Mediterranean Gardening

Mediterranean Gardening

Gardening in the Sun

Born in Kent, the garden state of England, my vision of a garden has radically changed over the years. I have adjusted my ideas and now can accommodate a far larger range of plants. I’ve gradually come to understand how I can make a garden that best deals with seasonal variations and other local conditions.

I was told before traveling to Australia that it had a Mediterranean climate. Coming from England, where green is the predominate colour, I found Australian suburban gardens very brightly coloured, and council gardens very dry. Unfortunately at first I found native plants to be dry, pungent, and not particularly attractive. But that is an aspect living in Australia that I’ve now not only become accustomed to but even enjoy.

Paintings of Australian Plants, Marianne North Gallery, Kew, England


Born in Hastings in 1830, Marianne North devoted her life to travelling the world and painting plants.
















At first, as a newbie, in my Australian garden in the Adelaide Hills I struggled to grow the wrong plants for the situation. While I was pleased to see that roses did well I loved lilacs and lilies of the valley and I tried to grow them. In the end I had to admit that their need for water and protection from the hot sun involved too much effort on my part - especially as at the time I also had three children, a job, and various animals to look after.

South Australia was my first experience of  ‘Mediterranean gardening’, and I have since always associated ‘Mediterranean gardening’ with this particularly state. The winters were wet and the summers were long and hot.

Singapore ‘Gardens by the Bay’






















The Mediterranean Section

Weather-wise and Water-wise

Since those days I have gardened in other places in Australia and come to discover a number of Australian and other ‘Mediterranean’ plants that I could plant in places that are quite demanding’ for instance in a city courtyard; in a sandy garden by the sea; and now in Greece, in a ‘real Mediterranean garden’.

When we are on the island of Lemnos in Greece, as one would expect, we have hot dry summers and colder wetter winters. But each place, and each garden is unique. Here on our windy island weather in winter can include extreme winds, snow and frosts, and in summer the dry spells can go on for 6 months.

Lemnos: Hot Summers and Cold Winters

Sustaining Ourselves and the Planet

In 2011 I gave a talk to a group of students on this subject, ‘Sustaining Ourselves and the Planet’. It just happened to be the hottest day on record in the city of Melbourne, a city once known as the ‘Garden City’. The group in the hall was only half listening to me, as everyone was anxious to get home, to find out if the dire warnings given for the state were warranted.

They were. The next day, when I read the papers the irony of my subject and opening quote hit me. I had begun with the words of Robert Quillen that, ‘If we wish to make a new world we have the material ready. The first one too was made out of chaos.’ Little did I know when I picked that quote how true it was to be, and what kind of chaos would soon be engulfing our neighborhood.

Firestorms had swept the state, two towns were raised to the ground, and 200 lives were lost. Large areas in the Dandenongs, the Yarra Valley and Gyppsland were burnt out and hundreds of homes destroyed.

Approaches to gardening changed after that fire. Articles in magazines, gardens in the suburbs began to take into account the fact that our climate was changing. We had to adjust our mindset. Commentators were even emphasizing the idea of survival rather than that of sustainability.

Two Areas of my Greek Garden that I water rarely


The Hot Garden      

The Shady Walk

(In fact I lost the two cypress trees I was training into an arch one hot summer and have had to replace them with a wooden arch)














Two Areas of my Greek Garden I water more often

The Vegetable Garden     
(Vegetables require quite a lot of water, even the Med. Veggies!)

The Herb and Flower Garden
(I water here as I have flowers, not just herbs, to give me colour near to the house.)














It seems that not only will we have to maintain sustainability and survive in our chosen spot we will have to question old symbols and mindsets. When I first came to the Adelaide Hills I felt ‘at home’ there as there were others who loved ‘English gardens’ and I saw that camellias and azaleas were what people grew under their eucalyptus trees. But even here gardeners are changing.

There is no doubt that ecological change will continue to affect gardeners. What Joseph Campbell suggests is that; ‘One should find the symbol in the landscape itself, of the energies of the life there. That’s what all early gardening traditions do, they sanctify their own landscape.’  Though I don’t interpret that as only planting native plants. I’ve found there is no need to throw down the trowel, or only plant native plants, we can also ask, ‘What are gardeners doing in other similar places around the world?’

The place that I have gone to find this kind of answer is the Mediterranean Garden Society. This is a society with headquarters in Athens but with branches in many places around the world, each place having a similar ‘Mediterranean’ climate. On the Mediterranean Garden Society web-page and through its journal I’ve enjoyed reading the gardening stories and looking at pictures of gardens, of those who are tackling similar problems.

On this site I’ve found others who enjoy achieving a sustainable and aesthetic garden within the limits set by ‘water-wise-hot-gardening’. They also sometimes ask can, and should, a certain plant be regenerated? Can, and should, it be replaced it with a substitute? And, always, what are the limits of a particular environment?

The Mediterranean Garden Society

www.mediterraneangardensociety.org

The Glory of the House

The Glory of the House
The beauty of the house is order;
The blessing of the house is contentment;
The glory of the house is hospitality;
The crown of the house is godliness. 
Anon.


Various Out-door Eating Places

Under the vines




















On the Terrace


(see an earlier blog for the story of the marble topped table)
















Outside the Kitchen

It all began with a Watermelon

I have written a book (still in manuscript form) about our renovation adventure. Here are three passages from the book.













EarlyTraditions
 ‘There’s something about the way old traditions are kept on the island, and this has always attracted the family, and me too. I arrived on August 15th, St. Mary’s Day. This is one of the most celebrated Greek holy days and it’s also my name day, and my mother had prepared a great celebration. I hadn’t seen my mother for a long while, nor most of my relatives since boyhood, so seeing so many of them all staying in the house was amazing.’
‘So everybody was still going there in those days.’
'Some were in the kitchen, some playing cards on the terrace, and I could hear others calling from upstairs as they got ready for a swim. There were wonderful aromas from the kitchen where my aunts were preparing meals and sweets, supervised by my mother who was the matriarch at the time. Ah, I remember it so well, the meals, the swims, the discussions on the terrace every evening while we sipped coffee, Greek coffee of course!’

Takis Sups with his Siblings
‘After the taxi left, George and I stood on the steps, and I swung the large door knocker. Almost before I’d knocked the door opened.’
I imagined that he was giving me these details to make me fall in love with the house, sight unseen.
‘Costa stood there filling the doorway. You remember how big he was from when you saw him in Athens on your visit? The two of us followed him through the house and found Zoe, my other sister Olga and a cousin from Athens on the back terrace.’

My First Meal in the House 
‘Takis’ two sisters, brother-in-law and an elderly cousin were nearing the end of their summer in the old house so we planned to stay in a nearby hotel until they left. However, that first evening, we were all going to have a meal together. Costa had again cooked a wonderful meal, but it was nevertheless an awkward situation. I was worried they might feel we were trying to dispossess them. Of course any family member had as much right as any other to spend time in the house, but this branch of the family had made it clear to the rest of the family that they were now the current host and hostess, and we’d not only come uninvited we’d come with the idea of making changes. ‘

My first meal 
(in what was then the kitchen of the house)

Chow and Chunter Today

Guests at the table with us sit and talk.
Facing each other we delight in conversation
Lightly discussing the day’s activities and the food.
Difference is digested, culture consumed.
We joke and present our gastronomic interests;
For facts and fodder, chow and chunter, go together.
As each guest airs their views on various victuals 
Moussaka is analysed – eggplants and cinnamon 
Just enough? And even the eponymous
Greek Salad takes on new dimensions.

Takis at breakfast

The terrace is where we eat breakfast and lunch. Takis and I enjoy those times when we don’t have guests and can leisurely have our tea and toast spread with our own marmalade. Anestis arrives about eight am, and then he and Takis will start planning the day’s work.

Coffee and Gossip 

Come mid summer, I try to do my gardening before and just after breakfast and then take an early morning swim. But I make sure I’m back for our eleven o’clock break because then it is down tools and we all relax with a cup of espresso coffee and few glasses of cold water.

This is when usually the time that friends drop in and gossip is exchanged, and we find out what is happening in other parts of the island.






Lunch with Guests











Having had our coffee break we do a bit more work before lunch. For me this is usually when I write and prepare the main meal, which will be eaten around 2.30 pm. Anestis often joins us, and when we have guests there are often seven or eight sitting down around the table.

Evening on the Terrace - or by the sea

Anestis leaves after lunch and we all retire and try to sleep a little - with the fan on. After siesta George and Koula dispense Greek lessons for interested guests. Then in late afternoon the sun will still be biting and its time for a second swim. But at dusk, when the terrace catches an evening breeze, we’ll often sit and chat with a few neighbours again. And sometimes we’ll walk down to the sea front to meet friends, for just looking at the darkening sea makes you feel cooler.

Garden Bones and Arteries

Garden Bones and Arteries

A Present for Takis

After our first year of working on the house when we returned to Australia I presented Takis with a rolled up scroll, tied with a ribbon, as a birthday present. It was a watercolour sketch I’d made of how we might lay out the garden - my first plan. To please him I’d made sure there would be no lawn as he suffers from hay fever. To please me there would be roses and jasmines and various paths leading off onto various garden adventures. To please us both the central area would be given over to vegetables.

Plan 1


The sketch took into consideration the basic requirements, such as the weather (Mediterranean), the givens of this site (flat and square), and what we had inherited from the past (certain trees and outbuildings). I had tried to take into consideration all the practical aspects of what we needed. And, a sucker for romance, I had also included a couple of wild garden spaces where we would let the wild flowers sown by Nature bloom in spring.



Picture of wild spring flowers

But it was still just a dream garden at this stage, for at the time the ‘empty football pitch’ had turned into a ‘builder’s yard’. There were piles of sand and gravel to be turned into cement, piles of old roof tiles and pavers that we hope to use somewhere, and rubbish waiting to be carted away. And, though I might get an area all tied up and think I could start, the workers would take over again and deconstruct the area again. However, slowly, something began to take shape.

I had a grand scheme nonetheless the scheme was often adjusted over the next year or two and compromises of many kinds were made. As with the work on the house the method used in garden development was also ‘organic’. Thus there had to be a plan 2 as we made more room to park cars, hang out washing, and I decided changed the layout of pathways in the hot garden which were too formal for my liking, and I worked out a way to limit the strict formality of the vegetable and herb gardens.

Plan 2

Paths – the arteries of the garden

To have a herb garden, a vegetable garden, a shady terrace and a hot garden I needed to plan for a number of garden ‘rooms’. But I didn’t want them to be boring so the paths were different to provide a distinct ‘feel’ to each room, the aim being to create a difference in the style of one’s travelling through each area. 

Herb garden before and after
In the herb garden you could smell the scents as you wandered around small formal paved walks.

Shade garden, before and after
In the shade garden you would want to walk alone or sit on a bench to look at a distant view. 

Hot garden before and after
In the hot garden you could perambulate around a gravel path. 

Vegetable garden before and after
In the vegetable garden the paths would need to be straight but wide enough to push a wheelbarrow.

Pergolas – the bones of the garden

Pergolas give internal structure, and by creating different levels they add variety. And covered with vines they give shade which adds a wonderfully romantic feature by sometimes screening part of the garden, or adding a mysterious, hidden, quality as you look through then to other parts of the garden.

Main walk before and after
Our pergolas cover the main walkway and the terrace close to the house. The main walkway leads from the car park to the terrace and it needed to be wide enough for two people to walk side by side. 

In England if pergolas are too near the house they only darken the house and wet and dripping areas on terraces, they are usually placed at a distance to give a view and added height for even more flowers than are in the flower-beds. In Greece they are close to the house to add extra, thick, shade in mid-summer. Most of the vines drop their leaves so that there is only filtered shade in winter.

Quotes:

‘Every garden is now wanting a pergola, that pleasant shape of covered way that we have borrowed from Italy.’ Gertrude Jekyll

‘I much enjoy the pergola at the end of the sunny path. It is pleasant while walking in full sunshine, and when that sunny place feels just a little too hot, to look into its cool depth, and to know that one has only to go a few steps farther to be in shade, and to enjoy that little air of wind that the summer clouds say is not far off, and is only unfelt just here because it is stopped by the wall.’ Gertrude Jekyll

Ongoing Structures

Having a structural design enabled us to enjoy my garden even before the plants filled it out. Of course as the plants grew we enjoyed the structures even more; all those lines of focus towards a tall tree, the variety of leaves and colours in garden beds beneath and on pergolas, the different textures as we walked or scrunched over the paths.

The paths are now laid, most of the trees are planted, and the worst digging done. And in my kitchen I am already benefiting from what was sown in the vegetable garden this year. However designs are still being discussed and erected. This year for instance we added another archway, leading from the shady walk to the vegetable garden. This was to replace the one that was nearly achieved from two cedars, but unfortunately died at the end of one very hot summer.

And Another Arch

Our Greek Garden's What, Why and How

Our Greek Garden’s What, Why and How

Plan 2

Anestis begins clearing

Australian Gardens

An Australian house is usually single story and set in the middle of a house block of land. Because of the size of this spread-out house and its placing there is usually a small amount of garden all around it. Australian gardens, like those in England and America, usually use the garden to enhance the house. So gardeners plant trees, flowers and bushes, and perhaps ponds and pergolas. There is often space for a lawn where the children can play. 

 Plus there are many public gardens where again aesthetics is important, and flowers are used almost like paintings.

(Gardens of many immigrants from Asia and the Mediterranean however are often different, as the garden, rather than being devoted to flowers, is often given over to fruit trees and vegetables.)

The Typical Lemian-Town Garden

In most Greek towns a house is several stories high and set right on the roadway. There is usually no house-garden, and folk keep plants in pots on balconies, while vegetables are grown outside town in an allotment.

But Every Garden is Unique

Our Greek house is three stories high and set right up against two roads. This placing - where you step out of the door onto the road - is typical. However what this place gives us is far more garden space if we wanted it, and even more than one would have in a typical Australian house and gardens set-up where the house takes up most of the garden space. 

We were happy to have so much land around the house, and we have now fully developed every corner to give us all the aspects of a garden that we wanted.

The What and Why of Our Lemnos Garden

         What did we want?           And Why did we want this?

The Basics: sitting areas, amenities area, car parking area

Plus.....

We like entertaining at home, so we wanted a number of pleasant sitting places. I like drying my clothes in the sun rather than in a drying cabinet (especially when there is plenty of sunshine), and we preferred to park the car in the property (rather than on the road as so many have to in Myrina).

Vegs and fruit areas

Even the White House has a vegetable garden!

And as we like cooking for ourselves and others we wanted a good vegetable garden and some fruit trees.

How we Achieved our Lemian Garden

The Plan

Along the way I found that the original grand scheme (see blog 23) needed to be adjusted, to accommodate various practical needs. For instance, our driveway was steep and we needed to be able to turn at the top. Plus we wanted a shaded carport for summer. Plus the first plan had not included a place to put the rotary hoist that came from Australia.                       

And, looking over my original design, I changed the pathways in the hot garden area to be more informal, limiting straight lines to the vegetable and herb gardens. I had hoped for the same informality along the back wall in the shade garden however once our helper, Anestis overseen by my husband got going, the stonewall ended up with straight lines.

Materials and Workers

 

I often found that I had to work with the conflicting wishes of all of those involved, plus I learnt how to deal with necessary limits of space and materials, and so compromises of many kinds were made.

Often revisions were needed in a hurry, and were drawn on scraps of paper found in a hotel room, or in the kitchen, on memo pads supplied by hard-wear shops, or in my diary, on planes as we flew back and forth to Australia.