Episode 18 Gardeners' World

BUZZING

Hello. Welcome to Gardeners' World.

Well, having been to shows and been away,

it's nice to get back here and spend some time in my own garden.

While I've been away, of course, the garden's been busy.

It's all changed.

We all inherit garden features that we have to work with.

But this week, Joe visits a fashion designer

whose Somerset garden incorporates a whopper.

Boom! That's a big, big viaduct.

When you have a garden, what are the things you dream of?

"Well, could I have a river through it?" But a viaduct?

And Carol is in Kent meeting a lavender expert

whose walled garden is exclusively devoted to this essential plant.

To be honest, whatever lavender you grow, it's great for the garden,

brilliant for the body and superb for the soul.

It's just such a brilliant garden plant.

The Jewel Garden colour theme

is one that we try and keep going from early spring

on into May and June,

high summer, and on into autumn.

And although we put a lot of effort and energy

into maximising the intensity of colour,

it's always surprising,

even though we've been doing this now for about 16, 17 years,

just how it takes off once you get to mid-July.

It really starts to explode.

It used to be said that August was a low time for gardens.

People went away on holiday because the garden didn't look up to much.

It was tired.

Well, I think that's baloney.

There's no need for that at all. In fact,

August here in the Jewel Garden is the best month of all.

But you do have to tweak the garden a bit to get that effect

because some plants finish their performance in June and July,

and then they do slump. So the secret is to cut them back,

and cut them back hard.

For example, this geranium finished flowering middle of June,

I cut it right back to the ground. It looked terrible.

Really stark and bare for a few weeks,

but now you can see there's regrowth. It's even flowering,

and it will go on flowering right through into autumn.

And the point is, this new growth is fresh and it's vibrant.

So as well as adding in plants,

you do need to cut back where it's appropriate.

Now, if I get in here...

Here's a delphinium.

Which was looking fantastic.

Intense sapphire colour.

But that's done its stuff.

However, if I cut this back to the ground, taking everything off,

there's a real chance that it will regrow and reflower

in late August, September.

Not guaranteed, but there's a high probability.

And even if it doesn't flower, there'll be fresh growth,

and that's how you keep August going.

Adding a few bits and pieces in, but also cutting back

to allow a sense of renewal and freshness

rather than everything getting a little bit faded.

So, down to the ground...

Cutting back will definitely help.

But sometimes you can add something to the garden

which really transforms it

and gives it a whole new life and energy.

Now this is some plant.

This is Ensete ventricosum 'Maurelii'. It's a banana.

The Abyssinian banana, and the Maurelii

is the variety that gives us this fabulous plum colour

to the ribs of the leaves and along the edges and the veins.

I saw it on the Britain In Bloom garden at Hampton Court,

and thought this is exactly what I need for this particular spot

here in the Jewel Garden

where I cut down a weeping pear last year.

And of course the colour is ideal because we use purple a lot anyway,

and it'll pick up the canna leaves.

So you get that rhythm of repeated shape and colour.

Now, it is big and it was expensive.

This cost £90.

But it should last for years, it was my birthday,

and if I was planting this in June,

I could get one that cost about £30,

which would grow just as big.

So it's to do with timing as much as anything else.

Ensete is a particularly tender banana.

If you grow a Musa - Musa basjoo is the most common one -

they are hardier, they'll take some frost,

and if you live in a sheltered area, you can overwinter them.

The danger we have here at Longmeadow is not so much the cold,

cos you can wrap them with straw and fleece, it's the wet.

The cold and the wet can rot them, and that's happened to me before.

So before the first frost, I will have to dig it up

and bring it in and keep it undercover.

I could grow it in a pot, but by putting it in the ground

the roots will spread and it'll grow bigger.

Right, that hole is deeper than it need be

cos I'm going to add some compost.

I would stress that this is rich, heavy clay loam.

Perfect for bananas.

So I don't need a huge amount of extra compost.

If you've got light soil - chalky, sandy, whatever -

add as much compost or manure as you possibly can.

The banana will appreciate it.

This is good Longmeadow compost.

Right.

I hope I've got the hole the right depth,

because this is heavy.

Oh, that's not bad.

How about that?!

Now what I'm going to do, because it's dry,

is I'm going to fill the hole full of water,

let it soak in, backfill it,

and then water it again.

So much of real-life gardening is tinkering.

You're just adjusting this and adjusting that.

So when occasionally you do add something which is really dramatic,

and really stops you in your tracks,

then that's a red-letter day.

That's really good fun.

Now, years ago, I worked in the fashion business,

and kept coming across this man called Roger Saul.

Very successful, very nice man.

Ran a company called Mulberry.

And I'm delighted to say that Roger has become a gardener.

And Joe went down to see his garden.

When you take over a garden,

you often inherit a structure or feature

that you have to embrace and incorporate into the design.

But very few of us are confronted with something as large as this.

A Grade II listed viaduct.

When Roger Saul moved here nearly 20 years ago,

he not only had to incorporate

this disused railway into the garden layout,

he also set himself the challenge of creating structure within the garden

which would work throughout the year.

So, Roger, what did you think

when you first saw this incredibly dominant viaduct?

I literally came round the corner

and then it was "boom!"

That's a big, big viaduct,

and it's a huge lake.

When you have a garden, what are the things you dream of?

"Can I have a river through it?" But...a viaduct?

And that is, it's such a dominant structure

that in a way you can't soften it too much.

It's there to stay.

Anything softening would have to be about 30m tall to have any effect.

Yeah! But actually you don't want to soften it, do you,

because it draws the eye through the arches really nicely,

to the beautiful countryside beyond,

but it is almost like a brick wall at the same time.

It creates more of a sense of enclosure

than I would have thought.

-But on a vast scale.

-Yeah.

I think I've probably got

one of the biggest sculptures in any garden in the world.

The current garden design is based around a very ornate rockery

which dates back to the 1960s. The then-owner was so enthused

by a gold-medal-winning garden he saw at the Chelsea Flower Show

that he commissioned a grander version

to be planted at Kilver Court.

It is absolutely classic, but to some, it must feel very dated.

Wearing my fashion design hat, obviously every season's got to

move on and last season is rubbish and you've got to keep moving on.

-There's a lot of fashion in gardening too.

-Exactly.

To me, the rockery garden here, Chelsea gold medal-winning,

point in time in 1960.

It is probably one of the most important gardens,

I would think, left in the country that still has its shape and form.

Have you ever been tempted to really meddle with it at all?

I mean, "Let's get rid of it, let's do something modern and different"?

Only when a Sunday Times journalist once said to me,

"Oh, this is boring, it's out of date", and I was trying to go,

"No, but it's a beautiful thing in its own right, why change it?"

You've convinced me, completely.

I can see that it is a design classic.

The structure of the planting, for a start -

we've got the lovely upright junipers and the yews

and the form of the plants and the contrasts -

-in the winter it must really look fantastic, too.

-It does.

Because, of course, you've got all the shape of the rocks

and the conifers. It's slightly starker, but it's still exciting.

With the Ceratostigma just cascading down over the front of that rock,

that is absolutely beautiful planting.

But you really play on scale, and you CAN play on scale here,

cos you've got the huge viaduct in the background

which sets the tone of the scale.

Probably if you had this rock garden without the viaduct,

it would seem massive. But the viaduct takes it back into context.

So, Joe, this is probably my little imprint on the garden.

This is the bit that you've actually got your hands on,

that you could change. This lovely formal parterre.

It's absolutely beautiful, actually.

So where did the inspiration for this parterre garden come from?

As a fashion designer, I spent a lot of time

in the '80s and the '90s over in Paris.

That's where I first saw this amazing Army Museum gardens,

which is called, I think, Musee de l'Armee,

and they had these amazing huge shell shapes

of box and yew hedging, and topiary.

And I just thought, "I'd love to do that one day."

And that just sprang back in mind when I first came here

and I thought, "What could I do to give this a formal entrance?"

So I tried to make a very simple, two roses only...

They're beautiful roses, aren't they?

-Is that Gertrude Jekyll, the pink one?

-Exactly, Gertrude Jekyll,

-and it's a very fragrant rose.

-It smells absolutely gorgeous.

-And the blue one?

-The blue one's called 'Blue for You',

and I had meant it to be slightly bluer, or purpler if you like,

but it's fine.

You've got the viaduct, you've got the lake, you've got the rock garden,

-and now your stamp.

-You've got different bits

that really chart the history of this site.

Then along comes little Rog

and says, "What am I going to do to make my fashion imprint?"

So I just really thought this part here, it's not a huge great thing,

but it's a very important part of the whole,

and I must say I felt terribly relieved having done it,

that it worked.

When I first came into this garden this morning I honestly didn't know

how I felt about it. Did I like it or didn't I?

It felt a bit dated to me.

But having spent a day here and talking to Roger,

I now completely get it.

I realise that as a garden designer - and many gardeners -

we go in sometimes too early and rip elements out of a garden

and we want to stamp our mark on it.

So hold back, think about it,

because you might be getting rid of a design classic.

Roger's garden is open all year round.

It's an RHS Partner Garden - there are actually over 140 of these.

And if you're a member of the RHS,

you can get in to see them on certain dates for free.

And details of where they are, which ones they are,

and when they're open, along with anything else in the programme,

is available on our website.

Now, I'm harvesting shallots.

And you'll notice I'm not just yanking them out the ground,

I'm lifting them with a fork.

That's important, because I don't want to damage the basal plate,

that goes from the bulb to the root.

So essentially, keep the roots attached,

and they will store a lot better.

So ease them out of the ground with a fork,

which is not difficult. They're not in securely.

You can see that these shallots

have still got some green in the leaves.

So they're still growing a little bit,

but the leaves are dying back.

And that's a pretty good sign that the bulb is ready.

You could leave it until the foliage has completely died back,

and in fact this is exactly the same as if you're growing daffodils.

The foliage dies back, which means all the goodness

has gone into the bulb.

But I don't think they're going to grow much more, I don't mind

if they're small, and I want to use the bed for something else.

So I've chosen this moment as being an acceptable compromise

between losing a little bit of growth,

but they're pretty much ready.

I'm a fan of shallots.

They're tasty, there are lots of different varieties.

They store much better than onions...

and they're just as easy to grow.

And these look small, but they're fine, they're good.

Now, this gives me a free bed and I am going to plant

these French beans that I've grown in a seed tray into this bed.

But it's a very hot day today and at this time of year

it's a bad idea to plant anything out until late afternoon.

In the midday you're just going to put it in there

and it's going to really suffer under the sun.

So I would suggest planting everything if at all possible

after four o'clock in the afternoon.

You've got a long stretch of about 12 to 18 hours of cool weather

before the heat picks up again the next day

and that gives them a fighting chance.

So I'm going to put those to one side and plant them this evening.

I've got here some of last year's shallots...

..which are still very edible.

When they're properly dry and the skin is all papery and brown,

just put them in baskets in a cool, dark place

and they store really well.

I've also got here the elephant garlic that

I harvested a few weeks ago.

You can see that they are a fantastic size.

What's interesting about elephant garlic is

although it's so big, it's actually quite subtle.

It makes fantastic pesto, you can roast the heads whole

and you can see the skin on these is beginning to get papery,

and if you are using garlic of any kind,

you can dig it and keep it in the fridge for two to three weeks

and use it fresh.

If you are going to store it at all, you do need to dry it until

the outside skin is dry and papery,

and that can take six to eight weeks.

These will last for about four or five months.

Not as long as some conventional garlic

and certainly not as long as any shallot.

And the way I'm going to dry these is outside,

but with a special bit of kit.

It couldn't be more home-made if you tried,

but all I've got is an old sieve,

a few bits of stick banged in the ground...

..rested on it reasonably level, reasonably secure

and the beauty of this is that they're in the sun,

they'll dry, but if it rains, they will drain very, very fast

and they won't remain wet and the airflow is under and around them.

And I've done this in the past with chicken wire and onions

and they can sit on that for weeks

and it doesn't matter what the weather is.

Oh, I'll put the label in. Like that, and that's it.

Now, the lavender here in the dry garden is very nice,

but it's not representative of the garden at all.

It's the only place that we can get lavender to grow at all well,

here at Longmeadow.

It doesn't like our wet, heavy soil.

But, Carol has been to visit a garden in Kent

where it not only grows well,

but it completely fills the whole of a large walled garden.

Lavender has been cultivated

for more than two and a half thousand years.

For centuries in many households,

it was THE essential flower

and recently it's really come to the forefront in our gardens.

Simon Charlesworth is the country's leading lavender expert.

His extensive knowledge of this genus has placed him

at the forefront of lavender breeding worldwide,

creating plants that have revolutionised the market.

His work has been central in putting lavenders

back into our hearts, minds and gardens.

It seems like a daft question, but why lavender?

I think it's just a wonderful quintessentially English plant.

Brilliant scent, great for humans, great antiseptic

and anaesthetic properties.

Brilliant for wildlife, of course.

-Bees love lavender.

-But doesn't it put some insects off too?

Moths and midges don't like the camphoraceous scent of lavender,

so pop some lavender grains in a bag and into your wardrobe, squeeze it

every couple of months and you'll find that it'll ward off the moths.

Yeah, and you'll enjoy it too.

But I think the main reason has to be it's just such a brilliant

garden plant.

It's cracking.

I suppose this is what you call English lavender, isn't it?

This is what you think of.

Yeah, this is an angustifolia,

or "true lavender"

and this particular variety is Folgate,

and at dusk and dawn, the colour of this

is almost ultraviolet, it leaps off the plant.

They would naturally grow very high up in the mountains of Provence.

Very, very poor soil.

Very resilient, they'll withstand minus 15 easily.

This one's beautiful too but it's only just coming out.

Yeah, this is an intermedia called Sussex.

So this flowers about three weeks after the shorter angustifolias

and it's a hybrid between an angustifolia

and one called latifolia or "spike lavender".

So you get the colour and the habit from the angustifolia,

but you get the long stems, the branching on the stem

and most importantly, the beautiful, heavy scent from the latifolia,

and most of those taller ones are sterile,

so it's our job as a grower and a breeder

to introduce some fertility in.

This is an increasingly popular lavender,

the stoechas or French lavender.

They're not quite as tough as the angustifolias -

minus five - so frost hardy and it's the first to flower in the season

and it'll repeat flower if you just keep deadheading it.

Oh, this one's quite different, look at this!

Yes, this is the beautiful canariensis from the Canary Islands,

with filigree foliage,

these long stems with trident flowers on the top -

unfortunately not very tough -

but you can shake seed out and pop that where you want it

and sometimes it will just seed itself all over the bed.

Right, so in actual fact, you can have it year after year,

-but only one year at a time?

-That's right.

I love this informal hedge here.

Yeah, they look beautiful, with all those pastel shades, or,

of course, if you want those two pristine rows

either side of a path, just one variety looks beautiful.

But the most important bit is brushing against it, isn't it?

It is. That releases the vapour from the glands that cover the plant,

so there's some in the stem, the foliage,

but most importantly are the calyces,

these are the little pockets that the flowers pop out of

and they're ribbed vertically and in between the ribs are thousands

of glands like little jewels.

Although you love all sorts of lavenders,

your REAL passion is to breed new varieties, isn't it?

It is, there is nothing more exciting than coming up with something

-new and revolutionary.

-And how do you go about it?

So you'd have an angustifolia here

and just before the flowers pop out fully, you'd either just remove them

or take the tips off the calyces,

-that allows the female to pop out...

-Shoots out from there...

She shoots out and then you rush over and get your male,

which has got the pollen in.

Just tickle him on the end and that'll be your new hybrid.

What is it you're after at the moment?

Well, I think the Holy Grail of breeding, really, is to get

a short, dark, late-flowering lavender

that still carries brilliant scent.

To be honest, whatever lavender you grow,

it's great for the garden, brilliant for the body and superb for the soul.

And once you've smelt a lavender,

you just simply have to grow it in your garden.

You do, yes.

We have to grow most of our lavender in pots here,

except in the dry garden.

And you can see that this one, although not a particularly

impressive example, is flowering nicely and doing perfectly OK.

And I wouldn't want to prune that at this point,

but this one here is a perfect example of being ready to prune.

Flowers have gone over, it's not yet setting seed.

You don't want to wait until the flowers have turned brown.

Just as soon as they are past their best, cut it back.

And you can cut as hard as you like as long as you leave

some new growth beneath the cutting point.

So, for example, you can see there is new growth here and here,

so I'd want to cut above that.

If you cut just down to bare wood, sometimes they don't regrow at all

and that is it, you lose them.

So, we'll just take that, cut into it,

and the idea is to establish a nice, compact shape without

any of that legginess that you often get on lavenders.

Right, that is now in a good state to put on a fresh flush of growth,

an inch or two more,

and that will provide a protective layer over winter

and then next spring, it will be ready to form its flower buds

coming out of a nice well-shaped shrub.

That's the pruning done,

but here are some other jobs you can do this weekend.

To preserve the health and fruiting vigour of your strawberry plants,

it's a good idea to renew them every few years.

The easiest way to do this is to propagate runners.

Choose the first plantlet on each runner

and peg it either into the soil or into a pot filled with compost

and the easiest way to peg it is with a piece of bent wire.

Leave it for about three to four weeks

and then you can cut it free from the parent and grow it on.

It's easy to forget that a buddleja is a shrub that can be pruned

to encourage repeat flowering just like any other.

As soon as the flowers are over, cut back to a side shoot

and this will encourage more flowers and therefore more butterflies

to come into your garden right through into autumn.

Tomatoes have grown well this summer,

but to speed up the ripening of the fruit,

take off all the leaves in the lower third of every plant

and this will let light in directly onto the fruits and it will

also improve ventilation and thus reduce the risk of tomato blight.

The rest of the garden is a busy place now.

It's changing, it's moving, it's growing...

But here in this long walk, it's calm. Very simple.

It's just box and Acanthus.

This is Acanthus spinosus and we do nothing to it, really,

all year we just wait for this moment when the Acanthus

comes into flower and they'll last for a month or so.

It's strong, simple and I think, really lovely.

And by the way,

all the Acanthus plants were grown from just a couple of plants

that we lifted from the Jewel Garden and took rooted cuttings from.

Well, that's it for this week.

Until next week, at the same time, bye-bye.