Another re-issue, this time a post by by colleague, Marianne, who also posts on Garden Rant. And has a new book out: Tropical Plants and How to Love Them.

Original post:

This piece by Marianne Willburn seems very timely, coinciding as it does with Monty Don’s series on American Gardens. (Don’t miss Federal Twist at the end of the first programme).

Do American gardeners need to chuck out all their British (and European) garden books? And are the Brits going to start going American?

Garden regionally. Get inspired globally by Marianne Wilburn

The argument began in the summer.  Summer heat indexes in the Midwest of the United States have been blamed for many intemperate acts – and Scott Beuerlein’s column in the July/August issue of Horticulture might just have been one of them. 

In a relatively brief but passionate 500 words, he advocated for the total abandonment of British garden writers by American gardeners. He was tired, he told us, of staring at and being guided by sumptuous landscapes which bore no resemblance to his own.

With tongue lodged firmly in-cheek – but nonetheless, gloves off – he raged over meconopsis, told the late, sainted Beth Chatto to ‘bugger off’ and implied that the Gulf Stream was the source of all genius in that scepter’d isle – or at least responsible for most of it.

500 miles away in Virginia, I was wrestling with my own heat indexes and an apathy brought on by the recent death of my beloved father.  I didn’t feel like writing. I didn’t feel much like reading.  Any activity undertaken was perfunctory and by rote – such as making it to the end of a magazine so I could clear it away and feel as if I’d dealt with the mail.

 But Scott’s column had an electrifying effect upon me that morning.  Though clearly tinged with satire, the sentiments were too predictable…too safe for an American audience that would not object to giving the Brits a tongue-lashing for what we continually assume to be a British propensity towards snobbery, condescension and arrogance. 

Dismiss British garden writers entirely?!? I couldn’t let it slide. I literally sprang from my chair, unearthed the laptop and vigorously defended a place for them on American gardening shelves – or at least a place for their books.  I sent the piece to GardenRant and Susan Harris, rebel gardener and lover of all things controversial, ran it.

Were Scott’s comments representative of American gardeners? Were mine?  Obviously there can be no definitive, sweeping answer. One might as well ask how American gardeners view euonymus.  Some of us can’t get enough, and some of us can’t even stand to see it in a fast-food parking lot.  Others might query ‘Which species?’ and a few ask guardedly ‘What’s euonymus?’ We are all coming at this discipline from different places – as hobbyists, as academics, as naturalists, and of course, as artists.

But to stop yourself from appreciating fine art just because you cannot recreate it brushstroke for brushstroke is absurdly limiting. Surely, the best art builds upon that which comes before it.

And, if an argument was to be made for rejecting those influences absolutely, perhaps we should first be honest about American/British rivalries and cultural prejudices that surface in our insecure moments – rivalries which might prevent us from taking the very best elements of other gardens and applying them (with regional adaptations) to the places that make our hearts beat.

And so I was.

A view of the lower garden in my five-year old garden at Oldmeadow in Virginia – with plenty of tropical accents that don’t originate in the Mid-Atlantic.

When it came, I enjoyed his rebuttal immensely – particularly the intimations that I was currently looking for a bit of extra-marital shrubbery and a willing Monty Don. I was predictably accused of snobbery, anglophilia, and using my own ‘poison pen’ like a dagger. But I held firm in my subsequent answer and delved a bit deeper into why we should unquestionably garden regionally, but pay attention globally – the last bit of which I share below with ThinkinGardens at the request of Anne, who read the pieces on GardenRant and asked me to contribute.

Alas, Horticulture is a magazine for subscribers, and an American one at that, so British readers will need to hunt if they have an empty Sunday afternoon and wish to start from the beginning (and make sense of some references); but my rebuttal and Scott’s most recent retort are all available online on GardenRant, and I have provided the links to the full articles above. I very much hope you enjoy our verbal sparring match – no matter which part of the world you come from.   – MW

The Argument:

No one with an ounce, or indeed, gram, of sense thinks that we shouldn’t garden regionally in America, or for that matter, anywhere else in this world. That we shouldn’t find garden writers that live where we live and garden where we garden in order to help us to gain knowledge and experience relevant to our climate.  

But to dream, and perhaps more importantly, to innovate, we should inspire ourselves globally: Paradise gardens of Andalusia, potagers in Normandy, xeriscapes in San Diego, shambas in East Africa. People working with their specific environments to create life-giving works of art that other gardeners can observe, absorb and adapt to their own climates and their own environments. Thus:

·        Half of Europe is embracing naturalistic pollinator and wildlife-friendly designs inspired in part by the prairies and open spaces of the Americas, and led by top designers. Hell, even Hyde Park is letting the grass grow. Do they loathe their own traditions?

No.

·        A nearby grower friend is showcasing & selling Mediterranean look-alike plants (in a cruel and chilly Mid-Atlantic 6b) as Cali-faux-nian. The customers love it. Did she throw out her summer stock of petunias & calibrachoa?

No.

·        Monty Don is inspiring his slavering audience to create restful Moorish gardens within the limitations of urban garden flats and boring, but respectable suburban neighborhoods. Does he thus despise boring, but respectable suburban neighborhoods?

Well, probably, but we can all agree upon that.

Therefore, I plead with gardeners, garden educators, and Scott on a hot summer’s day, who wish to make a full retreat into the safe space of regional gardening advice delivered by regional gardening experts:

Garden regionally. Inspire yourself globally.

Cutting ourselves off from other influences is short-sighted, possibly pig-headed, and will not lead to innovative, exciting design movements of the future. And for those now racing to the captcha to virtuously proclaim how few damns they give for “exciting design movements of the future;” it’s the Dutch Wave/New Perennial Movement you can thank for inspiring a new generation of gardeners – and non-gardeners – to create pollinator-friendly landscapes in an increasingly urbanized world.

This isn’t a zero sum game. The rest of the world does some things better than we do, and vice versa. Know what you know about where you garden, and know it well. Take time to know more.  Look for alternative opinions. Read footnotes. Whether British or American, pens deftly wielded as daggers can be a great deal more effective than those used to spoon-feed.

Doing all this doesn’t make you a snob – it makes you smart. And it just might put you at the top of your regional game.

Marianne Willburn is an American garden columnist and author of the book Big Dreams, Small Garden.  Read more at www.smalltowngardener.com