Growing by design

Straight into a new year and it’s just as we left off in 2014 with Irish horticulture getting stronger and stronger.

In 1996 the Garden and Landscape Designers Association (GLDA) was founded by talented horticulturists, landscapers and garden designers who wanted to give the industry a united voice in Ireland. Garden design was very traditional at the time, but in the intervening years it has developed and grown with the calibre of our designers — we are now holding our own on an international level.

Less rigid adherence to the rules, mixing roses with herbaceous, trees with conifers and even vegetables among the perennials, as opposed to keeping strict areas for particular groups of plants, has led to more relaxed and interesting gardens.

Ideal for the modern garden too, where space is at a premium. For two decades now, a new style of garden design has been spreading across the landscape. Inspired by nature and urging a more ecological approach, colourful perennials and grasses intermingle on a grand scale.

With an emphasis on light and movement, this style creates striking landscapes of great beauty. First pioneered in Germany, it spread to Holland where it was further developed by Henk Gerritsen and Piet Oudolf. Here it became known as the ‘Dutch Wave’. It later spread to the USA, where it is referred to as ‘prairie planting’ and was championed by James van Sweden. It is almost 20 years since the internationally acclaimed American, now departed, introduced the style to Irish gardeners and designers at the first GLDA International Design Seminar in 1997.

On February 7 The GLDA’s 19th International Garden Design Seminar will take a critical look at the contributions and shortfalls of this movement as well as exploring what planting design in the future may look like, especially in a land where beautiful and exotic trees and shrubs flourish.

The New Perennial Movement is the latest trend influencing garden designers. But apart from the seductive images in books, magazines and on our screens, how much do we really know about this movement? As this naturalistic style has moved from a few brilliant practitioners to the mainstream, has the New Perennial Movement lost its integrity? Or will its expansion reinvigorate it artistically? Is the Oudolf-style really a model for common gardens and parks? Can a style designed for a continental climate translate to a maritime climate where the main component can be damaged by persistent rainfall and slugs and snails, or can we adapt the style to create a uniquely Irish version?

Is it just a passing trend or is it something that will continue to build, and evolve? To find the answers join the GLDA on February 7 on a voyage of discovery in the company of some of the leading experts on the subject; the thinking and inspiration behind the movement, the plants, the planting and examples from around the world. It will be an informative and inspirational day, with the promise of some lively debate.

Thomas Rainer is a landscape architect, teacher, and writer living in Washington, DC. He is best known for his influential and irreverent blog, Grounded Design, which has gained an international following. He is a widely sought-after public speaker whose passionate and provocative talks have inspired and entertained audiences all over the United States.

Rainer feels we should use more native plants — “plant more daringly, and loosen up that landscape — for crying out loud”. In addition to writing, Thomas has designed landscapes for the US Capitol grounds, The New York Botanical Garden, and over 100 gardens from Maine to Florida. Thomas is an associate principal for the firm Rhodeside & Harwell and teaches planting design for George Washington University. www.groundeddesign.com

For 25 years, Keith Wiley was head gardener at The Garden House, a 10-acre garden on the edge of Dartmoor in south Devon. Here he created what has been described as one of the most exciting and innovative gardens in Britain, and the best example of leading-edge horticulture in the country. Now he has created his own spectacular garden, flamboyantly rich in perennials from all over the world. He is widely travelled, and has taken great pains to provide cultural conditions to match te plant’s habitats. Keith’s designs are truly naturalistic. www.wileyatwildside.com

Sylvie and Patrick Quibel will be coming from Normandy (France) where their four acre garden, Le Jardin Plume, has been described by Stephen Lacey as a paragon of modern garden making and one of the most seductive gardens of recent times. The Quibels are self-taught horticulturists and hands-on gardeners with innate design skills. In a rural, windy setting they have uniquely combined the exuberance of perennials, grasses, annuals and wandering ‘plantes vagabondes’ such as poppies and nasturtiums with the structure of old farm buildings, clipped shapely hedges, and an orchard. A variety of artistic and sensual atmospheres are evoked in a series of self- contained spaces with a flair that only the French have. Could this be the garden that holds the ingredients to supercede the mystique of Claude Monet’s garden at Giverny? www.lejardinplume.com

Verney Naylor MGLDA, one of our best known garden designers, a well travelled plant expert and garden writer, will describe her own way of bringing the landscape and a love of wild places into the gardens she has designed in many areas of Ireland.Few others could hold such an informed and experienced opinion on the use and culture of plants for the diversities of the Irish landscape. http://glda.ie/designers/verny-naylor/

I have no doubt it will be a provocative and challenging event and an experience not to be missed for anyone with more than a passing interest in garden design. For bookings, see www.glda.ie or email [e-mail]. Tel: [phone].