Nature-friendly gardens

For years I've taught garden design to mature students. We have a module on edible gardens - how and where to grow fruit and vegetables, and a module on how to work with nature. We take a field trip to a local garden centre and then to a supermarket, to see what is considered 'essential supplies' for the home gardener. It is illuminating.

The biggest product range is generally related to pest control. The second is devoted to improving the soil. Both of these 'problems' can be avoided with some simple changes in attitude and practice. As attitudes are generally hardest to shift we will look at them first. How we use local materials to create beautiful gardens is a creative challenge that as a design consultancy we respond to on a daily basis.

Many home gardeners want perfection. They want prize blooms, record sized produce and not a blemish on their carefully managed landscape. When we walk slowly into a natural environment, or even a local park, we will see that nature is not perfect. It aims for balance. Some bugs get to eat some plants. Some predators get to eat some bugs. We get to see the big picture, which is about nature working towards a balanced state of equilibrium.

When students say to me that they aspire to a perfect lawn, with no 'nasty worm casts' I assure them that without the worms their grass will require more and more inputs to achieve the same level of greenness, the same level of growth and resistance to drought. When you poison a worm you poison the soil. With companion planting you can boost the vigour of your chosen plants, fertilise your soil, and keep pesky bugs at bay.

We need to design our gardens and then develop and manage them in a nature-friendly way. Eco-friendly gardens are not a fad. With climate change and a global financial situation requiring us to be aware of inputs and outputs in a way we haven't considered for hundreds of years, we must change our attitudes towards nature.

In practice it means we have to let go a little, and allow ourselves to work with nature. Instead of laying poison, if we encourage natural predators into our gardens they will provide the balance for us. Nature friendly gardens are an art and a science. Greenstone Design's research team are constantly looking at new ways of developing healing gardens that are nature friendly, revitalising house and garden design to make the most of the local natural environment.

Eco garden design is design that makes a difference to the triple bottom line, to human health and well-being and hence to society, to the local economy and to the environment. We do that in an ethical way. It's what makes us a bit different.

Sustainble living and going green

With the new office open in Wellington New Zealand, House and Garden Design, as a division of Greenstone Design UK Ltd, is rethinking 'going green'. In New Zealand native planting has been trendy for some years. People choose natives not for their green credential so much as their easy care, low maintenance, good looks. This is true of native planting wherever you live.

Sustainable living is all about living more lightly on the earth. We need to use fewer resources if we are to manage a One Planet Living lifestyle in our lifetimes. This means that we need to choose how we design our homes and gardens carefully. Locally sourced materials, local labour, native planting suitable to our soil and climate all make a difference.

When we go green we need less fertiliser, less watering, less additives, less effort from us as the plants like the soil we have, as it is. An annual mulch of home-grown compost will provide all the additional nutrients the soil needs to stay healthy.

This is not to say that all exotic plants are bad, or that we must not water our gardens. The trick, as with all things, is to find the right balance. House and Garden Design.com explores the benefits of balance in our lives, and the potential for our homes and gardens to nuture us more fully.