This month Marion Dale helped the Kilmersdon Gardeners to focus on the factors to consider when creating a garden.

Marion came to garden design as a second career. Just after completing her training, she won a Gold medal at the Autumn Bath and West Flower Show and went on to create a show garden for Chelsea. This was her first face to face talk 0f 2021 after her Zoom lectures for the WEA.

The first choice to make is style – the typical options being Cottage, Formal or Contemporary, with lots of hard landscaping aiming for low maintenance. Then you need to work with the soil, testing the pH to determine acid or alkaline. Honeysuckle and Lilac doing well on alkaline and Camelia, Rhododendrons and Hibiscus thriving on acid soils.

Shaking up a sample of soil in a jam jar to find the proportions of clay, sand, silt and organic material helps to determine the soil type when compared to a soil triangle. How much sun does the garden enjoy during the day? Lavender, Wall Flowers and Rock Rose thrive in sunshine, while Ivy and Hydrangeas enjoy shade.

It’s important to check the maximum size for plants on the RHS website when making your choices to ensure they won’t outgrow their space.

The planting choice can impact on the design of the space with trees adding height and evergreens as living focal points. A prickly Berberis hedge can stop people walking through. Evergreen hedges can divide spaces and give a backdrop to the garden.

Some deciduous trees, like the Ghost Birch with startlingly silver bark can provide a striking focus if illuminated with solar powered light in winter. Weeping varieties of trees like Pear and Crab Apple can provide interesting shapes.

It is important to look for indigenous plants that are attractive to wildlife. These are usually simple ones like Hawthorn, Dog Rose, Oxy-eye Daisy, Poppies. and Meadow Cranes Bill. The most impactful choice is the colour theme - will the mix aim at harmony or contrast? Warm or cool colours? The flower arranger’s colour wheel can help. Marion finished by giving examples of her designs.

The AGM followed the talk. The pandemic means that there has been no plant sale for two years, although in 2020 some money was raised selling plants. The finances are still sound.

As members are not being asked for a subscription this year, the club will draw on reserves to pay for the hall and speakers.

The Chairperson thanked all members of the committee. The Programme Secretary has done a good job replacing speakers who have dropped out at a reasonable cost. He needs someone to shadow him this year with a view to taking over the role.

The Chairperson thanked the members of the committee for their contributions and the whole committee was reelected by the meeting.

The next meeting takes place on Wednesday, 8th September at 7.30 pm in Kilmersdon Village Hall. Emily Utgren will present ‘From Sweden to Stourhead – life of a gardener and arborist’. Visitors welcome.

Trisha Jordan