remind myself the pleasure is in the doing, and I’ll continue to make changes to better define this armature, integrate its parts, try to make it “read” as a meaningful statement about this place.

If I had my preferences, and cost were no object, all this would be a single thing, probably a series of interconnected pools moving off into the distance.  But the cost would be too high, and I'm not about to start again at this stage (and age).

Last fall, to better integrate the pond and raised stone bed, I started adding stone around the pond (above). It will be wider than shown here, but irregular and intermittent, suggesting a natural deposit of the native argillite, and visually wedding the pond more closely to the raised stone planting bed to its left.

The new sitting area farther out needs help too. It’s in the midst of large, blousy plantings, and needs some breathing room (it’s so bare out there now, you have to use your imagination). Some of the larger plants may need to be moved, allowing the eye to travel a bit. I'm thinking of adding low plant groupings about the perimeter of this area, to make it more “planty” so it feels like a natural feature, not some abstract idea imposed on the landscape.

A Walk Around
So down into the garden to see how it looks at ground level (below). Entering the garden from the front of the house, you move through this woodland garden before entering the open "prairie" space. The path on the right is the "private" entrance from the gravel terrace overlooking the garden; the one on the right brings you from the front entry.

Entering from the woodland garden at the side of the house, two paths start the visual flow.

The circling paths create a sense of flow, of movement, pulling you along and around even when there’s not much to see other than empty landscape.

The smaller path from the house passes on the opposite side of the pond then enters the main cross pathway in the mid-distance.

The curve of the major crossing follows a change in elevation. My thought was to use the natural contour of the land to shape the path.

If things go as planned, the box woods in the center will merge into a single undulating mass.

Looking back from the opposite side (below), the new sitting out area is visible on the left. It was added when the garden was in full growth. In this naked state, I can see it needs tweaking ... more gravel to widen it, low plantings around the perimeter to give it its own sense of place, addition of a narrow linking path on the right to complete the circle it wants to make with the existing path. I do want to keep the entrances to this area narrow, allowing room for only one person to pass at a time. This will be a private space when the garden is growing at full tilt, and access needs to be controlled.

Continuing around to the link to the main path on the far side of the garden (below), it's clear I need a similar link at the right end. At first, I wanted to prevent passage through this area to give it a greater sense of privacy. Now I find the desire to walk through irresistible. The message is clear.

The Wave Hill chairs are out of place here ... too prominent ... so I'll use them on the periphery of the garden, perhaps near the pond, and add simple low benches here.

The sitting area was imposed on the exiting garden, so some
larger plants will have to move to give it breathing room.

Rounding the back side of the garden, a wall of Arborvitae and some isolated evergreen specimens give some interest (mainly bringing some green into the brown field) ...

... but the stars at this bare time of year are the Japanese fantail willows (Salix sachhalinensis 'Sekka'), which I’m pruning into small trees with two or three trunks each (yes, some spring pruning is needed about now). These are beautifully shaped plants with a very Japanese aesthetic, at least to my eye, and I find they can carry the garden almost alone until the perennials reemerge. Later in the season they bear large fuzzy catkins heavy with yellow pollen. Even in the summer, their large, irregular shapes enhance the Silphiums, Eupatoriums, and other tall perennials and grasses.

The Japanese fantail willows are a prominent feature of early spring. These need pruning to reveal their beautiful shapes and, of course, much of their charm is their early spring color, which is lost here.

I've also begun to add bulbs though none are visible here. Daffodils and crocus survive the wet conditions well, and camassias should, though the few I've tried haven't been much of a success. There are actually daffodils in this view, but they haven't emerged yet.

So I have quite a lot of work to do this season, as I'm sure will continue to be the case with every coming year. The key will be in knowing when to stop.

Garden Diary: The prairie garden in black & white

This is the garden in early spring, after all the herbaceous plants have been burned or cut down. I rendered several photographs in black and white to emphasize the underlying structure of this wet prairie garden, and to help decide what to do to add meaningful structure at such bare times of the year.

The photo above shows a  large network of intersecting lines that make the underlying structure of the garden:  three stone walls on the right and left, as well as one at the base of the bank from which the photo was taken, another major diagonal formed by the narrow pond and its visual extension in a long stone planter filled with 'cloud' box woods and Bergenia, a diagonal line of Arborvitae (Thuja occidentalis) along the path on the right, and an evolving 'screen' of deciduous woody shrubs at the back.

Above in close-up you can better see the screen of the shrubs. Three high-pruned Salix sachalinensis sekka (Japanese Fantail willows) appear to be small blooming trees on the right (they are not). The lack of color, even without fine resolution, clearly reveals the varied structures, shapes and textures of the shrubs. Further to the left, in the center of the photo, are two thin twigged willows (Salix koriyanagi 'Rubikins'), all verticals, with a structure that waves gracefully in the wind. Yesterday, I took long cuttings and planted them further to the left to create a screen of five evenly spaced willows. These will stand immediately in front of a line of five Arborvitae. My intention is to extend the screen with a hedge of European hornbeam (Carpinus betulus) starting a few feet beyond the Rubikins willows and continuing for ten or twelve feet. After a further space, there will be a smaller hedge perpendicular to the longer hedge.

In the photo above you can see how the hornbeam hedges will form a corner that will visually terminate the garden at the far side, creating an enclosed space that I want to enhance with a 'forest' of various hydrangeas.

Above, a view of the far 'corner' taken from a position slightly to the right reveals how the right angle of hornbeam hedges will extend the line of the distant stone wall, then turn to the right to join with the rows of shrubby greenery across the back side of the garden.

Another shift in point of view to the right, above, almost shows another focal point--one not visible in the photo: a circle of dark red painted logs. The red, unfortunately, shows as black in these photos. And below, the main path, newly paved in gravel, has become a prominent geometric feature, far more so than when covered in wood chips.

A color photo, taken in July of last summer, just to show the dramatic difference when the herbaceous vegetation is at its full.

And next two more photos ... one in black and white taken today, contrasting with a color photo from last summer, taken from approximately the same position. Here you can clearly make out the dark red circle of logs in the distance.

Here is a photo taken from the opposite end of the garden, just inside the enclosure that will be formed by the hornbeam hedges. You can clearly see on the left the slant of the land, which becomes rapidly steeper as you near the Lockatong Creek about 1200 feet below the house. The rough, stubble field will soon be invisible beneath the wet prairie of the summer of 2011.

Below the three Japanese Fantail willows clearly show their high pruning. They require rather frequent pruning down below, where new growth continues to emerge throughout the season.

A view toward the house from the far end of the garden shows the need for embellishment of the view, particularly the wooden fence leading up to the house (made necessary to prevent deer from entering the garden). Cutleaf sumac on the bank will provide some interest. I've already dug holes for two new groups of Japanese Fantail willows, which will add visual interest as well as a feeling of intimate enclosure to that garden entry point.

Note the circle of red logs on the right above, and in the center below. This metaphorical feature will be a focal point of the 'private' space that will be formed by the hornbeam hedges and the 'forest' of hydrangeas between this viewpoint and the path.