Ah, who’d be fashionable? Or classy?
Someone else with a new garden which has prompted reflections.
Anne Wareham, editor
Away From It All by Debbie Wilson
Having only ever had back gardens, I suddenly found myself with six acres. Five acres of that is a field and 15-year-old young woodland, the rest is garden. I can take the landscape into account, I can have a real meadow (hurrah!), I can do wild. That’s what you’re supposed to do, isn’t it?
Wild?
I’ve started to read and to visit gardens. There are conservationists and eco-warriors, there are organic zero-wasters, there are self-seeders and plant colony promoters, there are people who just ‘edited’, there are prairie addicts, there are people who planted wildflowers in their borders and cultivated perennials in their meadows and there are grasses, grasses everywhere. I’ve started to doubt. What does ‘wild’ actually mean? And why is it the orthodoxy of the moment?
The natural world is undoubtedly restorative. In an overwhelmingly urban and suburban world, we need that more than ever. We love the idea of (probably less so the real thing) wilderness. We are constantly and rightly reminded of the reduction in biodiversity and the loss of natural habitats. We want both to deny this and to compensate by trying to create a small corner of the planet which reflects our ideals and gives us refuge from encroaching urbanisation. The most enthusiastic adherents of the wild are often either urban or at least bound by urban value systems. Educated middle or upper classes grieve over the loss of the ‘natural’ in our lives. (It is no coincidence perhaps that ‘wild planting’ often looks best set against the formalism of minimalist architecture.)
Yep, real meadow. Not been wild for thousands of years maybe. But meadow for many.
Holidays, for many, are the main way of reconnecting with the natural world. We try to recreate this sense of freedom and seclusion in our gardens. We imitate wildernesses we have visited, the chic design of modern art galleries, or a lost world of country vicarages, bucolic orchards and Victorian meadows. For gardening is also nostalgic, almost by definition, from the first ideas of a paradise lost to the current museum style of the National Trust. There has always been a golden age more natural, more idyllic to try to recreate.
And it was, it has to be said, usually owned by those with a wealth and privilege we like to emulate. (Why else, for goodness sake, do postage-stamp gardens try to create miniature versions of the grounds of a country house?) And there’s the rub: the fantasy of wilderness is of a place free, accessible to all. But most of it is privately owned by the wealthy few. Garden designers and the garden media present the achievements of the affluent as our role model. And we go to their magazines and books for advice and ideas. It’s hard to escape the pressure to keep up, to impress: gardens, like houses, are aspirational.
Up to the 18th century, gardening in Britain was strictly formal in design until the aristocracy with a new appreciation of landscape learned from painting, and with a sentimentality gleaned from pastoral poetry extended their gardens out into their estates, extolling the ‘savage picturesque’. Meanwhile their tenants, supplemented their fruit and vegetable plot with herbs and wild flowers, many with practical uses like primroses, violets, foxgloves and marigolds, from the surrounding countryside. The aristocracy claimed ownership of the wider beauties of nature whilst the working man, who knew only too well the practicalities of working in the cold and the mud, appropriated the smaller beauties to the safe confines of his own plot. It’s Jay Appleton’s ‘prospect’ and ‘refuge’[1], only it’s determined by class.
Now the affluent middle-class combine the two: they buy fields from indigent farmers and play at landowning. They design their gardens to blend with or echo the landscape around them, like the 18th century aristocrats. They like ‘prospect’. But they also bring wild flowers in to their gardens which they see as a refuge. A certain self-effacing modesty is a traditional British virtue, so combining the grand ambition of the aristocracy with the humble cottage garden is the ideal in good taste.
And they still, being upwardly mobile, wish for more. They want to escape their origins: hence calling someone’s garden ‘suburban’ is the ultimate insult. Gardening is a broad church, as the National Garden Scheme exemplifies, but horticultural judgements are, more often than not, inextricably entangled with those ideas of taste which are driven by social class and the current aesthetic. Gardening is riddled with snobbery – to its detriment. We’re all guilty of it.
The ‘wildflower meadow’ (although consisting mostly of cultivated annuals since they give a much more reliable show) has now reached suburban gardens and roadside verges and so the vanguard will need to find a new fashion to display their exclusivity. It’s not a little ironic that the gardening writer’s practice of recommending particular choices of plants and planting as exclusive only serves to make them popular. How long will it be before signature plants (eupatorium, veronicastrum, epilobium, for example) which I plant to show that I am a member of the club, become, as they say, common as muck?
So, I suppose that we have to accept that gardening is socially and culturally driven on the one hand but also try to hang on to why we think the natural world is significant. Wild gardening is still (despite the passing of fashions) experimental. It’s much more difficult to grow wild flowers than the pundits would lead you to believe. Many have extremely specific requirements and we don’t know that much about their reproductive habits or their precise habitats.
For me that’s the challenge: it makes sense to try to learn from the natural world how plants can flourish perfectly well without our help and when we don’t interfere too much, and then apply that knowledge to all our garden plants. And that, I suspect, is what wild gardening should be.
Debbie Wilson
[1] Jay Appleton, The Experience of Landscape (1975) proposes a theory of aesthetics based on satisfying our desire for opportunity (prospect) and safety (refuge).
This has been a very interesting exercise for me – thanks to everyone for their comments. Bypassing the issue of class, which doesn’t seem to interest people much, it is clear that ‘wild’ is so much part of the current zeitgeist that the word, confusingly and probably inevitably, means a whole spectrum of different things to different people. It can be about meadows – either because we find them aesthetic or because we want to retain them as habitats – and about how they are managed. It can also be about encouraging wild life and retaining native species – particularly in view of the increasing impact of climate change. It can stem from a genuine respect for the natural world. But for many it is just a fashionable style of gardening like any other, without any particular rationale. Gardening after all just expresses what we find aesthetic in the natural world.
The issue of how ‘wild’ habitats are maintained, it seems to me, also applies to the recreation of all kinds of habitat, not just meadows, which would naturally revert to scrub and eventually to woodland if left entirely unmanaged. As several people pointed out, gardening by definition implies control and therefore is the antithesis of ‘wildness’. How, and how far, we introduce into our gardens native species or adapt ‘natural’ habitats with cultivated species (whether they grow wild somewhere else or not), and how far we control them, is a matter of personal taste. Some people want ground elder and others don’t! It doesn’t make sense, I agree, to be purist in the Anthropocene era. Personally I like the idea of giving plants more ‘autonomy’, allowing them to colonise with less interference from us, which is, I suppose, just an extension of Beth Chatto’s ‘right plant in the right place’ (and perhaps a reflection of my laziness?). I also like the idea of recreating ‘wild’ habitats and plant colonies within the garden setting (in keeping with your given landscape of course). But, as a gardener, I also want it to look good – so deciding how and where to draw the line between ‘wild’ and gardened is the really interesting part.
I believe that last question is one that people fight out on the coaches when they leave after a visit to Veddw.
The rule of thumb is that if possible, every garden should have what we call an exclusion zone which is essentially a small wildlife corridor which isn’t gardened and just occasionally maintained.
This is usually planted with indigenous plant species.
Just outside Barnsley, Gloucestershire there are two beds of variegated ground elder (AEGOPODIUM podagraria ‘Variegatum’) outside a cottage. It looks stunning when in flower. Just don’t believe anybody who tells you it wont be as invasive as the green form. But simple, and stunning.
Well, don’t believe me, but it’s not as vigorous! It does make a several season long pleasure though.
Well, don’t believe me, but it’s not as vigorous! It does make a several season long pleasure though.
Perhaps I’m not reading as much as Debbie, or that America’s skew on what she reports as a fixation on “WILD” seems more focused on a revived appreciation of meadows. My perception is restoring or recreating transitional meadow landscapes has as much to do with increasing concern for all the WILDlife – birds, bugs, and native plants – that struggles when such habitats are increasingly scarce. Such places had been labeled “Wild”, “untidy”, “neglected, “hard-to-manage” and were therefore eliminated from human view. Now, with perhaps some artificial romance of a field of wildflowers and billowing grasses, landscapes that gently shimmer with color and movement, we garden-lovers are smitten with possibilities. Can we simultaneously restore habitats, nuture pollinators, support struggling species and create something of satisfying beauty by re-imagining meadows? Yes, we can, i but it would be helpful if we accept this is a contrivance and not natural. We need not define “Wild”. We simply must understand our own intent, what will define success for us, and not worry too much about rules.
I’m with Eric. I would suggest forgetting all about style and gardens with most of your acres. Contact your local wildlife trust and have them advise you how to manage your meadows for wildlife. Wildlife as I’m sure you know is horribly under threat in the UK and one of the tragedies is the disappearance of managed, diverse, flower-rich meadows which in days of yore were havens for a variety of things such as butterflies and birds. It’s all being replaced with monocultural fertilized grass planting. If you follow the advice you will be helping nature and you will end up with a most beautiful private nature reserve that you won’t need to plant or fuss over. All you need to do is bring in the sheep now and again and ask a local farmer to cut it (at the right time) and take away the (incredibly nutrient rich) hay to make some horse happy. Over years your meadow will transform. The key though is getting the right advice. If you need help accessing the info please feel free to email me and I’ll try to connect you.
I think this is excellent advice.
This is a great start, Robin, but it’s not quite so easy. It is very difficult to find farmers who are happy to do that cut or value the hay. Or cart the sheep in for a couple of months….Hence http://www.monmouthshiremeadows.org.uk/ and http://www.parishgrasslandsproject.org.uk/index.html – both worth investigating if you might be at all interested in this valuable approach.
This is a great start, Robin, but it’s not quite so easy. It is very difficult to find farmers who are happy to do that cut or value the hay. Or cart the sheep in for a couple of months….Hence http://www.monmouthshiremeadows.org.uk/ and http://www.parishgrasslandsproject.org.uk/index.html – both worth investigating if you might be at all interested in this valuable approach.
We have certainly had problems getting anyone to come in and cut our hay. Too many ‘weeds’ for it to be good quality! You don’t want to know what medieval methods we have been driven to…
“Managed, diverse, flower-rich meadows”! Perhaps that should be at the core of this discussion. Once re-establishing a meadow, are we prepared to do the regular hard labor of extracting sapling trees and woodies, removing aggressive invasives, and performing periodic controlled burns to assure the sunny field does not yield to a young woodland? Do we want those spaces to evolve as in nature or do we want to create artful compositions of appropriate plants to support wildlife and work to maintain that developmental stage?
The designers’ favorites are often selections that add structure and height and moments of colorful exuberance in these new meadow, and I think that is what distinguishes this new trend from pure environmental exercises. Gardeners with adequate property for this to be a relevant choice may make choices to use the meadow for inspiration. And they should be free to make personal management choices to guide how these places will either be kept in stasis or evolve.
Is there a confusion here between a traditional hay meadow, which will never grow trees or shrubs because it is kept cut low for several months every year? And burning (in UK anyway) would be awful.People in the uk do sow areas full of annuals and call it meadow, and the management of that is closer to that of an arable field without the crop, but still trees would be unlikely because it would perhaps be ploughed or similar. Are your thoughts all American thoughts, Eric?
I suppose this goes back to a distinction between a more “Wild” place and a “managed meadow”. My impression is that many contemporary designers – certainly not just American – are purposefully are introducing perennials and perhaps woody shrubs for structure, scale and winter interest that might intensify annual clearing efforts that I imagine are required for hay meadows.
I have at least one place where I have done the same. All that is required is an annual mow or strim, – around and avoiding demolishing the shrubs or trees if there are any.Then maybe taking off the cut foliage, or not, depending on how rich you want the soil.
I do the same. One or two very small trees have been sliced off by the grillo! Of course when the trees mature, the habitat will change…
Sorry – am I missing something? Why are we thinking it’s all about meadows? That’s just a tiny bit of the habitat spectrum. What about dry stone walls, damp woodland edges, dry woodland edges etc…? In other words, as other contributors to the discussion are suggesting…just look around you..what’s happy growing where? And what’s growing wild in other places around the globe with similar growing requirements which we could introduce into our gardens here to enhance the ‘wild’ feel?
Yes yes! And heaths, bogs, wetlands, streams, ponds etc etc
It’s quite hard to be satisfied with just the one type of landscape you’ve got. The downfall of lots of gardens is trying to introduce too many different mini habitats which are not compatible with the surrounding landscape?
You’re right Eric. Perhaps I’m just focussing on the wrong thing. All the stuff about class and snobbery is a red herring!
Though actually my problem is less with the field/meadow and more with the style of garden to go with it!
Oooh. I’m glad you’re reconsidering your thoughts on class and snobbery, Debbie. I was reluctant to directly challenge your words but don’t think that’s an issue of the “trend-setters”. I do think, though, that it’s an intriguing concept to allow the notion of more “wildness” to infiltrate deliberate garden designs, especially to allow a matrix of interwoven plant species to develop over time. Can we just “let things be” and simultaneously edit just a bit for purposes of overall aesthetic composition or to avoid the natural aggression of certain invasive species which might yield less botanically complex results? Therein lies the true art in pursuing this challenging but potentially thrilling new direction in landscape design. And let’s all realize it does not apply itself well to intimate small scale gardens.
I think ‘wild’ and ‘garden’ makes an oxymoron. If you do nothing to a patch of land, things will grow wild. If you start manipulating the plant life, you are gardening, be it ever so gently.
There is much that is pleasing about the current fashion for ‘wild gardening’. It’s just that our vocabulary is insufficient to describe what we are variously doing to patches of land within our grasp.
You’re right. And it is hard to find a sensible middle ground in this oxymoron. As other people here have suggested it’s the old problem of how much to control nature. I don’t want a woodland edge which is all hogweed and brambles; I want primroses, wild daffs, bluebells etc. Although I do want some blackberries too!
So, when not concerned about the language and rules we use or those who would characterized our actions, is it truly a challenge to give it a go? Although not a simple task, I think we can maintain or create a landscape with both an eye and mindset to allow complex matrices of plants to intermingle tending toward a more relaxed and “wild” sensibility. We can introduce (horticulturally appropriate) species that meet our own goals – to introduce a wash of seasonal color by flower or foliage, to introduce the movement and rustling sound of tall grass, to introduce an ephemeral carpet of delicate fragrance . But the dynamics of how such species will interact in “controlled chaos” rather than in designated layouts will surely lead to many failures, but hopefully some grand surprises, too.
I suspect this is where the books and articles from those who have succeeded and who name plant combinations offers helpful guidance rather than elitist prescriptions.
Well it may be that the issue of class and snobbery is a peculiarly British thing – it certainly exists, though it might be better to ignore it. It irks me because it seems to represent everything that gardening should not be about (which begs the question of course what gardening should be about). I guess my attitude to gardening could be summed up by Marianne Moore’s poem about poetry (just substitute gardening for poetry) which starts ‘I too dislike it…’ and ends with a passionate defence of it.
I do pretty much agree with your outline of how we can garden in a wilder way though I can’t resist pointing out that if it isn’t suited to small enclosed spaces that cuts out the majority of British gardeners. Not sure I agree with you about that anyway.
I am certainly not above going to the experienced and knowledgeable for advice (we all need that) bI do all like to experiment so part of the challenge for me is tolerating a high failure rate. I look forward to the grand surprise!
My sense is that in small gardens where one is as likely to be looking down and into the plantings at close range, some different rules for satisfying aesthetics apply. In such places where we can visually identify and absorb the unique character of plants – species by species – it can be disturbing to witness the competitive struggle of adjacent plants maneuvering to overtake one another. A “wild” character, close up, may look like unsettling chaos rather than a handsomely woven tapestry.
Here in the US, there does not seem to be a push for homeowners to aspire towards “wild” in the home gardeners small yard. There is, however, far more of a trend suggesting we use exclusively native plants.(more ecological in its ethos than aesthetic elitism). But the plants with the showiest flowers will sell first at our community plant sale, no matter what country it came from…… and that seems unlikely to change despite what the latest trends which garden books address.
(Yes,in a way we’re lucky here in UK because there’s absolutely no reason to restrict ourselves to ‘native’ plants. But we do now have worries about what diseases we are importing when we import plants……)
Excellent concise article. Agree with James, Wild is a style. Another Lifestyle.
It seems to me that a distinction needs to be made between the notions of order and disorder in the garden. A wild garden is untamed: it allows disorder at least to some degree.
Stop saying “actually.” Please, just stop. It’s a plague on the language and means nothing.
“What Does ‘Wild’ Mean?”
See?
No – your revision doesn’t mean quite the same. (hope you’re not going to ask me to remove ‘quite’)
Say whatever you want. Just remember – the road to Hell is paved with adverbs!
Thanks Xxx
Why the emphasis on native in the UK where the last glaciation scraped away most of the plants, leaving fewer natives by far than we have in North America? We live in a time when all nature has been modified to some extent by human civilization–yes, the Anthropocene–so native is rapidly losing any meaning. We can try to hold on to what remains, but there is a powerful argument to use plants that thrive in existing conditions, “native” or not. We need to learn to manage the modified, the “corrupt”, nature we are left with. We really have no choice. By the way, good article, except for the equation of “native” with “wild”. Wild is a style.
Have to agree with James, at least in part. “Untended” does not mean “native”. AND managed woodlands and meadows are not “natural.” They may contain natural elements, but we’ve managed to interfere with natural processes by doing things like preventing fire. The real dichotomy for most of us is: gardens vs. feral or ruderal spaces. Both are valuable beyond measure in a world of concrete and steel, but let’s not underestimate our impact by thinking there is any “wilderness” untouched by man left…air and water have seen to that….
You’re right about my confusing native with wild, though we have so few natives left growing ‘in the wild’ it is understandable that people want to grow them in gardens.
I suppose what I was trying to say was that Wild just as a style is not a very satisfactory idea for me. I want it to have a sensible rationale and not just to be another fashion statement. But perhaps we’re all so confused about this there isn’t one!
Well said Debbie – we are marked by situation and class, no matter how much we try to be ourselves. Phillip, in my old garden, endemically wild meant a host of nettles invading from the railway track, and ‘prospect’ and ‘refuge’ were nowhere to be seen.
Yes, if I didn’t ‘garden’ around my wood, all I’d have would be hogweed – which is lovely in flower but a bit of variety is nice too…
I think what it means is doing the necessary homework to find out what naturally grows in your area and planting accordingly to attract local wildlife.
Therefore, plant only native species endemic to your particular geographical location.
I don’t go with the ‘plant only native species’. Through a follower on our Instagram account I learned that the lovely red Monarda (bought from a local humble garden centre as an impulse buy) which grows happily in my garden here in the Black Mountains of Wales grows wild in Western North Carolina! Fantastic! What else is growing there which I can introduce to my ‘wild’ mix’ here at Nant-y-bedd garden? Well written Debbie! Minimal interference is my motto – bring on the ground elder!
O, yes, I keep a bed of ground elder and it looks great when it flowers – and not bad the rest of the year. Great leaf.
Anne – I have finally found a kindred spirit – someone who appreciates the finer points of ground elder as much as I do instead of being scared of it and ripping it out. Do you know that many people have never seen it in flower but when they do, here, love it? As do the pollinating insects of course – and the scent is lovely too – well a bit ‘marmite’ perhaps…and it’s edible. Perhaps it would go well with marmite sandwiches.
There’s a thought! It’s a great plant to edge a path with next to a hedge- seeing that was what woke me up to its possibilities.
Quite!