MY TWO GARDENS

The new main garden has now suddenly become a garden in Houston, Texas. This will be my garden for the next three to four years. The garden appears as fairly rigid and formal and entirely without anything edible. It’s a challenge to make this garden appear more personal and enjoyable without making it labour-intensive.

The garden consists of heavy, dense clay, is completely flat, and it is not a single stone naturally in and on the ground., The drainage is nonexistent and there is around three four-inch with some humus on the top of the clay. Someplace at least.

The Cottage garden in Scandinavia is located on the island of Orust in Sweden about one hour north of Gothenburg.

We will spend a lot less time there now compared to before we moved to Texas. But the main goal is still to divide the garden into zones, planting hedges, shrubs and trees that give shelter, shade, and space.

“Orusthagen” is completely on top of a moraine ridge, surrounded by tall mixed forest. Sun and wind from most sides. It is incredibly rocky, there are pebbles and stones everywhere, and it is impossible to plan where you can plant because the size of the stones in the ground is so variable that I do not always know if I can move them. The cottage is surrounded by an old cultural landscape with crisscrossing stone fences. Someone has obviously struggled with rocks long before us.

The cottage garden on Orust in June.