Jottings in the lilac bed

Well at long last I have a plan: a nascent one. But it is at least something to aim for. I have gone for lots of grasses. The anemanthele (stipa arundinacea) are sitting on the terrace here as I type – sparkling in the low London sun. I bought three of them at the RHS London Halls on Tuesday. And thus the endless transporting of plants across the Channel is set to continue.

I have decided to call this the Lilac bed rather than the Deutsia one as we just don’t know how long the wretched shrub (some call it Mock Orange) will be there. It has one main feature – it’s scent. And guess which happens to be the only example of a Mock Orange tree that has absolutely no perfume in spring whatsoever? Yep, ours. It puts on mighty amounts of growth and his rather dull. And shades the rest of this bed. The previous owner, Ine, tried to plant lavender under this thuggy beast. And the poor plants were leaning way out of their comfort zone and barely surviving. So after this year’s pruning, I think the shrub can have another year of grace and we shall see.

And at long last I can offer you the scaled drawing of the garden and houses on one single image: that didn’t take too long to post now. Just promised from weeks back.

This afternoon if all goes well (and I really should be baking mince pies and making Russian Tea Cakes) I will start to try the hardest of all the garden schemes : the big shade garden up near the potting shed. Eek.