EP230- Transforming Dreams into Blooms: Paula Byrne’s Journey In The Beautiful Kilgar Gardens

In This weeks episode John chats with Paula Byrne creator of Kilgar Gardens In Kilcock, Co.Meath. Paula leads us on a virtual tour of these fantastic gardens.

 Can a garden transform your life? This week, we take you on a journey through Kilgar Gardens with Paula Byrne, who went from having no gardening experience to creating a stunning three-acre masterpiece. Paula shares her incredible story of turning an initial dream of a small cottage garden into a full-blown passion project, drawing on her background in interior design to meticulously plan and cultivate her expansive garden. Discover how gardening has not only brought beauty into her life but also served as a source of therapeutic joy and resilience against setbacks.

Enter the artistic world of garden design and planting with Paula as she reveals the secrets behind Kilgar Gardens' breathtaking beauty. Learn how she uses innovative techniques, like marking out garden paths in the snow, to achieve perfect scale and proportion. From the vibrant poppy garden to the serene June garden filled with old roses and clematis, Paula provides invaluable design tips and maintenance strategies. Dive into the rose garden, home to around 50 roses, and get expert advice on ensuring healthy growth and dealing with common rose issues like black spot and mildew.

Finally, explore the practical aspects of gardening that Paula champions, such as the no-dig method and effective plant propagation techniques. Hear about the emotional satisfaction of watching a garden mature over time and how the artist color wheel can be a game-changer in garden aesthetics. Whether you're intrigued by seasonal planting strategies or the structured routines that keep a garden thriving, Paula’s passion and extensive knowledge will inspire both novice and seasoned gardeners alike. Join us for an episode that celebrates the boundless creativity and therapeutic benefits of gardening.

Its a garden well worth visiting, Kilgar is open the first weekend of every month from May to September. You can find full details here

https://www.kilgargardens.ie

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:13

how's it going, everybody, and welcome to episode 230 of master my garden podcast. Now, this week's episode, we're getting back to an episode, a type of episode that I used to love doing, and that was the open garden features, and this week I'm delighted to be talking to Paula Byrne from Kilgar Gardens. Now, kilgar Gardens is on the road between Kilcock and Summerhill and it's to set the scene and we'll get into the detail of it shortly. It's a three acre garden, but within that garden there's several different gardens, so it's it's gardens, or a series of gardens within a garden, and Paula is, as this is, an open garden, it's open the first weekend of every month for the rest of 2024 and it's uh, it's a garden that I haven't been, but I've drove by it a few times and actually, from the road even, it looks, it looks like a nice, fabulous place and I can't wait to get, get to see it sometime soon. So, paula, you're very, very welcome to Master my Garden podcast.

Speaker 2: 1:07

Hi John, how are you?

Speaker 1: 1:09

Good, good, great to have you. So, as I say, I've passed by it several times but never gone in. So just outside Kikok, on the left hand side, as you head towards Summer Hill, and outside you know the hedges, mature hedges outside, and all of that looks really nice, tidy. It looks like a very appealing place. But take us inside the garden gate. Tell us a little bit about Kilgar Gardens when it started, and then maybe about the gardens themselves.

Speaker 2: 1:36

So many people say that when they come in to visit the garden, like they say oh, I passed here all the time and I've been meaning to pop in and then, three years later, they're here.

Speaker 2: 1:44

I passed here all the time and I've been meaning to pop in and then, three years later, they're here and yeah, it's, it's, um. We built the house in 2007 and, um, I just had a little garden at the side of the house. I wanted just a cottage garden. That was my dream of just having a little small cottage garden, and it was a big site, a big field. So, um, a lot of the boundary hedging went in, um, and most of it was a football pitch.

Speaker 2: 2:12

To be honest, for three years, yeah, yeah um, I was quite happy with two little gardens at the side house with one strip down either side and and, uh, yeah, that's about as much time I had to put into the garden at that time. But yeah, just got the book and, uh, basically no experience whatsoever in gardening before I came here. Um had experience in um interior design just did a course in that before we built the house. So I just found that fantastic same supply outside and designing a room color, focal points, vista scale, proportion it just um, it just came natural. Then after that it was just um, yeah it's incredible.

Speaker 1: 3:02

You say that because there's there's lots of people that you know talked on the podcast and they've been gardening all their lives or they've picked up gardening from, you know, grandparents, particularly grandparents, but that it's in their life, all their life essentially.

Speaker 1: 3:19

But there's also a lot of people that come to it later, um, and they, they get a bug, as you said, and you know there's several people who have opened gardens, who have been on the podcast and it has been the exact same way. They just got their house or moved house and then started doing a little bit and then got hooked, um, which is incredible that you know that you get so hooked at that stage, and then it becomes, I suppose, uh, it becomes it just becomes your space, your project, and for me, I look, I just love the freedom of it right being able to go out and do what you want, plant what you want, the freedom of being outside and yeah, I that what that for me was just and having a project and being able to work on a project and see develop three years on like you'd have a vision of what the garden is going to look like.

Speaker 2: 4:14

And then you come three years on and it's like it is.

Speaker 1: 4:18

it's better than you ever thought it would be, and that just becomes a yeah, a bug, to be honest and and then that that project completed or are delivered to to the plan. Yeah, then that sort of sparks the next phase or the next, the next project or whatever it gives you confidence and getting to know your plants, like when I started planting.

Speaker 2: 4:41

First it would take me three days to put in the plants. I moved them 10 times and now it just, it just comes natural second nature, yeah it is yeah, yeah. So you definitely, you train yourself and you learn just so much and it's not just about the gardening like you have to be positive, you have to look forward, you have to. You know you're always looking forward to something when you're gardening, even in the worst, like this winter was so wet. You're just living for spring.

Speaker 1: 5:12

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 5:13

Planting the bulbs and you're waiting for them to come up. So it's just great for your headspace and keeping you looking forward and keeping you positive. You have to be positive when you're a gardener. There's no doubt, doubt, yeah because there will be setbacks yeah, absolutely yeah but it's also, I suppose, um.

Speaker 1: 5:32

I forget who it was. I think it was anya the anya the oh, she's fantastic yeah, anya leighton back, uh, she, she was on the podcast last year and and she said that you know there was things that failed, but there was always something that succeeded. And, like you say, you stick in a bulb and six months later there's a flower there and that gives you a lift. Or you plant something and one dies, but then the other one is beautiful flower and again that gives you a lift and it's these for me.

Speaker 2: 6:00

I can't understand people who say, oh, I have that plant and it's grand, but it only flowers for a week and then it's gone. For me, that's even more special because it flowers for a week.

Speaker 1: 6:10

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2: 6:11

I suppose there's two ways of looking at everything and you have to look at it the positive way and yeah, yeah, brilliant.

Speaker 1: 6:19

And when this garden started in 2007,.

Speaker 2: 6:21

Just had you come from a garden of any sort in your previous home we lived in a little cottage and it was a lovely garden, but it was mostly all shrubs yeah, yeah so you go out and you cut them into your, your balls every spring and I became very, very bored with it and was that a garden that you had planted yourself, or was that one that was?

Speaker 2: 6:44

no, it was one that was there and it was thrown around us and I had to get out and maintain it and that's really started it yeah yeah.

Speaker 1: 6:51

And so this, this new garden, then became, I suppose, an opportunity to express yourself and uh, yeah, the fact that you were doing interior lands, uh, interior design, you had that bit of a flair, that bit of uh I didn't realize that, though, at the time right you know, it's only when I started uh doing things that I realized it's, it's the same thing.

Speaker 2: 7:11

It's, it's just how your head works and were you a sketcher?

Speaker 1: 7:15

are you a sketcher? So if you come up with this product, you know so. You're not.

Speaker 2: 7:18

So this is in your head, you pictures folders, pictures, books and just a vision in my head One of the gardens, the rose garden. When I marked that out, I marked it out in the snow. Good way of marking it. I marked out the paths and then I went upstairs and I looked down and just looked at the scale and the proportion of it and marked it out after scale and the proportion of it and marked it out after that and it was yeah brilliant, brilliant.

Speaker 2: 7:50

An easy way of marking it out, actually, and a good way of getting a visualization it was just to look at your scale and your proportion and and that's the most important thing at the start, I suppose, and then getting in your three stories of planting and your focal points. And in this garden, and when you're in one garden, there's always something when you look ahead. I always say to my visitors, as gardeners, we look down.

Speaker 2: 8:12

We were always looking down looking for weeds or whatever, but I asked them to look ahead okay because there's always something leading you into the next garden or um a focal point that makes you want to go on that journey through the garden.

Speaker 1: 8:27

So that's that's good design, I think yeah, for sure, there's something, something drawing your eye and leading you on a journey. So maybe, maybe, take a slight step back and we'll go back to the road. So take us on this journey through the, through the gates, um into Kilgar Garden, and it's like it's a big site, it's three acre site and then within that there's a series of gardens. So maybe take us along and bring us through the garden virtually oh, there's a series of gardens.

Speaker 2: 8:52

A lot of the gardens would be the size of your average townhouse garden, yeah, so, um, I think that's appealing to people when they come to say, well, I could have that in the back of my um townhouse garden, the first garden and the poppy garden. That's appealing to people when they come to say, well, I could have that in the back of my townhouse garden, the first garden and the poppy garden. That's changed a lot.

Speaker 1: 9:11

OK.

Speaker 2: 9:13

So it's now all the hot colours.

Speaker 1: 9:15

OK.

Speaker 2: 9:15

I have just gone out into it. So there's about 20, 20 in it, all the hot colours and the foliage of the plants chosen for their color as much as the color of the plants. So it's the reds and the oranges and the yellows and, um, I've been working hard in all the gardens trying to get continuous color okay. Like before, each garden peaked at a certain time. Now the last few years, I want them to be good the whole year right, and how is that going?

Speaker 1: 9:50

it's difficult in a hot, in a hot garden, or yeah, I'm getting more and more satisfied with it and it's the bulbs, basically, are the trick. I think yeah oh yeah, so that you're getting your narcissi, your your tulips particularly, and then that's leading into your perennials.

Speaker 2: 10:08

It's difficult when you have individual gardens. That's the difficult bit Getting continuous colour or interest in each garden through the seasons. It might be a little bit of a lull in between, but yeah, it's getting better, definitely getting better at it.

Speaker 1: 10:23

Yeah, so the first garden.

Speaker 2: 10:25

Into the June garden. Okay, called it a June garden for obvious reasons. It's fabulous in mid-June. It's just starting to peak now. All the old roses are in there. They flower once and I grow clematis up through those old shrub roses to give uh color later on and I've extended the beds, widen the beds to get in later color okay, and is this?

Speaker 1: 10:52

is this your? Is this your rose garden, or is there a separate rose garden as well? There's a separate rose garden all right, so I'm stepping ahead here. Hold on yeah right, so we go from, we go from the, from thepy garden. Why was that called the poppy garden originally? Just out of interest.

Speaker 2: 11:07

Because it had loads of poppies in it, loads of poppies, and now that has switched to more hot colours.

Speaker 1: 11:13

So it's, and then you're moving into the June garden, which peaks in June. Yeah, when are we heading for next in terms of we'll?

Speaker 2: 11:20

come back on the mall. Yeah, and we'll come back on them all. Yeah, you're going then into the rose garden, which is at the back of the house.

Speaker 1: 11:27

And that's kind of one of the big things for Kilgar is the rose garden. It's one of the main things in it.

Speaker 2: 11:32

Yeah, I have about I'd say about 50 roses in the garden, if not more, A lot of them David Austin roses. The rose garden is mostly David Austin roses, but all around the house and in the other gardens. Just sure, I find the Irish grown roses the best. They're just super easy. They never fail to be honest, they're just good, strong, healthy roses and the roses do well here. There's good airflow.

Speaker 1: 12:01

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 12:02

And I've no shelter really at the back of the house. So they're getting good wind, they're getting sun, they're in a nice open um area and good soil load. Just start off with good soil and no competition around your roses I think, that's the trick when you're getting them started yeah, it's a big thing.

Speaker 1: 12:20

Um, I suppose the question everyone now always has with roses how are you staying on top of? You know airflow is a big thing and you've mentioned that you do have that and how you stand on top of you know black spot and mildew and all of those type things you do anything. My roses twice yeah yeah, and you're using just off the shelf product, or is there? Is there a trick that you have?

Speaker 2: 12:43

um no, there isn't. I think the trick is to have your roses healthy have them grown vigorously. Yes, yeah, if your roses are healthy. I mean, you may get away with just spraying them once a year. That's happened here. You know I am. I won't spray them unless I absolutely need to.

Speaker 1: 13:02

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 13:02

Yeah, so you know when they're healthy you just don't. You're spraying them less. If I have something, if I have a rose out there that's looking miserable, it's gone. It's just not worth having.

Speaker 1: 13:16

So, and when you say have them grown healthy, are you doing anything specific? You're mulching the soil, I presume.

Speaker 2: 13:22

I never feed them, never feed. So it you're mulching the soil, I presume.

Speaker 1: 13:24

yeah, I never feed them, never feed. So it's just purely feeding the soil as opposed to feeding the plant. Yeah, brilliant. And then the plants themselves are more resilient and healthier, grown more vigorously, and then I do think um the right position.

Speaker 2: 13:37

Yeah, I think that's a big thing okay yeah, I have roses at the front of the house and they're not near as good as the roses at the front of the house and they're not near as good as the roses at the back of the house where they're getting full sun yeah, yeah, also get in the air and yeah, so that's important as well yeah, still always comes back to right place.

Speaker 1: 13:52

Right plant, right place, yeah yeah for sure. So that's the rose garden, and stepping on. Then where are we heading for next?

Speaker 2: 13:59

you go into the mediterranean garden oh nice which was um originally the vegetable patch. Right, the vegetables went to the compost heap most, most of the time. So, um, I grow a lot of my own cut flowers okay um. So a lot of the annuals go in there and it has gravel paths, pots, a few olive trees, loads of lavender herbs. It's a pretty garden, yeah.

Speaker 1: 14:28

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 14:31

Apple trees room to sit and, yeah, I think a lot of people really just like that garden.

Speaker 1: 14:38

Nice Sounds brilliant. Again, we'll come back on them all and maybe talk about plants that are within these gardens as well, but I know there's a water feature somewhere. I've seen it on your on your website, so there's a nice water feature, that's the last garden.

Speaker 2: 14:53

So before we get to that garden we go into the meadow garden right and after the Mediterranean garden. But the first few gardens are all symmetrical and square and have a formality to them. But after the Mediterranean garden the paths start to curve and the planting gets softer and wider and it becomes a lot more relaxed. So the meadow garden is like that it's two little houses in it and two little sheds in it, one, um, just customized sheds. I customized myself. The roof off. My dad's old shed is in one of them and all his milk and powder stuff is in it. It's all rock and chair. And, uh, there's another little shed in it and it's uh like a little florist house. My mom was a florist, so yeah, and, and the path curves and each as you're walking in the path the planting is high and airy. It's loads of like ammages and cow parsley and, uh, verbena, and it's tall and airy and all the plants are repeated through it. So you're picking a selection of plants and repeating them through the garden and it's getting that meadow look.

Speaker 1: 16:14

Yeah, that sounds like a relaxing spot, so I presume there's a few seats in there as well, somewhere, yeah.

Speaker 2: 16:20

And then you step through to the last garden which you said you can go on a little path then down to um, I have the raised beds where I saw plant all the cut flowers. So that's um, that was only planted out there. In a couple of weeks I just go down there and cut, put flowers and use them for bouquets. But the last garden I did is the serranity garden. Uh, definitely my favorite. Yeah, it's most people's favorite. Uh, it's just something about it, it's just a lovely feeling in it and it's maturing really well. So, um, you know, when you start a garden and you have this vision, and then three years on you say, yeah, it's looking good now, and then, four years on, you just say this is really lovely. And I'm at that stage now where it is just.

Speaker 1: 17:07

The satisfaction is really there at the minute and it's a new water feature card and there's a pond.

Speaker 2: 17:13

Yeah, there's a pond in it which I I thought long and hard about putting in, but it's um, I got the idea. Um, I went on a trip to France and went into this lovely garden and it was quite a small garden but the paths all meandered in it and it was really densely planted. So you went on this journey to this really watch, which was a small site but you felt like you were in a really big garden, all site, but you felt like you were in a really big garden. So I came home and the grass had grown long because I'd been on holidays and I just took out the lawnmower and mowed strips through, that's through the garden yeah and uh gave the beds a good mulching.

Speaker 2: 17:56

It's poor soil, it's wet and, yes, parts of it are heavy clay. So, um, I just uh mulched on top of the grass and let it die off over winter and started planting it then in the spring brilliant, so no, dig effectively no, no diggers, no dig, no big mess it was and it was.

Speaker 2: 18:18

It was perfect, like the trees went in really the first year, so it was perfect for the, the trees, and working really hard now at getting the woodland plants in. I had the back of the garden. Like all the other gardens are full sun, so this was an area of creating shade, dappled shade, and getting in my woodland plants and bulbs and yeah, it's, it's really lovely and yeah, it's, it's really lovely. We put in, put in the pond, put in some steel arbors. There's six or seven of those big arches in the garden so they're bringing on that journey through the path and I finished off around the pond with the same steel um, a circle of steel around the pond and there's lovely birds in it. Emma jane rush more um made the birds. She's from grey stones oh, I saw those.

Speaker 1: 19:15

They're they're um, they're beautiful, but they're unusual looking. They're kind of they're metal with wicker through it. Is it wire?

Speaker 2: 19:21

made from wire. It's all wire, all wire. Oh wow, yeah, they're.

Speaker 1: 19:22

They're kind of they're metal with wicker through it is it wire made from wire, it's all wire all wire oh wow, yeah they're, they're class looking yeah, and they change color.

Speaker 2: 19:30

They can go from blue during the winter like they're just really.

Speaker 1: 19:34

Her work is amazing so it's obviously copper, then it's copper material it changes to copper.

Speaker 2: 19:39

Yeah, yeah, they're lifelong, I mean they're.

Speaker 1: 19:42

They're just completely sturdy and they're just so that, so brilliant yeah yeah, they're gorgeous because I saw them on your website but I haven't seen them in person, obviously, but they're. They look brilliant and I thought I thought it was actually metal with wicker through it, just looking at it on the on the picture all wire brilliant, yeah, class really good. Um what? What it sounds like is that there's a different feeling in all of these gardens. That's it, yeah, and I suppose a different.

Speaker 2: 20:12

For me. I've been to a lot of gardens and a good garden to me is that feeling when you go inside and say oh, this is it. I love this garden woolerton hall in england was was one of those gardens where you just went in and said this is really. You know, this does it for me yeah and you do. Just, I think here is known for peaceful garden. Um, yeah, yeah it's funny.

Speaker 1: 20:46

There's a couple of, there's a couple of gardens there's. There's um hunting brook, obviously, there's one down in the, in the valley, in hunting brook, in the, in jimmy blake's garden. There's a feeling there and it's not. It's not a feeling necessarily about the garden itself.

Speaker 2: 21:01

There's an energy part of jimmy's garden.

Speaker 1: 21:03

To be honest, yeah, likewise and I haven't been in a couple of years. But there's, there's a feeling. You get there, it's it. It is about the garden to a certain extent, but even if you forgot about the garden, there's a kind of an energy or something there yeah and it really is a special place to be and very soothing place to be like yeah, for sure why is it just?

Speaker 2: 21:24

yeah, yeah, I, I love that part of this garden yeah, and there's other.

Speaker 1: 21:29

There's other places not necessarily gardens that I would get that same feeling, but that was definitely I remember that distinctly getting that feeling in that area.

Speaker 2: 21:36

It was just but I think that's um, that's a gardener's personality as well in their garden, I think it rubs off yeah, yeah, possibly in a sense, yeah yeah, and you're.

Speaker 1: 21:48

You've created, then, I guess, these different feelings through the garden, because obviously this, this garden, and we'll reverse back through them in a minute, maybe talk about plants, the different plants that are within them, but, um, you know, talking about the last garden where you have the, the shade and the dappled shade and the shade loving plants and bulbs, and that's your favorite garden, the most calming garden, you said. But then, coming back to the meadow, there's a sort of a I guess you know that style of a garden, there's a, a bit of freedom in that, and then you come back to the hot colors, the, the mediterranean.

Speaker 1: 22:22

There's different feelings within them all, I guess um which is, which is quite unique as well yeah sounds very interesting. Actually, you know to to see and feel that. Yeah. So we'll do a backwards tour through it now and we might just go a little bit more detail into the, into the plants as such. So your favorite garden at the end started off with big trees. What, what, what were they?

Speaker 2: 22:44

what sort of trees went in and um, I've lots of cornice trees my favorite, and they're fabulous. Now, at the minute, I'd say we'll get another week probably out of the cornice trees. They're just I. I love them, they're, I've loads of them, yeah yeah, and which variety was it?

Speaker 1: 22:59

or, pardon, what variety was it?

Speaker 2: 23:02

uh, the cornus cooses cornus cooses yeah yeah, gorgeous tree yeah, and so you've.

Speaker 1: 23:08

You've a block of them planted down yeah, I have.

Speaker 2: 23:10

Yeah, I go all or nothing, to be honest.

Speaker 1: 23:13

Yeah, because a lot of people will put that in as a specimen, sort of single, single entity tree. But you've planted these on brilliant right, they're out yeah, yeah. So how many?

Speaker 2: 23:23

hydrangeas are like I I. There's 30 or 40 hydrangeas in that garden brilliant when they're out, they're out and yeah, grasses, uh, there's um, but I think I planted 80 millennia grasses underneath the blossom trees oh so when the blossom trees, they're lovely now, but when, in autumn, the blossom trees when, oh so when the blossom trees, they're lovely now, but when, in autumn, the blossom trees, when the leaves start to go bronze, so do the grasses. Yes, yeah, that's a lovely sight as well.

Speaker 1: 23:52

Beautiful contrast between the two. Then, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2: 23:55

So there's lots of grasses as well, and then some specimen plants like there's oh God, go back in and think magnolias and yeah getting in all. Now I I'm getting like the one-off specimen trees and plants.

Speaker 1: 24:16

I'm putting them in so yeah, yeah, yeah, and bulbs you mentioned bulbs. What? What's going into that garden? So I presume all white daffodils, white daffodils yeah, brilliant, all white yeah, and massive white daffodils yeah, class. So you're going to have scented ones in there, I guess, because a lot of your favorite brilliant yeah, I love it.

Speaker 2: 24:41

Yeah, um, so, um, I suppose a lot of the planting there is like a lot of times it is white right white fox loves. They all self-seed under the white blossom trees so yeah yeah, it's just. It's not that I planned it that way, it just seems to be the way it has, uh, developed. Um, the snowdrops are lovely, they're coming on lovely actually and then the bluebells come out, the daffodils, fritillarias and the tulip sylvestris. That's lovely. That runs through some of the garden, yeah.

Speaker 1: 25:19

Yeah, so, and you're going big impact, like the quantities you're mentioning are big in all of these. So it's a big garden, john, like the quantities you're mentioning are big in all of these.

Speaker 2: 25:24

so it's a big garden chance. Yeah, you're getting a big impact from all of this yeah, yeah tetrapanics as well. Um, I've a lot of tetrapanics in it and, like I'm, I'm running that through one of the big beds as you're coming in the house, in in the driveway, I'd like seven or eight big in the driveway.

Speaker 1: 25:47

I'd like seven or eight big tetrapanics in this one, yeah. And so they're giving you that big, that big leaf, um unusual leaf, and and a canopy, like umbrella almost, and then you're, you're underneath it with something else. Yeah, class, dramatic, dramatic looking is right, yeah, and uh, how do you find it? Do for you there.

Speaker 2: 26:02

Brilliant.

Speaker 1: 26:02

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 26:03

Yeah, yeah, lots of little babies every year and spread them around.

Speaker 1: 26:07

Brilliant.

Speaker 2: 26:09

So it's become sheltered now, so I'm also getting in. There's a good few acers in it as well, which I couldn't grow to start. So a few lovely specimens of acers in it.

Speaker 1: 26:20

Yeah, that's nice now that you're getting a bit of shelter that you're able to start introducing.

Speaker 2: 26:24

I'm in my element now Around the pond, then has all the iris out at the minute.

Speaker 1: 26:31

Yeah, irises are looking brilliant at the minute.

Speaker 2: 26:34

Yeah, I love them.

Speaker 1: 26:37

There's a lot of plants on this list, isn't there?

Speaker 2: 26:38

I know I keep saying well, what's your favourite plant?

Speaker 1: 26:48

And we're still only in the first garden or the last garden as we reverse back here, so um, the previous garden to that then was am I right in? Saying that was the meadow garden, was it as we step back? So in here you said you were planting blocks and then repeating that block across the garden.

Speaker 2: 26:59

Pretty much yeah so not not so much blocks but um, say, picking 15 variety of plants and rolling those through the garden okay, so you're getting that meadow. Look you're getting, and there's antristus in it and the amymages and you know the cow parsley. Look the sangasorba, the cranberry, sangasorba pescicarius, all that kind of uh, so that kind of look and feel it and and the trees are actually planted. The trees at the beginning they're apple trees and I've I've um pruned them into a really nice shape, so they're actually lovely as well in it.

Speaker 1: 27:42

Yeah, yeah, and you're going to get obviously great colour there early in the year Great crop of apples every year. Great crop of apples. Yeah, and just out of interest, what sort of varieties of apples do you know?

Speaker 2: 27:53

No idea.

Speaker 1: 27:54

No idea, I've been there a long time and all doing well.

Speaker 2: 27:56

I picked the apple trees at the start and put them in Brilliant. Never thought anyone would be asking me the name of the apple tree.

Speaker 1: 28:12

I was just asking about vintage because, um well, I run a grow your own food course and and on that there's certain varieties that I I see doing well here, that, and others that are not doing well. So it's only just interested to see what ones are doing really well elsewhere yeah, sorry, no, I can't help you yeah, no problem, no problem, um. So then we went back into the cut flower garden.

Speaker 2: 28:27

I think was it uh, no, so you're going into the mediterranean garden, mediterranean garden yeah and so what?

Speaker 1: 28:34

obviously there we're seeing.

Speaker 2: 28:35

You mentioned olive trees, you mentioned lavender and the pots are planted with cacti and um aeoniums. All no watering in the pots and there's herbs in the pots. They even have a few strawberries in the pots and that kind of thing, yeah, and a lot of herbs and loads of dahlias gone in there. So I lift all the dahlias, bring them in and they're all gone out now in the last few weeks. Salvia's yeah, a bit of everything in it, what else? Oh, nepeta, yeah, it's pretty.

Speaker 1: 29:14

Yeah, Nepeta's brilliant for just.

Speaker 2: 29:17

Absolutely brilliant yeah.

Speaker 1: 29:19

Grows everywhere, grows anywhere and good colour.

Speaker 2: 29:23

There's a lovely standard privets actually lying in the pat nice and the napita is underneath, so you're getting that purple walk as you're walking down there oh yeah, lovely yeah, so that's nice yeah and did you buy them as standard privets or did?

Speaker 1: 29:38

you actually no I bought them as standard. Yeah, yeah, and they're easy to keep them as well, of course, super easy trim super easy here.

Speaker 2: 29:45

Yeah, yeah, yeah we're saying brilliant yeah right in that so yeah, and then the previous garden to that was you're going into the rose garden, then you're going to the rose garden.

Speaker 1: 29:57

So back into the david aston roses you reckon you have. Is it 50 roses or 50 varieties of rose?

Speaker 2: 30:05

uh, 50 to 60 roses, not 50 varieties, yeah and so what?

Speaker 1: 30:09

what varieties are you?

Speaker 2: 30:10

um princess. Anders wild leaf I have, bosco bell is my favorite and it's much because it's a good, strong, healthy rose, but the flower is the roses itself. The color changes and it's my favorite yeah princess, anne, I would say definitely the strongest rose to grow david, austin, wise and big blousy. I mean, if you want a big blousy rose, that's, that's it, yeah yeah, and scented.

Speaker 1: 30:41

Have you scented flowers in there? I?

Speaker 2: 30:42

think I'm gone immune, to be honest, to which one you go out like a day, like today. Now where it's, there's a breeze yeah the scent is amazing yeah, yeah, there's arches there as well and rambling roses, of those bobby james, and they flower once, and then I've wisteria going up the other side, so that'll give something else yeah, give you a bit of variety, yeah yeah, yeah and back then it's, it's open, there's a metal railings and it's open out into the field.

Speaker 2: 31:14

So like you're getting the formality of the roses, but then you're looking out into a field, basically where the cows come up to the fence and so it's a nice contrast contrast yes, you have the formal rose garden, and then I was looking over the cows.

Speaker 1: 31:30

Yeah, yeah, brilliant yeah then you you were stepping back into the previous garden was the june garden june garden right. So that's coming into its prime um at the moment. Yeah, or's coming into its prime at the moment.

Speaker 2: 31:44

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 31:44

Or it's in its prime at the moment.

Speaker 2: 31:46

So the Teletrons are lovely there at the minute. I have some cornice trees in there as well, the smaller cornice trees. The roses are just starting to bloom there and the wild roses are the old shrub roses like William Lobb and Cardinal LaRiche.

Speaker 1: 32:03

They flower once yeah but they're special when they come out and what so this is not the hot bar. No, the hot one is the last one as we go so roses, get my head around it. So, yeah, that sound. That sounds like a, like a, a nice garden as well at this time of year. And then we're into the hot garden, and this is the one with the cannas. Uh, so you're going for leaf color? Yeah vibrancy, that sort of thing.

Speaker 2: 32:38

So maybe go through the plants list there um well, I even planted some sunflowers in there this week. They're real chocolatey dark sunflowers.

Speaker 1: 32:47

Nice.

Speaker 2: 32:48

I put a lot of annuals in there. The beds are not. That's a small garden now and the beds are not wide. Cannas alone have like about 20 cannas went in there this week. There's rose. Hot chocolate is in there. That's fabulous rose as well.

Speaker 1: 33:06

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 33:08

And there's a few standard privets in it the wild rose, the flower carpet rose, I mean the yellow.

Speaker 1: 33:16

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 33:16

And, oh, I actually planted. So there was a box hedge frame in that garden and I took it out. It was miserable. And last year I went to little and I got a dianthus and it was black and it was amazing, right and little.

Speaker 2: 33:34

When I was getting my pint of milk I got this dianthus and I loved it so I saved the seed okay and cut the stems, turn it upside down in a bucket and and let it dry off, and I had hundreds of seeds, so brilliant um, yeah, I had about 50 pots of this dianthus and I I framed that garden in it and it's black and it's starting to flower now and it's, it's brilliant, gorgeous yeah yeah, that sounds interesting yeah, the group actually the other day and she asked me, but what's the name of it?

Speaker 2: 34:07

and I said little's diana so, yeah, yeah, no idea, but it looks brilliant and unusual yeah and, and not necessarily something you think in in the hot garden as such, you know, with that color, like hot color, like it's it's black and I have yellow beside it. I can't think of the minute, but there's a lot of oranges and so, yeah, it's a lovely contrast with the oranges and yellows.

Speaker 1: 34:37

Yeah, I'd imagine yeah, brilliant, and black flowers typically. Sometimes they can look super.

Speaker 2: 34:45

I do flower arranging as well, and you're making a bouquet If you put in a little bit of black and a little bit of orange.

Speaker 1: 34:53

Yeah, you're getting a massive contrast.

Speaker 2: 34:56

Yeah, and you really teach yourself doing that. The combinations that work.

Speaker 1: 35:00

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 35:01

Orange always works, and a black scabies as well, and it's gorgeous.

Speaker 1: 35:10

Funny. Tj Meyer was on the podcast a few weeks ago and he talked about the color wheel and, uh, how he used it as well.

Speaker 2: 35:15

Well, I think as well. So we're probably you know probably.

Speaker 1: 35:18

Yeah, you're probably on the same, using the same system.

Speaker 1: 35:22

So yeah, it's fabulous with his colors yeah, he talked about the, the artist wheel, and there's, there's an artist wheel in his book and basically the idea is that if colors are side by side on the artist wheel that they'll work together in the border or the bed or whatever. Yeah, and it's funny, the other day I was putting in some plants around a new seating area where we sit, where our sort of barbecue area is. The sun hits it from 12 o'clock in the day until, yeah, until it disappears at night. It's brilliant for for late sun, but first thing in the morning it's freezing. So we put a little spot out the back. If you're having a cup of coffee outside the odd morning that you can do it, but anyway, um, I was planting a few bits out there and I found myself looking at the color wheel. You see, because I do not have the, I do not have the artist, I or I don't have the interior designer, sort of I don't have that. Simple as that.

Speaker 2: 36:19

Yeah, so I mean, you know, you don't just get that.

Speaker 1: 36:23

That comes with time yeah, probably yeah, and I'm maybe getting used to it and like to be honest in terms of the, you know, the ornamental garden here, for for us here at the moment, it's it's all about growing food at the moment yeah, so it's not as nice, I think, as for sure, a veg patch is just yeah, I love it.

Speaker 1: 36:43

um, yeah, so every day we're taking something from it, so it's like that's really important for us here. Obviously, in time we'd like to get the rest of it looking beautiful, but anyway. So I looked at the color wheel and I was just about to put two things together and I said, hey, I better have a look at this wheel. So I came back inside, picked out the book and they were on totally opposite sides so I moved. So it'll be interesting to see. You know, by using that a little bit, I'm sure it's going to work. So yeah, yeah you know what.

Speaker 2: 37:15

Most of the time it just works works anyway, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you can't get too caught up on all these things, you just go at it, and I mean flowers together, just work yeah yeah, you do get your nice combinations sometimes, but if I go out to cut flowers for bouquet, I'm taking them from every garden, I'm putting them all together.

Speaker 1: 37:40

Yeah, and they look well anyway.

Speaker 2: 37:42

Yeah, and they're totally natural. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1: 37:47

You mentioned annuals that you're putting through the hot garden particularly, and I think, into the June garden as well. I think you mentioned annuals. So what? What annuals are you using, or what ones are you?

Speaker 2: 37:57

using to get that pop of colour. I grow loads. Yeah, I haven't mastered the habit of sowing half a packet of seeds. I have to sow the whole packet, so I end up. Oh my God. These have to sow the whole time, so I end up. Oh my god, these have to get planted in somewhere. So yeah. I grow everything Malachala, tajities, tohoni, I love it. Chinese forget-me-nots, they've gone under the roses, they're inks and blues. Cosmos, yeah, snapdragons, you can, just can't do without They've gone under the roses.

Speaker 2: 38:30

They're pinks and blues. Cosmos. Yeah, snapdragons, you just can't do without them. For a long time. Okay, and I love trying. Every year I pick five or six different packets, something different.

Speaker 1: 38:41

And I have a go.

Speaker 2: 38:43

I just love sown seeds. Yeah, so you obviously have a greenhouse on site then as well presume, yeah, two polytulans and a greenhouse and they are a health hazard. You have to back your way on my literally one. One year, if anyone's seen me, I fell back into a crate and just sat there. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

Speaker 1: 39:10

Like they are a health hazard right they're just so packed but I bet you they're very productive they are yeah, yeah so like there's a lot of plants in this garden and obviously you're buying certain things you know, specimen trees, your standard privets and all that you're, you're buying all those plants in yeah, very good, and but you're obviously doing a lot of propagation. Is it just sowing seed you do, or do you do anything?

Speaker 2: 39:37

else. Well, I take my salvia cuttings and, um yeah, mostly sown seeds yeah, yeah and I'm not, so the cuttings are usually at a time of the year when I'm just busy yeah, yeah yeah, um the seeds. Like if I want 10 or 15 or something, I'm not gonna buy it, I'm gonna yeah on seeds. And now I know, like you know, you grow your fox doves, you grow your sweet williams, like you just basically, your grasses are so easy to grow from seed yeah, for sure it really is, and like if I didn't know at the start, like when I started gardening I always thought so and see, that's for experienced gardeners.

Speaker 2: 40:19

It's really not yeah, if you're going to start gardening, that's the first thing you should do yeah and have a go yeah, perennials, like in in the autumn time, perennials, biennials, grasses.

Speaker 1: 40:31

It's just so easy if you have a tunnel or a greenhouse or somewhere to put them, obviously, um, just sew them. You could sprinkle the water and then I not say forget about them, but you don't have to do much with them then till the following spring and then move them on, and it's so, so easy and so satisfying yeah, and you can have you know I went out today and I I had um two trays of fox loves and I just went out under the trees and planted them out.

Speaker 1: 40:59

Yeah, brilliant, like there's masses of them, you know yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's so, it's so, so easy and and, as you say, people are a bit daunted by sowing seeds and maybe a little bit afraid of it, but they definitely shouldn't just read the packet and follow the instructions and I promise you it'll work.

Speaker 2: 41:19

Yeah, for sure, all the seeds I saw in spring, I'd have two polytunnels full. You're probably going to get three or four trays. That didn't work. Yeah, out of all that yeah, and and that's no big deal. You have to get rid of them so quick.

Speaker 1: 41:34

It's just gonna grind on me, but yeah yeah, yeah, you hate looking at them as you pass by. Yeah, yeah, there's nothing as frustrating as that. Or if you're growing a six pack or a nine pack of something and three of them or four of them have sprouted. But then the others haven't.

Speaker 2: 41:49

Yeah, that's a nine. Oh my god, I hate zinnias. I'm never buying another packet of zinnias because they just won't grow for me, right?

Speaker 1: 41:58

so yeah, no, there's certain things. All right, that can be. That can be a struggle, isn't it? Um, so you're doing a lot of the propagation yourself. There's a lot of gardens here. There's a series of gardens within the garden. How is you know what's the important things? You mentioned mulching, obviously, sowing seed, but like there's a lot of work here in this, so tell us how that happens.

Speaker 2: 42:25

It's four days a week from Christmas for me and I am like hell bent on doing those four days, no matter what the weather, and I know if I do those four days I'm going to be okay then when it comes to open season. So like I know the gardens so well now, I know how long it's going to take me in each garden and it's daunting I like I start to slow down in September, go on a holiday and I might do a day here and day there or whatever, but once Christmas is over, that's it, I'm back you're back head down I am back to work and I'll take one garden at a time okay, and spend a week in each garden and then repeat that process yeah and have

Speaker 1: 43:12

it the way I want it and so at that stage you're going in, obviously, tidy up. Uh, are you mulching?

Speaker 2: 43:18

I'm going in john with a hedge trimmers, right those perennials, and I am down to the ground with them. And this year everything had to be put into ton bags. I couldn't get up to the compost heap, it was so wet, so I ton bags, you know the big ton bags yeah, yeah, yeah put all the stuff in it. It's good, like putting your leaves in some, and it's a good way of doing your compost and yeah and I leave the leaves in those bags in the bags.

Speaker 2: 43:46

Yeah, yeah and the leaves in those bags, in the bags, yeah, yeah, and the leaves go back out into the garden.

Speaker 1: 43:50

And you use them what like? 18 months later, 12 months later?

Speaker 2: 43:54

Yeah, 12 months later.

Speaker 1: 43:55

Yeah, yeah, brilliant, yeah, and there's no better mulch to be putting on.

Speaker 2: 44:00

No, I have my system and I know what works and I love working on my own. Yeah, yeah, marcella's not here during the winter, so he works in the stud farm next door.

Speaker 1: 44:14

Okay.

Speaker 2: 44:14

He finishes at half four. Like it's dark at half three four o'clock, so he doesn't start to come in the spring when the clocks change and he might potter around in the shed down there and just to get out for a while.

Speaker 1: 44:29

Brilliant, yeah, but I suppose, as you say, it's something we talk about on the podcast. A lot is, I suppose, when it comes to sowing seeds, and you know, particularly in the vegetable garden, once Christmas turns everyone's starting to put stuff in and there shouldn't be any panic in sowing seeds straight after Christmas Don't achieve anything, don't achieve anything, definitely not. Panic in sowing seeds straight after Christmas Don't achieve anything, don't achieve anything, definitely not. But there's huge merit in getting out and doing your bit of edging, doing your cutting and your trimming, doing your mulching. There's huge merit in that because when it comes around to April, may, june, july, that work that you've done then pays huge dividends. At that stage, yeah, yeah, now it's. Sometimes it can be hard, as opposed to motivate yourself to do it.

Speaker 1: 45:12

You have no choice yeah, you have no choice because you have to make yourself once you're out there.

Speaker 2: 45:17

Yeah, like you don't want to come in then yeah, for sure yeah, yeah yeah, for sure and you go out and you look at the weather and you say it's, it's just god awful today, but actually when you're out in it, it's rarely as bad as it looks when you're looking out from the couch.

Speaker 1: 45:35

Yeah, definitely not. So the open garden is open for 2024. It's open the first weekend of every month.

Speaker 2: 45:43

Yes, from May to September.

Speaker 1: 45:46

Brilliant. So from May to September, first weekend of every month, that's the Friday, the Saturday and the Sunday- yeah, and if it's a bank holiday, the Monday. Monday as well, brilliant. So for all the bank holidays, you're getting four days essentially, and three on every other weekend. That's brilliant.

Speaker 2: 46:03

You can just come in. You spend your time in the garden, there's teas and cakes in the tea rooms and uh yeah and we never mentioned your, your cakes, because I know that's a big feature of going there is.

Speaker 1: 46:18

Don't say that. So I know you mentioned uh like the cakes being an important part of a visit, uh, but you're doing all the baking as well yourself I do the bacon wow. So what's your specialty um?

Speaker 2: 46:31

the carrot cake is more famous than the garden I hope my wife is not listening. She, she loves her carrot cake so I do carrot cake, I do a coffee cake, bakewell's different bakewells yeah scones coffee, and that's perfect brilliant.

Speaker 1: 46:50

Yeah, so someone can come and have a tea or coffee, one of your famous cakes and then take a stroll through the garden. Just the final, final thing before we start to close off. Uh, you mentioned at the very start that you want people to look up and move forward through the gardens. Yes, is there something particularly that you're looking for to catch their eye, to draw them from one to the other, or is it the site?

Speaker 2: 47:16

Yeah, when you're in one garden and you look ahead, you're going to see a little house, or you're going to see a gate, or you're going to see a path going through the next garden. So that's what I try to get the groups to do when they come okay, so within each garden then, yeah, when you're in one garden, it's to make you want to go in and see the other garden okay, brilliant.

Speaker 1: 47:39

So there's some enticer down the line that you can. You can pick yeah in your eye and then you have to follow it. Yeah, brilliant, yeah good, a good idea, and always leading, leading through. So, um, open, open the first weekend of every month right through to september, and then it's uh, closed down for the winter and back at it after christmas and tell people where they can, you know, find your website and all that so that they can plan their visits.

Speaker 2: 48:06

Um is it gardenscom, instagram, facebook. Um, yeah, all the information I post regularly on instagram, daily nearly on instagram and facebook. So brilliant you get to even see the garden through the winter and see what I'm doing brilliant.

Speaker 1: 48:23

Yeah, um, and I'll. I'll put the all the details in the show notes anyway, but you don't pre-book or anything like that.

Speaker 2: 48:31

No, you don't pre-book Unless you have a group. Unless you have a group.

Speaker 1: 48:34

Ten or more. Just you need to pre-book and, other than that, just arrive on the first weekend of the month Brilliant, it's been really interesting, really interesting chat. I actually like I've seen you obviously on instagram and but I feel like I can visualize these gardens already uh after your explanation. So, but I'm really looking forward to getting to see them and really looking forward to getting to taste the bakewell as well when I do get there, I'll give you a big slice. So yeah, brilliant. So it's been a really interesting chat.

Speaker 2: 49:03

Uh, the garden sounds spectacular, uh, from the outside, as you drive by it, you know it looks, looks great, so I can imagine there's competition along that road, john, like the stud farm one side me and the golf course the other side, and they keep their road immaculate.

Speaker 1: 49:18

Yeah yeah, you have no choice, only keep up a bit of pressure yeah, yeah, but it does, it looks, it looks very nice. Um, the entrance looks great. Um, as I said, looking at you on instagram, everything looks spectacular and you've described it beautifully, so it sounds like a garden that's really really worth visiting. And, yeah, you can check out kilgar gardens the first weekend of every month right through to september, paula, it's been really interesting chat and thank you very, very much for coming on. Master, my garden podcast thanks very much, john.

Speaker 2: 49:46

It's easier than I thought it would be so that's been this week's episode.

Speaker 1: 49:50

A huge thanks to paula for coming on. The gardens really do sound uh, superb. Can't wait to get to see them, definitely going to get up this year. We actually passed that road reasonably regularly, so I'm looking forward to getting in there. It's, um, yeah, as I say, it sounds, sounds like an amazing garden. And the fact that it's relatable for people in that there's a series of gardens, each one that would be, you know, similar to an urban style back garden, so easy to replicate in your own garden or to bring an idea and take it into your own garden. So, yeah, it really sounds like a place worth visiting and, yeah, can't wait to get to see it myself and to taste the Bakewell, as I said, so that's been this week's episode. Thanks for listening and until the next time, happy gardening, thank you.