“Designing Successful Gardens for a Mediterranean Climate”
Jennifer has been gardening and creating gardens in the Mediterranean for 25 years, and particularly in Greece since 2004. Natural Mediterranean landscapes have always been the basis for her inspiration, and habitat creation /enriching biodiversity are central to her multi-layered plantings.
She discusses various projects in contrasting areas of Greece, her approach to creating landscapes that are climate appropriate, and increasingly moving towards low input gardening for more sustainable gardens.
Okay um good evening to everybody and thank you very much for joining us um I’m so delighted to see so many of you here to hear Jenny gay speak given her long relationship with this Society Jennifer is a landscape architect Gardener and writer based in Greece she
Grew up on a farm in Wilshire in Southern England and spent her childhood immersed in farming life and the natural world she studied ecology and geography at undergraduate level followed by a masters in landscape design at the University of Sheffield in the UK while working for a year in an
Architectural practice however she missed the outdoors so much that she applied to the rhs rosemore to train in water culture armed with her joint qualifications she then put all of it into practice in three years at the Jerusalem botan iCal garden and back in Europe a year and a half at the
Society’s very own spoa garden outside Athens Jennifer set up her own design company in 2004 working predominantly in Greece she specializes in the creation of climate adapted naturalistic Landscapes natural habitats and Gardens with 25 years design and gardening experience in the Mediterranean Basin she has developed a deep intuitive
Knowledge of growing plants in summer dry climates drawing on this and a lifelong love of plants and wild places sense of place and planting composition is integral to her work her aim she says is to create beautiful spaces where people feel part of and uplifted by the natural world this evening she will
Discuss five projects in different areas of Greece her approach to creating the Landscapes that are climate appropriate and increasingly moving towards low input gardening for more sustainable results thank you Jenny so much for thank agreeing to talk to us it’s been a long wait because we actually agreed
This last November I think but I’m so pleased to see you tonight if you’d like to share your screen now can you all see that yes absolutely thank you brilliant okay okay well thank you Angela for that lovely introduction and thank you all for for registering just it’s really um
Thrilling that so many of you want to hear this um so yeah Angela’s given a good introduction to to me um and we’re going to look at um some projects and how I’ve managed them with climate environment in mind um as we all know the MGs was founded with the principles
Of water waterwise gardening at its heart and and climate adapted gardening is is is is really an extension of that and I think probably most most of us are really trying to practice that um and I think these considerations are important wherever we’re gardening but maybe particularly whoops we’re going too fast
Um particularly with with the Mediterranean because we do experience um a harshness with our long dry Summers um and and and with climate change um climate events becoming increasingly unpredictable so as Angela said I grew up on a farm and I think it’s had a profound influence
Um on on my life choices because I spent a lot of time playing in these fields and and in streams and and in the woods um and and even though I tried to work in an full-time in an office for a while it it it didn’t last very
Long in 1997 I came to the Mediterranean um first in in uh Jerusalem um which you know a lot of Israel has a Mediterranean climate and and shares um habitat types in common so that really introduced me to the Mediterranean climate and the Mediterranean flora and I really fell in
Love with it I spent three years there and then started to try and find a position in um a Mediterranean Garden or some kind of landscape practice in Europe in in Mediterranean Europe and that’s how I ended up coming to spoa by this time it was the year
2000 and I was Sally’s first um Garden assistant so until that time she’d managed Alan um there she is um I I I want to pay tribute to her because um it was quite an extraordinary P privilege spending that year and a half gardening with her um and and and she
Really is the original sustainable environmentally friendly Gardener you know she she she always recycled everything um and she I I saw this um in my local organic shop and I took a photo of it for this lecture because I just thought it sums up um how Sally viewed
Life you know us being part of a whole system and and and and and and respecting all all other living creatures rather than thinking we’re going to dominate it as many of you will know she was legendary for her ability to spot um the tiniest the tiniest
Plants at 100 Paces and and more and this photo was taken by Clare ay one of her later assistants um probably two years before she died so she would have been 88 in this photo and she’s scrambling up this very precarious Rocky um cliff on mty
MOS sort of holding on to a telegraph pole and and and if you look very closely there’s a cigarette in her left hand it just sums up her courageousness and her enthusiasm for life um so um here we have Greece and um the climate classification types and when I
Was researching for this talk I was reminded that there’s actually two two um Med main Mediterranean climate types in in in the Mediterranean Basin the the one with the hot summer and the one with the warm summer now the very bright yellow is the hot summer and then these
Sort of slightly more grayy patches in the middle the warm summer in Greece we’ve got mostly the hot summer and let’s just go to the next slide see a lot of the mediteranian Basin does have this very bright yellow which is which is termed as the hot one um but then as
You go in land in some of the other areas you get into cooler climates obviously the red on the bottom it represents much hotter climates that are going towards desert and then I got further into this I hope you can see this it’s not best images but there’s two um images that
Show how the climate was classified in 2016 and what they expecting to happen in the year 2100 that’s how yeah so you can see obviously it’s getting hotter um and at the moment quite a lot of Y sorry we’re on the wrong one um in 2016 there’s
Quite a lot of yellow still and then as you go into 2100 we’re starting to get areas of desert in Spain um the yellow is creeping up into the north of Italy um the cool area mountainous areas in in Greece are disappearing so this is what
Is expected to come our way and I think just generally we all know there’s going to be more unpredictability so my practice um I’m Cades based now I used to live on the mainland but now I I live in Andros um but I I do projects all over
Greece um and I guide them through from the drawing board to their physical creation and then we also offer after care um for the maintenance and in some of those Gardens that’s ongoing and has been for many many years um landscape design is quite noticeable as a discipline whereby once
You’ve done your created your garden and and and finished your planting that the process doesn’t really end there um so what happens thereafter the maintenance um is controls how the garden looks and so it’s crucially important and often rather undervalued I feel the so these are the the design and maintenance values um
That I try to put at the heart of the practice um sense of place that means and by that I mean reading and respecting the landscape and and trying to allow it to inform what we do climate adapted which is the theme of the the
Talk and I mean in the main point being that um trying to grow plants that will cope with the conditions that we’re living with rather than trying to impose plants that can’t cope um enriching biodiversity even though in Greece we’re living in the most um Rich biod device country in
Europe there’s still plenty of um areas where there’s been destruction and there’s always room to improve biodiversity I think sustainability Trying to minimize input and and and doing our best to use resources sustainably and then hopefully all of those things mean the result is aesthetically pleasing so I’m just I’ve got this
Rather long list of what I mean by climate adapted gardening um and I’ve got some slides to illustrate all these points so um I won’t spend ages going through these here but I’ll illustrate them with with with slides so the first thing um is to use
Plants that are grown from the outset to survive drought and heat and this is taken at Olivier philippy nursery and he really he’s the holy grail for for for for for dry gardening in in the Mediterranean Basin really um so he’s been going out and collecting plant
Material from the driest areas of the Mediterranean for probably over 35 years this is one of his slides I think taken in Morocco so if you’re collecting plant material from areas like that you can be pretty sure that that that’s that’s tough um the next thing is to encourage
Deep rooting when you’re planting so that the plants can be independent and survive without lots of Molly cuddling um the chap on the right um sorry on the left is Arian who’s been with me for 15 years um dig your holes big that’s a very big hole for a for for
A mature Olive Tree actually um it’s important if if you buy the plants from Philippe he you I think many of us already know about his special pots that encourage the roots to go down and right from the outset he’s he’s encouraging the plants to grow um to be tough so
He’s not overwatering them or overfeeding them but if you don’t have plants from his Nursery then you might need to break spiraling root bows at the time of planting to stop them continuously going around in a circle and never breaking into the ground water catchment basins um for the
All important firste watering some clients don’t like the look of the moonscape it creates but it doesn’t last for long and it’s so worth it to be able to give the the plants a deep water and infrequently so if you don’t have those Big Basins then you can’t give deep
Watering unless you’re standing there with a hose for a couple of hours right plant right place sometimes for me um that means needing to recommend um plants that come from Landscapes like this this is ciros in the cides um photo taken in August and I remember when I first even when I
Came to Greece I’d already been in the Mediterranean for three years um but I still looked at that landscape and and sort of felt um a reg that it wasn’t flowering or looking fresher or waiting for the time when it would be and my Approach has completely changed my
Perception has completely changed now I look at that and I see beauty and all the different colors of gold and bronze and even Grays um that come about as a result of of of S summer survival techniques so that’s um a close-up of the same landscape taken a little bit
Later on and on a dollar day and you can see there’s total defoliation on many of these plants um where and to to help them survive in these Rocky dry conditions with no rain but still there’s a beauty in it and and I think a lot of um encouraging my clients to to
Go with dry gardening is about getting them to embrace more this summer dry aesthetic that there is there is actually Beauty in it um and and and and and explaining why plants uh behave as they do in the summer in the wild I think it helps us
Um Embrace and enjoy them more somehow so I just put up a few plants here I think many of us are really familiar with this already but the summer dormant spiny cushions um sopar like Spar scoparium um oils and and aromatics resin soils and aromatics produced by plants like thyme
Um have an effect resistant effect against radiation as well as making them unpalatable the lovely felt leaves there so many Mediterranean plants this one is origanum um and beautiful contrast in a in a planting composition oops sorry and then also the dimorphic foliage of some plants like flis which um drop their
Leaves in um late spring early summer to the wide flat leaves that are good for photosynthesizing and they drop those and replace them with a narrower Leaf that’s held vertically that helps them reduce their water loss um macki community of shrubs for others of you in different areas you’ll
Be familiar with this um in as chaparal matal Finos Malay in Australia um they’re just amazing for structural um Frameworks in the garden this is a completely natural area that’s being possibly probably actually in gree G goat grazed and the wind and the environment just makes
Those shapes um and I use these plants again and again in my in my designs because they’re just so good and strong and tough and any if they’re not flowering um they’re just the the foliage gives such a lot and many of them do flower and bury at different
Times of the year as well and then on a lower level the really important Community whoops um in in Greece is the G the fra um also known as gig which is this going back to this lovely community of aromatics and prickly subshrubs and bulbs and grasses
In there and and those often give us the Fantastic spring um floral displays and there’s a few of them that I just use again and again and again because they’re so useful so here we have a garden um that I would say is a high input Garden um I’m not
Sure where it is actually but um you do still get demand for Gardens like this in Greece there is still um an idea that this this is how a garden should look um so this will be watered frequently probably every day um there will be lots of nutrients going in there there’s lots
Of colorful annuals um because of all the water there’ll be lots of lush growth and um then probably lots of chemicals to control the pests that like the Lush growth so there’s there’s a lot a lot of resources going into that Garden um even though it it might be colorful
And green but it doesn’t really belong to the Greek landscape um so this Garden um is what I would call a low input Garden it it doesn’t have fertilizers or nutrients added to the soil um yes we added sand into the the planting holes um in order to create
Good drainage so that is a a resource used and we’ve also gravel mulched it um but they’re mostly oneoff um inputs that then help the garden be more sustainable and use a minimal water um so this Garden is watered perhaps once a month and and even and less than that
Now so another point in our climate adapted gardening is to respect the water cycle um this is water logging from runoff from um from Paving um that from torrential rain but the water just didn’t have anywhere to go it’s very rocky soil underneath but if you use permeable Paving and land and
Rain can can permeate where it lands then it does help to reduce this kind of thing reducing compaction in heavy soil soil preparation is super important to make sure you have good drainage um here we’re adding um sand to Clay and yes that is a lawn in the back ground it’s
The only Garden that we’ve done with a lawn generally we don’t do Lawns um the client really wanted something um that that where his children could play and and it’s watered about every 4 days um okay so and there we have um this is permeable Paving so it’s not on a
Concrete reinforced base which um is very popular to do here people are quite afraid of earthquakes and so they tend to do Paving on on this reinforced concrete base always but it’s it’s it’s not all it’s not really necessary in in a in a in a in a wild area in a rural
Area like this where you can lay your Paving slabs onto a soft Earth base or sand base and allow and and even okay you have Paving slabs but the the rain water can can permeate through and that was also an example of of using locally resourced materials that stone came from from the
Place um reduce recycle reuse repair everything you can the the the the optimum the the classic examp in the garden is is composting so wherever you can to to compost material um managing fire for landscape sorry managing landscape for fires um this fire came to close to my home this
Year my house is on the Ridge at the top the White House with the fire coming right up behind it this was about six weeks ago um and and and there was a little bit of burning in in my in my garden but luckily um all was well um
Generally we we’re told that fires are bigger than usual in the last years with incre increased and more intense heat and possibly there are more of them and most fires are um started by humans but this one in fact was a lightning strike we had a a continuous storm Without Rain
Of dry lightning and these were there were two strikes that started the fire in two places in the valley we also had firing Corfu um again it was about um this area had burnt 15 years ago um and this year this time it was about 40% bigger than usual which apparently has
Been the average because the the flammable material was that much drier these are olives um I went close to inspect them and and they are actually alive and I’m hoping next time I’m there I will see that these are Greening up because that’s exactly what happened with this pistachia terab benus this is
Just down the Hill from my house and you’ll see part of it on the right side is singed a month ago the whole of that Crown was singed and it has with we had a decent rain and it’s resprouted green from the top which is really exciting um some other plants I noticed
That were recovering really quickly after rain were castrum on the left there and then dmia shooting out days after fire and that’s in a complete um scarred um fire scarred landscape and of course the Oaks are really good at at recovery after fire as well so let’s get to the projects um
Here we are back in Greece um I have projects all over Greece I tend to have a hot spot in gfu um I’m sure partly because the conditions are quite good for gardening there and then so we’re looking at two projects there one project on the mainland where the rainfall is much less
One on my island of Andros and then another one over near turkey in the east of Greece just to remind us about rainfall the dark purpley color is the highest rainfall over a th000 millimet um kfu up the top here where we’re going to look at two projects
Often gets 1200 millimet of rain which is twice that of London but the big difference is in Corfu it falls on 50 to 60 days of the year and in London half the rain but it falls on 250 days of the year so steady rain throughout the year whereas here a
Very intense fast rain the project we’re looking at in Attica is sorry um uh less than 400 millimeters of rain a year the orange areas are some of the lowest rainfall then the the Andros where I am I’m in the one of the wetest uh Cades we
Have about 600 a year and then Samos over in the East um is about 800 so here is kfu typical um view of the landscape there um cypresses olives Rocky mountainous very beautiful island that has become very um touristy they have huge numbers of visitors it’s got high humidity which is
Both good and bad for gardening um bad in the sense that um it we tend to get many more pests there and it seems to be getting worse and good in that it just gives the gardens a little bit more of of of support um through the year so the
First one we’re going to look at is Rue which is right up in the Northeast close to Albania um and there’s lots of tall mountains up in Albania with um that send down rain and quite cold winds in the winter we can get snow I’ve been
Snowed in up at r on more than one occasion so it’s quite a contrast because in summer we might get 38 39 degrees and then in Winter we might get minus5 not every year but it happens this is Rue um it’s a hamlet it’s about 500 MERS above sea level um
It was home to uh stonemasons and the whole area is full of quarry quaries with excellent Building Stone and these um families came from ierus on the mainland apparently around 200 years ago because there was a lot of building and they built their own houses from the quaries on which which were right
Beneath their feet it’s very floristically rich this is a typical roadside Verge in um spring amazing diversity and this was the kind of feel I got when I first went to R extraordinary views across to Albania um ever changing and ever beautiful and that view is quite important in consideration when you’re Landscaping
Because you don’t want to um steal its Thunder I suppose um and it’s important not to block that view frame it um and take it into consideration um um in in in in what you do so this is Rue as it was um and this was the big inspiration for the planting
Pallet those natural colors you can see on the right side Wisteria that dated from um when the village was inhabited um with caving in roofs wild flowers just storming all over um and shrubs fig trees growing out of walls I me it was quite an extraordinary magical place it
Was abandoned about 50 years ago um because it didn’t whoops going on its own without me um because um there was no electricity there and no running water and when running water came to the nearest Village they up sticks and and went to to to live um to where where
They had those modern conveniences um so it hadn’t been lived in for about 50 years and an architect um named Dominic Skinner um stumbled across it and found out that it was for sale and he bought the whole thing and um he didn’t really know what he was
Going to do with it but he knew he wanted to restore it and the plan came to restore the houses for uh luxury holiday rentals which is it’s what how what it’s doing today so this is um lunari ana which uh is is um all over North kfu and I’m very
Much too in in in in Rue this is the wonderful Stone um you can see the striation the horizontal stations it makes it a brilliant uh Building Stone this now is the backdrop to a pool um I haven’t got a picture of the pool in the in the um
Presentation um but it makes a wonderful backdrop um to to to the communal pool for U and we used of course this building Stone um in in the project um and almost everything came from from the place so it was very much making use of what you had
Locally a lot of our work at Rue was about pruning and sculpting what was there so it wasn’t just restoring the buildings it was Al also restoring the landscape there was lots of impenetrable growth um uh overgrown trees damage broken um thickets you just couldn’t
Walk through and so I think 60% if not more of our work there was about pruning sculpting creating the spaces um which would make which would make the landscape almost all the plants that we used are Mediterranean natives the hillside at the in the background of this photo is uh natural Hillside and
And makes beautiful part of the view and and and and and the planting we wanted to try and reach out to that to to bring that landscape in and and and try and reflect back one from the other so you see all these wonderful contrasting macki infri type um plants
Here um most of the in this photo are not flowering by now and um but they still I think make a lovely composition hopefully um and this is again at a later time of year again you see the hillside Beyond with the olive Groves mixed in with Mai and
Cypresses and um in the foreground that’s an um planting of atroplex which we’ve Cloud pruned um to kind of reflect that Hillside opposite we have to manage Vis visitor expectations also Rue is full pretty much all of the summer with um guests paying guests um so it was important that we had
Um flower flowering interest in the summer um this is the main walkway um this photo has was taken by cleive Nichols the garden photographer and it’s been quite a lot on social media sorry everybody keeps doing that um and so this is the start of the flowering
Season the westeria walkway and then um we carry on through with underplanting of agapanthus and plago is in there somewhere you perhaps can’t see it so in the summer we need to rely on um flowering plants from other Med Mediterranean areas um to help us so of course the South Africans and the
Californian flowering plants pretty good in helping us do this we do need to water them to keep them flowering but um they give us flowers that maybe our own local Flora doesn’t give us so the agap Panthers of plumbago brilliant at that and then um the T
Bagia it goes from April to November um if you keep deadheading it um yeah on on and on so that’s that’s a really useful one for our summer color um here is um a little a little shot to show you what goes on behind the scenes this is in January we’re pruning
The Wisteria um Isabelle Sanders on the left who was one of Sally’s assistants and Lola who works for me full-time in kfu is on the right um and so lot lot of care goes into to getting it right so that we can keep that floral display
Going and then another shot to show how the the picture changes throughout the year you know the gardens change um over the years but also consistently through the year and I think each each stage has its own Beauty even though it’s not quite the showstopper that it is when
It’s in flower it still has interest so this is going down into the lower part of r um that tree is a pistachia terab benus I think it’s the biggest one I’ve ever seen and it’s literally growing out of a rock um quite extraordinary it was in
Pretty good shape when we found it and we have pruned it um to create this area where you could walk through um lots of spring Flo in this area but there wasn’t so much to carry it through onwards um and I tried planting a canther mollus thinking it might uh survive through the
Summer but in fact even if we water it it it doesn’t really want to keep going so we let it follow its natural cycle and we keep a succession of um irises follow through that’s a little bit later early June that’s Iris Jane Phillips oops it’s doing it again um so that’s
The same area with um and then when the iris is died down we just accept that it’s going to be a dry area um with the framework of the the shrubs and the trees around and the rocks and and and it’s really enough it’s quiet um but it’s
It’s it’s enough and it’s a little bit like the the threshing floor at spoa um okay and then going on down into the Wilder areas we increasingly planted um only natives um this area is um was quite an interesting spot because we started digging we saw that the soil was really
Stony um and we started digging to see uh what our planting depth was like and we started to discover all kinds of um things like shoes and um second world war um helmets Army helmets um no plastic there was no plastic but it had clearly been the village Dumping Ground
Um we had to take out about 10 ton of material from this area before we could plant and bear in mind that everything in Rue um there’s no no road going through Rue so there’s a parking at the top parking at the bottom and then about
A 100 steps in between up this quite steep slope and everything that we did in Rue had to be carried in by bucket so um that was quite an adventure and then continuing on you see again the the stonework um the little ruin at the background um the architect very
Cleverly made that into a a kind of folly Lookout um which is rather sweet rather than than restoring the whole thing okay so that that that’s Rue and now we’re going down to the West Coast of Corfu um still good rainfall um um it’s closer to uh sea level where we are
There um and we have the West Coast views generally I find West Coast um West Coast gardening much harder West Western facing Gardens more difficult because you have that beating Sun the whole afternoon um and and and so there there is a little bit of added stress with the west facing
Garden um again it was a very beautiful landscape um it it’s an area of um Olive Groves interspersed with quite a big stretch of unspoiled um Mai which I I really hope that um not too many houses get built there because I fear that they may um but these extraordinary olive
Trees which um many of you will be familiar with in kfu with all this rainfall they grow twice the size of the ones in in ateka and many other areas of Greece um they have been neglected though and many have damaged or broken um branches and are quite fragile so our
Role here was to try to keep the stature and size of these beautiful trees because they really are significant but to try and make them a bit stronger and generally what happens with this kind of size Olive Tree is that they get cut off the top of the trunk and then left to
Resprout so you lose all that amazing Crown um and we really spent a lot of time trying to to make sure that that didn’t happen um we used tree climbers to get up into the canopies and and it takes about four four or five hours to prune everyone so it’s it’s an
Investment but I I think it’s it’s really worth it so the house is very modern um by a paris-based um Greek architect called um Emmanuel hoopus um and we worked very closely together to um figure out how we would try and anchor this house into the landscape and even though we have these
Very strong contemporary lines um they all feed back into the original Terrace Terraces of the plot so the plot was all all an abandoned Olive Grove um recycling reusing what what’s there we we took um Stone from the excavation and broke it down and made it in into wall
Walls so all the all the stone came from came from the site um a big area of planting in front of the house this is on the pool Terrace looking up um this um slope was quite a a subject to debate um because I wanted
It to be in two Terraces to make the planting easier it’s it’s a 45 degree angle slope um but the client and the architect one the day and they wanted this big quite dramatic slope um which you look down on from the house Terrace and look up and and and and the house
Kind of disappears really into it and the planting is um basically um a weave of native shrubs grasses perennials um and there’s three mixes in there and they’re all repeated five times so it’s kind of quite I’d say quite Pete aloff inspired um and in this photo I think
It’s year two all the grasses and the perennials are going crazy and the shrubs have not yet really um developed so the the shrubs um are are going to come up and really sort of hold it together and we we clip them and and that’s that’s that’s going to Anchor
This whole whole scheme so at the moment it’s it’s it’s it’s very exuberant but there will be a little more structure in there as time goes by and that’s it from the side angle um so the aim of the planting Ian obviously to provide interest and um and
And and the clients were really committed to an exciting um Garden um but to soften the architecture and and to make it feel it belongs of the place um and this was the the image from the the front of the the talk so obviously the the garden is changing all
The time I used um San’s ruber perhaps um I was a bit bold because it’s really seeding itself all over the place and unexpectedly i’ I’d used centranthus in other projects in Greece and never really had a problem with it rampaging and here with more humidity it is
Rampaging even on a water cycle we we’re watering here about every 16 days um during the summer and trying to decrease that year by year but even then it’s still going crazy so we have to manage the centran this all the time in the background you see the olives that we’ve pruned
Um um and and and they’re coming back really well and and some of the fragile branches are actually thickening and there’s one of the s-shaped olives and and again at a later time of the year um less color but lots of contrasts um this house has a roof um
Garden so this was part of the effort to blend it into the landscape and the local planners really liked it and I think it’s a contemporary structure a lot of the coru new builds are quite traditional in appearance and this one is not and I think the green
Roof really helped to get that through through planning um and they commended that that effort um The Green Roof is um plays a role in moderating internal temperatur so it’s not just to be pretty um this part of the green roof in the background has a depth of around 50 cm
Substrate and we can grow um shrubs and it Blends right back into the landscape behind it so it just merges merges imperceptibly I I don’t have a photograph that shows it to you but but but it does um and then the main part of the the house the The Living Spa the
Living room um has a shallower green roof it’s a huge expanse it’s I think eight meters by 15 um and that’s a shallow green roof um with about 12 cmers of substrate um and succulents and hippia the hippia actually taken out um because the client didn’t like them um so we have a
Lowlevel planting there what I didn’t anticipate with this green roof was that this part of it especially is a Sitting Duck for weeds and we spend a lot of time and effort weeding um so the substrate um there’s lots of perlite in there and um twofer and Crush
Brick um a little a little soil um but it’s it’s just this wonderful flat space that weeds just seem to love so we’re still we’re now in year three I think and we’re still weeding almost every month um to keep that under control and that’s I I I guess really because it’s
In a in a in a Rel relatively wild place um where there’s just hundreds and hundreds of of wild plants waiting waiting to land there with every passing bird or or or wind so that that’s kofu um moving on to the mainland we’re into area of a very low
Rainfall less than 400 U mil a year um this Garden is just down the road from sparza so it’s in very similar conditions it’s slightly higher um above sea level um and there there there’s there’s a photo of typical ateka this is taken just near near that project so you
You can see very Rocky dry Landscapes relatively treeless um and there is the house the house was built many years ago and um I was we were invited to come in and plan a garden when the house had already been there probably probably 20 years so you
Can see it’s surrounded by macki Olive Groves um a little bit of pine behind um so it has um quite a hotch poch of of of Landscapes around it it’s an area where there has been quite a lot of um development both um housing and Light Industry not not directly near the house
But but in the whole area of Attica um so it’s a large plot around um 25 Str which is around 8 acres and um this is how it was when we took the project on so there were trees um lots of Olives very beautiful olives very dry rocky
Soil um lots of parent rock pretty close underneath that surface and the odd shrub planted here and there so we really needed to find a way to unify the site um to make it feel more harmonious to to make the house feel more anchored in its
Landscape um and to sort of add another dimension it felt quite two dimensional so this was um three months after planting we’ve put Irrigation in because we we have so much planting here that it was the best way to deliver that deep infrequent watering whoops sorry done it
Again um so yeah that’s that’s just three months in and then that’s one year later so it was quite fast development and some plants really go quickly in in in in Greece and then you have to wait for the structural plants to come through again we’ve used
Gravel as a mulch to um you know retain the moisture and this is uh five years after planting I think this is this is a photo taken by Olivier Philippi um as he came to visit us here and he said it’s like an agro forestry landscape and and he’s
Right so we’ve added this this this third layer and it becomes typical of of the Agro forestry Landscapes around in in ateka and the spaces have become more immersive and enjoyable um and we created Pathways around the garden where you could walk through and and really enjoy the plant
And again it’s this old favorite palette of bulurum atroplex pistas ramus all these plants that um give this fantastic um structure and and and a multic canopy of course which is good for biodiversity and again um the idea that you change from from 2D to 3D and then we we have some really
Good flowering plants plants with um plants like salvia Allen chering perosa is fantastic alcopa another one from from Texas is amazing for giving summerflowers with little water little or no water we phased the planting so that we didn’t put too much stress on the well I forgot to say that there is a
Well in this Garden though it often dries up in summer um so we needed to be careful and we did this um planting over um several years and this was a priority it’s right near the house and um and needed to be it was one of the first off
The blocks along with the boundary planting that I showed you just now and this is um the after um there it is with a sculptural goat and there with one of my doggies we use um succulents quite a lot to give some drama daion Agave attenuata Yas there one appearing over there
They’re all all really fabulous for giving you a little bit of dynamic um dynamism in in in the in the planting along with the flowers and again you’ve got the little bagia there which is just Irreplaceable and G though G in the dri Gardens often doesn’t make it through the summer in in
Greece um gravel mulch again um this was the last area of the garden that we planted and I think it was the area where where I I feel I got into my stride the most I think it’s the area that I’m most pleased with and it probably has the most diversity of
Plants there so it was again Olive Grove um quite compacted soil that we really broke up to get the good drainage um added the gravel Mulch and in case you’re wondering why there’s a a Jeep parked up there this used to be um used to haul things around the garden and it
Broke down in that spot and um we thought rather than move it we would just treat it as a as a as an artistic installation so it stays there and in fact plants are growing out of its engine now and this is a very recent photo of
That area so that’s probably five years in um lomelosia in the foreground brilliant for ongoing flowers they dry but they’re just lovely in sort of froy on um on on that shrub and then the peria um with the lomelosia in in the foreground again both really really
Useful um oh this is a um photo of vilka the owner of the garden um with her dog Boo Boo and um so I just wanted to talk about Apex predat PR Predator we think of ourselves sometimes um as gardeners as apex predator um so um and the apex predator really
Dictates how how the planting Community evolves and and and vilker is is the best apex predator in in the sense of managing the wild plants that seed and from both our planted plants and also from the wild Community um so this is a big issue for us in um that of course
Seeding plants are the future of the garden and gravel is really good for helping the plants the seed so all any Garden that we have that is graveled has a really great seedling population with all these wonderful plants emerging and um sometimes we have problems in some of
The gardens where someone goes in very enthusiastically and removes them and so we have to try and teach them to um to to choose the right seedlings to remove um and and vilka is is a genius at at doing this and also allowing just wild plants that have
Decided they want to be there and and choosing whether they’re the right ones that can live happily with the planting that that we’ve put in so here we are um on our way to Andros um the garden we’re going to look at is about 300 meters above sea level
On a west facing Garden um it’s it’s I think the main thing to say climatically about this Garden is that it’s windy in fact the whole island is windy we’re very famous for our wind here um but we have good rain and and Andros has Springs so we’re we have that
Advantage um and we have these wonderful valleys we have four of these valleys in in Andros that go northeast to Southwest all one after the other in a rolling Direction um and this is the highest uh point on the island which is around just under a thousand meters and then in the
Foreground you have um a typical wall which shows the the the rock which is a very sort of Sky Rock um and it gives rise to this very moisture attentive um soil surprisingly I was quite surprised at how moisture retentive it was mineral Rich nutrient poor um quite moisture
Retentive um but generally pretty free draining and and we have very very good results with Olivia Philipp plants here um zoomed on again yeah so this is a very typical of um the northern part of Andros um which is a little bit like the Moors of Scotland but but with sun a a
Lot of sun and along the top you see the typ typical vernacular of of of the walls of Andros which have these rather particular um large Stones placed in them which was which was a lab labor saving device but they’re rather beautiful um and then and Andros also has um very
Rich fertile well-watered valleys so it’s it’s quite a comparison this is just above my house um and you see these beautiful windblown multi- stem trees um heavy goat grazing and we have very a lot of sarum dominance because they don’t touch that um but it’s still a a rather beautiful landscape
This is the project um it’s in a village called arvato which means without sheep um it’s definitely with sheep and goats so we needed to fence it we’re always reluctant to fence but um they just come in and and make a lot of Destruction and
And it’s just not just the eating of the young plants but also um you know these uncontrolled goat HS um do a lot of damage to walls um so yeah a fence went up um in the background you see a ASA mon Bell enes which is a beautiful Maple um local
To the to to to to this island in fact it’s growing in many areas of Greece um and um beautiful site um and it had these um wonderful Terraces and these are beehives and sometimes in Andros and many of the CES actually you see these beehives built into the walls
And of course we’ve kept those um this is um a monument to the to the goat um my client commissioned this beautiful sculpture of a goat which is just perfect eating a um a kermes oak there and you see this rock um which is
Part of the the garden um and an an a really important part of the the structure of the garden so we used our usual pallette of of plants um the Grays and the greens um bu plum in flour here I don’t think we’ve had a slide where it’s
Been in flour and and that’s another one the shrubby whand which we find really really useful for summer flowering and also sorry um the the limey green color is also a really useful contrast that we don’t always get we get it with euphobia in the spring but that one that starts
To flower late June early July and then goes on all through the summer and again the the flower is dry and a very beautiful um part of the garden so these these clients fully embraced um the concept of dry gardening it was another Garden that was pretty much supplied by by the Philippine
Nursery and you see here um this is the the side um entrance into the up to the back back part of the house and you see the um the santar Spinosa has defoliated but I think it really looks um perfectly fine you know when it’s contrasted with plants like
Um uh cistus and reany and pistaa and flis which have kept their Fage um but you know some people might look at that in a plant brocher and think oh goodness I don’t want that plant with any leaves but actually when you see it in the composition I I think it looks rather
Beautiful and there it is again in another part of the garden just with the evening light picking up the bronzy colors but mixed in there with globularia um rany again two Crums a Salvia helm and that’s looking out to um the West looking up towards the mainland and there’s a windmill there in
The in the foreground which is rather a lovely focal point and again like the Rue project we really tried to reach out to the landscape Beyond just sort of bring it in and that’s um a photo taken a little bit um later in the season there you see the
Hrsm with the um the ongoing flowers I think it’s known as Immortal in in French um because it it it just keeps going and going and again the to bagia and you see oops the local Stone um again from a local Quarry to help the house feel anchored in the
Place and there again we have L um Rosia and uh lemon asum I almost forgot its name and and and and they’re again very useful and in very low low water conditions and this Garden is is on um a two to three week water cycle as well
And that’s looking back up towards the house with the big Oak behind and you see the hrms and the lomelosia there and mixed with all these other lovely fra types and and and and gar it’s just about enough G um water to keep the gar going um in some Gardens where we have
No water um the G the G doesn’t make it and that’s with the evening light again um we we leave the the the flowering heads on flis um when the plants are established in the early years we tend to remove the the the Dead the the dying flowers because it seems
To keep the foliage A Little Bit Stronger through the summer okay we’re nearly there um this is the last Garden um Samos near Turkey um I’ve put it in because it’s a town garden it has a little higher rainfall so it it has um wind um but
It’s it’s it’s it’s a little bit Kinder than the last two gardens we looked at in terms of climate um and here we have an incredibly deep soil when they dug the excavations for the house they they never found Bedrock it just went down and down and down um so it’s probably
You know it’s it it in a valley leading to the Sea and it’s it’s all this soil that’s washed down from the mountains over the years so this is Samos little bit like Corfu um slightly drier less tree cover but there is still significant tree cover um lots of
Pines this was the site um it really was a bit like Grand zero um just about everything had been demolished um there was a citrus Orchard left um which was not in a great state but we’ve revived it and there was also a beautiful um Walnut Orchard which we’ve managed to
Use I’ll show you how in a minute um so take a look at that White House on the on the horizon the next photo you can just see it on the left side so that’s the same view five years later so it’s um oops it’s a
Two two wer plot nin strum at a site just just over two acres um right in the heart of a university Town um called carasi um it was an industrial town that was famous for um uh having lots of tanneries um and um quite unusual to
Find this large uh stretch of land in the middle of of of this town and there had been a small house there that was had been totally abandoned it was in such a bad state of repair um it it was demolished um but as I say there had
There were fruit trees here but and this part of the garden I really have no idea what had been there probably Orchards of some kind um so we created this sort of multi-ad planting again um there’s a public car park on the right side of the
Garden um so it’s quite noisy and we had to um try and create a a screening um to buffer out noise and um also for a visual screening and again the same kind of mix of um multi-layers of of macki frona plants um oops sorry it keeps happening
Um and we clip the forms to make these cloudy cloudy forms um and to give the the strong framework um the garden is quite long and thin and we created these Meandering paths all the way through which then also created large flowy areas of planting um it’s quite an interesting Garden in
That um when I began conversations with the client um he said he had didn’t hadn’t had a garden before and it was quite a new idea to him to to think about actually walking through his garden rather than it being something that he viewed from afar and so he’s he really enjoys this
Idea of how immersive it is um walking through and getting that experience um again the idea of bringing bringing the surrounding landscape in um in this case a church there is the church with all the all the planting um and I like to think of this Garden as a wildlife
Corridor um because we’ve created quite a stretch of of of habitat actually there um which links it’s almost like a linking point with other Gardens and then to the hillsides hillsides Beyond um this is the Walnut Orchard which we managed to um make into the main entrance it was very convenient
That it happened to be that there was a lovely um straight walkway um that we could create to a place that that was accessible to the to the the road and we underplanted it with plumbago and um Myrtle and fossum and there’s a reron in there and agapanthus um at certain times
Of the year and there again we the garden really needed shade as you saw in the first um slide there was really nothing there so um we created a mury Avenue here and then further down the garden there’s a Grove of Melia um azarak the Persian
Lilac um we we we added sand into the soil mix because it was quite a hay heavy heavy soil and also you saw um again in that first picture how um all the construction traffic was going straight over it and and heavily compacting the soil so we had to do a
Lot of deep digging um and this again just shows all the layering use tree sorry trees like carobs and um feus and Oaks and Pines to create the shade lcof um from Texas um I just wanted to show one of that um fantastic as a as a summer late summer
Flowerer um and then yeah a little word about so we we we prune um we trim regularly um many of the plants to to reduce uh vapo transpiration rate rates and you know to so so that when they’re going into summer they they don’t they don’t have growth that can wil if it’s
If if it’s in a very drought stress area and um this always reminds me the gardener we have a full-time Gardener here he’s a really really good really good guy he sometimes loves to over prune and I have to restrain him to to kind of allow the plants to to breathe
And express themselves a little um but he does maintain it beautifully other than that um so we’re coming to the end um um so many books and people have influenced me I’ve just put up a few um books um that are particularly relevant to this talk while I I um make my
Conclusion um so I guess my first point is that it makes total sense I think we all we all agree um to look to the native Flora um for our inspiration um that’s what surviving in this climate and and um we’re really trying to convince our clients to embrace
The summer status of of our Mediterranean plants um um so that I think this is key to really uh enjoying um rather than lenting how they look if you really appreciate what the plants are doing and how they’re behaving but always bearing in mind that you can use other Mediterranean climate
Plants for those summerflowers and succulents um so incredibly useful for for structure and accent planting um as Europe gets warmer um I think Gardens in in northern Europe are looking to us for um techniques and and I would really like to see more skilled gardeners out there in in Greece at
Least um promoting dry gardening techniques um we’re quite short on skilled gardeners there’s a lot of people working out there with little training and and and lots of really good landscape designers but few um really skilled gardeners um um working in an artistic way tends to be quite technical
Gardening um and just to finish if I’ve got time um Food For Thought um last year I went to um one of the Beth chatau symposiums um the theme of which was um rewilding the mind and lots of interesting ideas a group of 500 gardeners and designers all gathered
Together and it was a really um interesting event but two things stood out for me um one was the talk by Fergus Garrett who is head Gardener at dixa in Sussex in the UK um very well- loved Garden of the late Christopher Lloyd um and they had recently had a biodiversity
Audit carried out in the garden and the belief was that the greatest biodiversity would be in The Meadows and in fact they found that the greatest biodiversity was in the oldest part of the garden where the there were lots of um old stone walls and paths um
But this is a an intensively gardened area and that’s where the greatest biodiversity was and then the second point is that um a guy called Dave gson who wrote the book silent Earth in the leftand bottom corner of the screen um he told us that in the UK Gardens take
Up more space than protected uh nature reserves which means that um that we as gardeners uh what we do matters because if if if I don’t know what the figures are for the the the Greece or the Mediterranean but in the UK If there’s more Garden space in nature reserves
Then then what we do can really change things so that’s it that’s what I have thank you Jenny fantastic I mean I think that it’s so brave of you to take on the um you know the the the maintenance after you’ve planted I think that’s that
That makes you sort of unique um because of course we all know that on the paper it’s it’s one thing but actually doing the walking the talks shall we say so yeah it’s rewarding it is rewarding carrying a garden through it can be it’s it’s it’s quite sometimes quite
Difficult to juggle designing and and managing Gardens because often you know I want to be out there doing what the plants are telling me they need and I’ve got clients who are also have design deadline so it’s sometimes a difficult juggling thing but I I I really enjoy it
So can I ask you now to um stop sharing so that we can get everyone back um okay hi everybody um I noticed that that that the chat has been extremely active and I um would like uh to ask Maggie um just to quickly read out any questions from
That were on the chat um for Jenny uh so that you can just answer that so shall you go for that mag Maggie yep sure let’s go with that um so there’s quite a lot of questions some of them quite specific and some of them more General
Um one question is about how widely are the native plants available for horticulture presumably the question means um native plants to Greece how are getting more widely available all the time all the time um much much better than when I started um I think the difference is that few people are um yet
Growing them in a way that really prepares them for drought and that’s that’s the big big difference so I can’t I I find that with Olivier I I mean I I think maybe I skipped through this when I buy from Olivier Philippi we have much better chance of getting those Gardens to get
Off irrigation um I think we do and I’m so I you know I hear in France that there’s a massive dry gardening culture and many clients are asking for dry Gardens I don’t think anyone asked me for a dry garden yet I’m the one who’s trying to convince them they need a dry
Garden um so um yeah so but I think and and the Greek Nursery trade is still it’s young and um they’re still a little fearful and they’re still you know when I go to the nursery guys here and I say can we grow plants like this and I show
Them a Philly plant and they go no don’t buy that you know they want big plants with a little pot not not not a pot with a little little bit of plant so we’ve got we’ve got a way to go here that sort of leads into another
Question which is how would you advise getting your gardening team on board with waterwise principles so how do you persuade the people who Garden your Gardens to uh Eng I have that problem I mean my own team we’re they’re they’re I mean I don’t think they join my team in this
They are dedicated so you know my my team are there and and I and I work and I collaborate with other gardeners and you know we work together and we’re all of a mindset um my problem uh I share that problem in that you know some of
The gardens have an have a a local Gardener you know we tend I don’t think I explained we tend to do quarterly visits three to four times a year to do the kind of the structural works and and pruning trimming um and so on and and often with some of these bigger Gardens
They’ve got a local guy and some of them it’s really really hard um I think the more you can explain why it’s important the better it is um yeah it depends how much they’re willing to take it on board I don’t what kind of people
Um yeah I mean some of it depends on education there’s a question here about also are there any um recommendable schools or programs for Gardener training in Greece well that’s what I want the mediteranian garden Society to do and they are doing Lucy is already doing stuff and she’s doing so much now
And also on social media but I think is something that that our society has the potential to do um I do you know I I can’t answer you really um comprehensively because I don’t know how much is being taught in in Colleges and Schools and and and universities now I
Know Lucy does get school groups um and possibly students also at Sparrow we’ve certainly had students historically um and there’s people interested but I think that there’s still isolation I certainly feel quite isolated sometimes and I you know sometimes I feel like I’m the only one only only one out here who’s really
Trying to to do this but I I think lots of people are trying but there’s still a lot of fear here sure um how are the gardens watered how how most of the gardens that we make that are watered have an in fact all of them have an irrigation system if
If they’re going to be watered but we do we insist on deep um infrequent watering so we’re trying to make sure that that’s never more than once a week um I mean now you know everyone who comes to me um uh accepts and they know the style of
Gardening that I do so I don’t get get into the situation where someone really wants a very lush green garden um but sometimes eyebrows are raised by collaborators if I’m trying to water even once a week they they there’s still a mindset that you should be watering every day um but I’m
Trying um with philippy plants we normally start off on a 16 or uh 15 or 21 day cycle and then just keep getting less and less and less until um some of them have no water at all some of them we still water once a year I’m sorry once a month
Because um they just get a bit too tired for the client you know something we try and push it and push it and push it and then there’ll be a point W okay we’ll just do water so the irrigation systems sit there under the gravel and are used
When they need to to be at used when they’re needed to be and it might seem like an extravagance but with big Gardens it’s it’s cheaper than having someone water and the other problem is if with some if you have someone water you have to trust them to do the Deep
Watering and that’s very hard unsupervised if they’re not totally engaged in dry gardening um another question what do you do with Leaf litter in the gravel marched Gardens and how deep is the gravel layer gravel layer um about um look it depends on budget but we aim for
10 um really like to do 10 if not more sometimes we have to accept around seven and a half we try no less than seven and a half and that’s that that will only be a budget constraint um and the leaves um soft tin rake I’m they’re a little bit
Frustrating but I think you you learn to a lot of people are very afraid of that and I think you learn to the gravel becomes just like the soil and you just rake a bit the thing I love most about gravel in some way is that it stops people Leaf
Blowing because I get um some of these guys out out in out in the on the islands Leaf blow soil which drives me insane sure um there’s an interesting comment here um uh somebody obviously in Cali California who who talks about there’s a contrast between you’re using
Gravel mulch in Greece whereas they use a woody mulch in California because they find the gravel desiccates the garden plants too much really that’s about difference in rainfall um that no no um so I would say um so using we use mulch um that’s been you know Garden waste that’s gone
Through the shredder I I should have mentioned this um and and and and and shredded to create a compost we use that as a mulch in the bigger shrubby areas so I’m talking about macki plants will accept that perfectly well and that that’s lovely but the smaller um frona
Plants especially the Silvery ones um I think that kind of organic mulch it it tends to create this humidity around their necks and then might cause um phyo problems so I do tend to avoid it for that reason but I I I I haven’t had that experience that that person’s getting in
California okay here’s a very specific question do you have any suggestions for trees in the northern part of Greece near caterini the garden faces East to near the sea and they would like some shade in the summer can we can that person can I be in direct contact and
And have a think about that um that’s is petros’s iPhone that question came from okay petros’s iPhone if I can um um I don’t know um it would be good onra list yes people have asked of also if they could have a plant list if I could
Jump in um maybe I could send sorry this is U this Karina is not is just petus is is wrong it’s a mistake rightor if you write to me then I will I will write to you okay well done um the plant list Jenny do you think plant list
Um what um of a particular Garden or just and many of the plants that you’re using in the gardens it that you were using yeah yeah I can give you my fa my favorite one yeah Jenny one of our speakers earlier in the year did something that I thought was
Quite useful he he did his sort of you know tops you we don’t expect you to sit and right thousand of plant names down I mean obviously um but he’s sort of he had his top 30 or something like that yeah happily happily because I
Think there were a few I kept saying I use these again and again and yeah sure absolutely 100% And I think it was not it was nice that there was so many there were different stories in your you know different layerers in the in the
Plantings if that comes to me then I can distribute it to the the attendees okay okay brilliant thank you another question is how often are you pruning the shrubs oh that’s a really good question um depends a lot on the year actually I it depends on the rainfall um and it
Depends on the level of watering that we’re giving them the less less you’re watering the less you’re pruning which is great um so in the driest Gardens you know it can be twice a year in some of the gardens where we have this balance to strike between um client needs and
Trying to be dry gardening and uh it can be four times a year and it depends on the shrubs as well it it so that’s quite a complex question yeah sorry fair enough fair enough thinking about di biodiversity have any of your projects had Baseline biological surveys that you then follow
Up to document change I’d love to do that no um I mean they did that at dixter which I mentioned and and it was fascinating I think they they it was absolutely fascinating but no I mean I I I remember one project we did in the
Pelones and that was a project which had been raised to the ground I think there had been quite interesting fra before we even arrived and um the the builders went in and just took everything out and I remember we we camped there for three days to to kind of measure up and you
Know get a feel for what we were going to do and and we saw nothing living in that place at all and you know when we started planting and butterflies started coming in and birds were nesting it was just so the best thing it was one of the
Most rewarding moments ever so I’d like to I would definitely like to do that um there’s a comment here about amending garden soil saying that in California they’re urged not to bre plant into n they urged to plant into native soils and not break up the soils because that um destroys the soil
Structure compaction so I totally agree um it depends on this the situation that you are landed with so for example in the aato project um there was a lot of undisturbed terraces with native soil fantastic and that’s all we had to do just plant into it if you’re if you’re
Planting on a building site that’s had Machinery going over it um it’s a nightmare so you’ve got to do something but I totally agree where we can I’m to I’m into um the no dig and non non- Amendment and and and in fact maybe I didn’t highlight enough that I am going
More and more and more towards less um less um additives I and I went through a phase of using sand integrated into the soil not I’m interested to try what Peter corn is doing adding it to the top I haven’t done that yet but I was integrating riversand into the soil
To improve um heavy clay structures um I have haven’t been landed where the garden that needed that for some time and and I’ve and I’ve been lucky enough to be able to use only native soils locally um which you know I think is the way to go yeah I agree okay uh here’s
Another speci if I could add to that um in Olivier has regularly reminded me that um soils in California are far more Rich than in the Mediterranean Basin area Greece and Southern France and Spain um they’re newer soils they’re they’re much they have more nutrients um we have
More um acidity than we realize So based on the plants that grow that he has observed growing in our area when he’s come to visit so yeah he would he he would continue to pound that into my head that you have you know it’s a different different premise so it’s
Really interesting yeah yeah y can I just add to that for a minute it Sean is in Northern California I’m in Southern California it’s entirely different here if you go when I go to Northern California the plants I see the soils and all they are far different
What we have down here in Southern California is probably much more like Greece maybe not quite as extreme but very alkaline very little mineral very little nutrition very little anything but you see when I’m planting into native soils like that it’s almost I inevitable that I need to use Olivier’s
Plants because um you know with the exception of a few nurseries most of the local ones are overfeeding them so if you you know you have these plumped up over over over overwatered and overfed plants going into conditions like that you can’t do it so I I you know I end up
Um using but that it is we are getting more nurseries that are are going in the right direction they just need to go a bit more I’m guessing in California you have you have good supply of um nurseries and Forward Thinking well when I went to California
In 2017 on the occasion of the AGM I came back and I just went into a three month depression because of the expertise and the level of gardens that we saw and that the plant the diversity of um hybridization of plants available um was just mindblowing yeah mind you Olivier is
Going more and more towards species he’s he’s he’s decreasing his supply of of um cultivar which is interesting well um but if you’re you know sort of setting anyway that was just yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah they have good I think that it’s a big market
Right so I mean there’s Nicholas is here with us he’s working for a big uh Nursery um you know it’s a huge market so they’ve got that um Extra gear yeah and I should mention Yanni Gillis you know I think he’s the one who’s really trying to push the limits the most um some of you may know his Nursery at near Marathon um I mean he has some of the range that Olivier has now okay
So who’s that sorry Yanni Gillis ah yes of course yes yes yeah yeah um a very specific question uh what to do with Cyprus trees that have grown too tall for the proportions of the garden oh [Laughter] blim I mean look look I mean you do do
You know who was asking that question where are they uh they’re in kios Kos yes okay um I don’t know if um you I as that question if I can I Jenny where yes hello i’ you may remember me had tried working I asked you to work with us on a
Project many years ago in Athens yes I remember you vet the um um the cypress trees were planted in four different heights okay and although they were watered for the first year for the roots to catch and since then I haven’t wed they’re about 20 22 years old but
They’ve grown too tall and I’ve lost the proportions and I was going to Lop them like they do in Tuscany yeah seeing your photograph today in your talk um I thought maybe there’s another way of doing it I thought I’d just ask you may
Yeah I mean I was going to say you know if if you’ve seen obviously Tuscan Gardens and nickel deian was a famous one with her Garden in Lao in the south of France um when she was making that Garden apparent The Story Goes I don’t
Know if this is true but Louisa Jones um I think she was the one who told me so it probably is um that um she she couldn’t afford to buy High um big cypresses and and a nursery um owner had um a load of cypresses around the back
That had all been had their tops destroyed and she took them all and made a feature of having this garden with top lopped um cypresses and they’re rather rather lovely so I mean depending on the the situation is it in the hios town um it’s just outside hios town rondos maybe
Send me a photograph I will there’re too many because once you Lop the top you got to every couple of years haven’t you you might have to do that it depends if the leader grows again it might not yes the leader might not grow never broken
The tips off yeah I’d love to see a photo I hate answering specific questions unless I’ve seen a photo thank you very much beautiful talk thank you thank you too uh there’s a question here about using orandas in Mediterranean Gardens given that you haven’t mentioned those
Oh I didn’t mention I don’t use them very much yeah no I don’t use them much occasionally I do when I need a a flowering shrub in summer um you know but they do have this toxicity which puts me off a little bit um and handling them you know because we’ve sometimes
I’ve inherited Gardens which have had huge amounts of Hool Ander and and you know we have to to deal with with um pruning them and so on but I they do they are useful for that that summer flowering color on an evergreen and you it’s difficult for us to get it from
Something else so I will use them but not it’s not my number one um okay I I think we should make this the last question because time is going on um plant suggestions for paros no rain for months and it’s right by the Sea okay that put you on the spot yeah
No I mean but there’s load Millions you know there’s so many and it depends what you you want so I mean again we ought to have a dialogue um but you know many of those we we’ve been I if I give give out my top 30 most of those would be all
Right for that situation I know parts so um you know I mean you want to go first for all the stuff that’s growing up on the Hills sisters belot sarian um SATA thba you know time all of them they’ll be great or you could or you could hire Jenny to come and
Uh she’s working girl she’s a working girl right I mean in the sense of the okay so ask a quick question yes who’s that very nice talk I must say uh if one has a if one has uh already Dry garden but for some reason it’s been watered
Regularly uh for some time can you slowly slowly stop watering those plants time scale I mean what how long was it a dry gard and what what happened it was was dry garden plants but it was basically always watered oh blimy how I mean how frequently did you have a
Drying out period in between because that’s key if you have watered a garden but it’s not so frequently that the soil remains moist all the time then you have a much better chance of um getting them back to dry garden Health yeah it was not moisted I must say but I mean one
One can I presume you cannot stop it immediately no I think you can wean them off though and you might want to trim off um growth that might Wilt in the period that they you know are struggling to adapt so to keep the vapid transpiration rates down
You might want to keep trimming um but I would you know wean them off slowly slowly depending on the frequency of the the watering you could start by doing a little and a little and a little um to slowly get them up to um you know a good
A good stage thank you thank Donal Donal has got his hand up Donald yes Jenny you may remember the garden that I have been very close to SP of course of course of course let me come back to the question about um Oleanders because I they’re such a
Useful plant I find they’re very common in be of course and I remember yours good and you have lots of scented ones uh yes some of them yes are strong vanilla scent um and a great variety not all that philppe had uh because he no longer keeps I don’t think he no longer
Supplies them no about 60 or 70 varieties we have in the garden here and there’s such Wonder plants you might be the National Collection what’s that sorry you might be the National Collection for Greece I mean I don’t think have this that wonderful plants they’re disease resistant they don’t need all that much
Water and they flower for so long and they’re plant but you don’t seem to like to use them is it equip test are they pra there was some o Anders in the last project especially we’ve got o Anders because we needed some green some some
Color and so yeah I’m a bit mean but I I I think I am slightly prejudiced because of the the handling of them but but but you’re right I mean I it’s a you know I really dislike um disliking plants um so I I I I I don’t like to have prejudices
Against them but I it’s not my first my number one but I but I I remember them in your your garden and they’re lovely yeah yes thank you okay any other questions uh yes hello uh Liz hi Liz yeah just one one one quick question um gardening in
Greece I did Garden I use that word loosely on PA sauce for a time um we used our rainwater we kept kept it in a sterer and could use that over over the summer to water how how compulsory is it in say in cor Fu because so many people
Are watering the water tables being affected are they made to hold their water from the there’s plenty of water in the winter can do they hold it yeah we’re encouraging it like crazy um it’s it’s it’s it’s it’s compulsory if you want to be be in a position where
You um you know if you’re not completely committed to dry garden and you’re going to be Watering your garden you need to be rain rain water harvesting without a doubt yeah okay without a doubt um and and I should have mentioned it it was on
My notes to mention so yeah I mean um we strongly encourage it and and I think it should be it should be compulsory and they’re not doing nearly enough for Fu uh both publicly and privately but the the the the incentive is actually coming much more from the private side now so
So some of my clients have like storage tanks of 400 Cube if we get into the project early enough um they usually take the advice to do it because you can fill summer summer thunderstorm in kfu can half fill a tank of 100 Cub you know
So it makes all the difference it’s free it is free I there’s so many good things and you know the water many of our Villas in kfu get um have a very inconsistent water supply during the summer um and you know we have this problem with pools we have kofu has too
Many visitors really so there’s a there’s a huge stress on this island that has all this water and um you know the tankered water is is not is not a very good quality so yeah absolutely crucial okay thank you thank you Liz Caroline Norris thank you um Jennifer Could you
Actually include with your list on Plants um some recommendations of gardens to see in Greece that would be good Mediterranean Gardens to see Public Gardens anything that you know that I could see if I went there or I could recommend that somebody’s going there
Okay yeah I I can I mean there’s not I know private Gardens can be a problem but um yeah and kuu now you know kfu has become a bit of a garden Hotpot um because um there’s been you know a lot of a lot of investment into the island and
There’s a lot of large um houses with large plots um and people who are able to to to develop quite extensive Gardens and they have a coru open coru Gardens open day twice a year so if you were visiting Greece it might be a good time to time it with
That and Ros Rosie Rosie is in with us today she’s in it’s Rosie here yeah they organize it she and Christina they’re the they they organize the coffe open so that would be one thing um yeah I’ll think about let me think about it I mean
Of course there’s F roza that’s the main one um but there are other possible private Gardens that you know you might get access to but it needs organization I mean we we do now in kfu quite a lot of Tours we’ve had the American Horticulture Society um the Portuguese
Came the Irish um h quite a few have been to and and Rue is on the tour and Karina and I are going to do a a peloponese tour together aren’t we kerina oh fantastic one way gonna happen doubtful going not up okay so um we’ll finish this will be the last
Question yuran hello there um I haven’t got a question I just want to say thank you to Jennifer Gray because a long time ago you used to write for Athens news before he died and thanks to those columns or the columns you used to have
There I became a member of the mentan G Society I just want to say thank you that was all that’s that’s lovely to hear yeah no it’s a long time now it’s been gone over 10 years um but I might try and start writing again soon I’ve
Been so busy I haven’t had time really but I’m I want to there’s an excellent article in this um this month’s um issue of the Mediterranean Garden all about plants and planting from you isn’t there yes there is actually but um car that’s an old article that Caroline used from
Many years before I don’t know I should have told you all that but you should said yes of course it’s very detailed and very long and I was say Well done if you’ve done that as well as doing your work thank you so much um Jenny for than you too um
And uh we’ll look forward to getting those little lists while you know putting you under a bit of stress sorry um and if anybody wants to be in touch with Jenny um you know just I’ll I’ll definitely pass on your email unless you want to give out your email now um
Perhaps can do yeah I mean the power of question and the north question I think they they need specific um thought and also the heos question um you know I can if you send me photos I would consider that a little bit more um personally I’ll definitely get those to you then
But yeah I mean I can give my email now if you like um sure people would be delighted to be in touch with you it’s Med Landscapes gmail.com so that’s short for Mediterranean Landscapes okay super all right that was Brave of youch of of activity thanks everybody
For joining in it’s great to see uh you all again and um good indeed see you next month okay thank thank you for participating thank you jennif thank you Jenny thank you Angela thank you very much you’re welcome always okay thanks to both of you bye