Wednesday 11 July 2001

New ground rules (Filed: 10/07/2001)

Stephen Lacey meets Piet Oudolf, the Dutch pioneer plantsman whose ideas on a simpler, more naturalistic style of planting have helped to change the way gardens grow across the globe

The back of Piet Oudolf's farmhouse in Hummelo, north-east of Arnhem, opens directly into a large old barn, alive in summer with whirling swallows and chicks piping from their mud nests. On my first visit we sat behind its wall, eating and drinking under the oak beams, with Oudolf chatting in his Dutch-accented broken English about modern art, architecture and garden making. The juxtaposition of raw nature and sophisticated design ideas seemed apt: that is the essence of his style. Garden juxtaposition: his clipped shapes are often solitary and simply geometric

Over the past 10 years Piet Oudolf has become one of the big names in gardening, with public and private commissions as far apart as Sweden and the USA. Last year he won, with Arne Maynard, the Best Garden Award at the Chelsea Flower Show, and this summer his double borders at the Royal Horticultural Society's garden at Wisley, Surrey, bloom for the first time.

Around the world, the pendulum has been swinging towards more relaxed, naturalistic approaches to planting, and away from the highly strung, high-maintenance border, exemplified by the likes of Sissinghurst. In the process, the spotlight has fallen on Oudolf, 56, who - based in Holland - has been designing with grasses and the simpler sorts of meadow perennials since as far back as the Seventies. In 1982 he moved to Hummelo with his wife, Anja, specifically to start a nursery for such plants, which were then unobtainable from other suppliers. Gradually a garden evolved beside it, where a steady stream of other designers now come to educate themselves in the new naturalism.

'I like my planting to have the feeling of nature,' he says. Not that his borders are meadow-like in arrangement. I was surprised, in fact, by how traditionally structured they were, with his perennials still grown in clumps and more or less tiered in height. The natural feel comes from his choice of subtle, muted, wispy, even rather coarse plant material.

Colour doesn't interest him as much as a plant's shape, luminosity and movement, and the way it develops through the year. He looks for poise, and what he calls 'good before-and-after-flowering periods' - buds, leaves, seedheads and stems. 'Even out of flower, a plant can have so much energy,' he says.

The repertoire is not confined to wild species. Garden variants with the right character are welcomed in, and indeed he raises new varieties himself - 'It is my hobby.' It is good, and rare, to meet a top designer who is also a red-blooded, hands-on plantsman. Two of his own perennials he is rightly delighted with are Salvia verticillata 'Purple Rain', which produces arching 18-inch heads from July to October, and Astrantia 'Roma', with long-lasting red pincushions. He does no feeding of his borders, beyond an occasional scattering of spent nursery compost, and only the odd plant is supported, by means of a semi-circular iron hoop. 'But my plantings are not low maintenance, they are less maintenance.' They need weeding in spring and early summer, and selectively cutting down in autumn and winter. 'Also, I am always changing things.'

Minimalist flavour: shape, luminosity and movement interest Oudolf more than colour

Aware that his borders are more horticulture than nature, he likes to separate them from the landscape. 'I love architecture and pattern, and with hedges and clipped shapes you can bring form to plantings of perennials which are gone in the winter.' But instead of traditional symmetry, he goes for abstract, rather quirky layouts, as in his front garden, where the principal oval flower bed and yew cylinders are all set askew in the lawn. And his clipped shapes are often solitary and simply geometric, giving a minimalist flavour to the design.

'The main thing is I don't like copying. I like experimenting.' Words from a true original.

-- Anonymous, July 10, 2001

Answers

The minimal fertilizing probably helps. I have the occasional wildflower volunteer in my garden, and they grow SO tall, sometimes it's difficult to figure out what it is supposed to be.

Staking (or more particularly, trussing up with invisible fishing line) is the solitary most important thing I can do to prevent the garden from going out of control.

This summer I was determined to keep up with it.

I thought I was, then rain, then oppressive heat, then more rain, then more oppressive heat... The garden area that most needs the work is impossible to get into when things are wet, so once again it grew out of control. Last weekend we finally had a period of unusually mild weather, for July, so I was back to trying to reclaim the garden.

What I discovered about the fishing line is that it either slips down a bit and/or the clumps start to grow out of it, so they all needed a second layer.

Of course, the worst effect is tying them up after they have started to flop. No way to make it look natural at that point.

The second more important thing I can do (since I'm lax about documenting the progress with pix, but maybe with my digital camera this year I can give it a try), is to pull out the uglies in the late summer or fall (along with the annuals). It saves scratching my head in the spring and giving something I don't quite recognize an opportunity to piss me off again.

I also cut a lot of plants back this weekend. I figured I would try to get them all out of the way so they would peak again together.

-- Anonymous, July 11, 2001

Oh, of course the third (or is the first and second) most important thing I could do is to stop planting stuff so closely. It's one of the reasons I have to cut back during the summer.

Many of the plants I transferred from my mother's former garden were clumps of multiple species. I have found that there were many interesting combinations as a results, and probably included plants I never would have thought to try. However, now that they have grown together into neighboring clumps, there are areas where I'm at a loss how to thin them out without losing one kind altogether.

Oh well, my overall landscaping plan was to replace as much scraggly lawn as possible with high maintenance garden, or rather, to end up with a garden that was just a bit larger than I could manage. I just hated those earlier times when I would very occasionally reach the point where I couldn't think of any more puttering to improve how the garden looked. Then I was stuck with just sitting back and enjoying how it looked. Apparently I have very little tolerance for that. It's why my deck is so small, I knew I wouldn't be using it very often. ;^)

-- Anonymous, July 11, 2001

Well, I have often used this method to separate clumped plants that I wanted to spread out, or in some cases use elsewhere.

First I go in with a shovel and just use it to cut the roots, making one clump of 'mondo grass' into three parts, for example. Then a week or so later I go in and remove two of the parts and replant where I want them, or just move them apart a foot or so. This method is also used when transplanting trees. What they do is cut all the roots around them, and then let them 'get over the shock and start some new roots,' and then they dig them up and move them to the new site, bringing some of the soil from the old site to line it with. Makes for less of a period of transplant shock.

Another method, depending on the plant, is to pinch some of the stems off and stick them into the ground so as to spread them out, and also pruning the mother plant at the same time. Coleus works well with this method, and also the annoyingly overused artillery[sp?] fern.

I haven't tried this on the bouganvillea as yet, but I have read that you can take some of the newest growth with just a hint of bark and stick it in a vase with water. It is supposed to root and then you can plant it in soil. Makes for a weak plant at first, but then it is a vine, isn't it? LOL Make sure it isn't blooming when you 'pinch it.'

We were thinking of spreading the heleconia out some and making a larger screen along the fence, but it had its own ideas about spreading and now it's all I can do to keep it where it is. I really need to pour a cement curb around it, I guess. We gave a piece to our neighbor who proceeded to plant it right next to our fence, so it is growing under it and spreading into our yard in a new spot. The weedeater makes short work of it, but again, only the cement curb will stop it entirely.

Crotons will root in water. I've done it a few times. I prefer to airlayer them because they adapt and grow faster that way. Also, the mother plant tends to send out new growth below the airlayer so that when I cut it off it doesn't appear too barren.

Bulbs are different of course. I don't do much with those, but in the past I have separated them at most any time of the year with okay results. I guess they prefer to be fiddled with in the fall, though. Of course, up north I hear that they need to be removed from the ground before first frost or something. I laughed when my aunt [In MN] told be she had to bury her roses each winter. Being from So FL that sounds really funny. I've never had to do that. Then again, I think it was the roses that got me into the habit of pruning everything to within an inch of its life, and sometimes to death. Jus can't do a little at a time. LOL

For example, I have two hibiscus out front. They have been 'hedged' to reach up to the bottom of the window which allows them to be about four feet high. Since hibiscus develop flowers at the ends of the stems, they never really bloomed much unless I let them reach the roof, which tended to obscure the view from the window. Well, I was out front pruning them [I don't use hedgeclippers, too hard on my arm, I use pruning shears one stem at a time, which makes it a half day affair] I decided to cut them down shorter than usual. by the time I was done, one was three inches tall, and the other was almost totally gone. If the mower man would just mow them over I'd never have to do it again. LOL But, alas, they are now about a foot tall. No flowers yet, though. It was an amazing difference to go from twelve feet tall to nothing. If it wasn't raining right now, I'd go out and shorten them some more. LOL We want to replant with something else, I'm tired of orange flowers. I want different colors there.

Well, enough rambling. Maybe I can do a little out there between showers...

-- Anonymous, July 11, 2001

Barefoot, I think dividing the clumps I have in mind would involve digging out the entire pile and knocking ALL the dirt off the roots so I can tease alternate stems (species) apart.

One I probably can't handle that way because the leaf stalks are too similar.

Another I have in mind is iris mixed in with something quite magnificent that I have never identified. The iris is now almost hopelessly entangled. That has always meant digging out the entire clump and soaking it in a large barrel of water to loosen it up. I just can't imagine the other plant surviving that. It also means I'm rather limited in what time of year I can put it through this routine.

I love iris. Maybe some year I'll learn to replant them some place I can get to once they need thinning again.

-- Anonymous, July 11, 2001