A brilliantly sunny February day found a healthy crowd of members gathered at Le Jardin de la Gare, hungry for advice on dealing with the problem areas we all have in our gardens.

Une journée de février brillamment ensoleillé a trouvé une foule de membres réunis au Jardin de la Gare, avides de conseils sur la façon de traiter les problèmes que nous avons tous dans nos jardins.

Christian Mistre of Pépinière La Soldanelle was an ideal choice of speaker on this ticklish topic, since he specialises in plants which will tolerate the fairly extreme conditions in his nursery, with 40°C summer temperatures falling to -8 or even -12°C in winter, not to mention the Mistral.

Christian Mistre de la Pépinière La Soldanelle était un choix idéal d’intervenant sur ce sujet difficile, puisqu’il se spécialise dans les plantes qui toléreront les conditions assez extrêmes de sa pépinière, avec des températures estivales de 40°C tombant à -8 voire -12°C en l’hiver, sans oublier le mistral.

Christian’s approach was to examine different difficult situations experienced by members, on the basis that understanding them would enable us to deal better with them. He explained that a plant has no option if it finds itself in a challenging spot – it can’t move (except by sending out seeds), and so must either adapt or perish. A plant’s ability to adapt is affected by numerous criteria, extremes of climate, soil types and so on, and Christian used photographs which many of us had sent to him to illustrate his themes.

L’approche de Christian était d’examiner différentes situations difficiles vécues par les membres, en partant du principe que leur compréhension nous permettrait de mieux les gérer. Il a expliqué qu’une plante n’a pas d’option si elle se trouve dans un endroit difficile – elle ne peut pas bouger (sauf en envoyant des graines) et doit donc s’adapter ou périr. La capacité d’adaptation d’une plante est affectée par de nombreux critères, des climats extrêmes, des types de sols, etc., et Christian a utilisé des photographies que beaucoup d’entre nous lui avaient envoyées pour illustrer ses thèmes.

Sandra Cooper has written this account of the talk.

Sandra Cooper a écrit ce compte rendu de la conférence.

Jocelyn welcomed a group of about 25 members to her garden and gave us a brief history of the two years that she has owned it. In early 2010 a group of MGS members surveyed the land and proposed possible designs.

The chosen plan included a continuous path around the garden and a paved terrace behind the house with a south-west facing, sloping bank with walls and steps down either side to the path.

A builder was employed to create the path and terrace and Jocelyn talked about the importance of good preparation. The path’s foundation was made with crushed rock gravel, then a layer of geo-textile and finally a covering of well-compacted fine gravel. The natural soil in the garden is heavy red clay over rock, so for the sloping bank linking the terrace and the main garden new lighter soil was brought in and mixed with river sand.

In October 2010 a group of branch members visited to put the plants in and at the time there was concern that the soil might wash away in heavy rain. However, it held firm and was subsequently mulched with medium (15/25) gravel. The clay soil appears to have been a fortunate choice as the bank needed to be watered only three times in 2011.

To the north-west of the path the land remains much as it was when Jocelyn arrived, with a mixture of local vegetation including Quercus ilex, Arbutus unedo and Viburnum tinus. The central area has had some trees planted in it, including a fig, an almond and an Acer monspessulanum. An Albizia julibrissin did not survive and was replaced by a quince.

The eastern edge of the garden has been developed with plants from the mountainous monsoon area of China: Rosa chinensis, buddleja and photinia. Although these plants can manage with very little water, they are watered twice a week in very dry weather in order to produce large flowers to delight the butterflies.

After lunch we walked through the garrigue to a magnificent viewpoint, en route passing several capitelles, drystone dwellings constructed in the 18th century.

There were fewer wild flowers than normal for this time of year, but we did see Cistus albidus, Iris lutescens subsp. lutescens (syn. Iris chamaeiris) and one member of the orchid family, the violet-coloured Limodorum abortivum.

This practical ‘hands on’ event was the second stage of our project, following the hugely enjoyable Garden Design Workshop led by Hilary Ivey in February 2010 at Jocelyn van Riemsdijk’s new home.

This time, thirteen enthusiastic members descended on Jocelyn’s garden armed with spades and trowels ready to implement the final design drawn up by Hilary. The area to be planted comprised a large south-facing semi-circular bank which falls away from a paved terrace to the rear of the house. The ground had already been well prepared and planting conditions, after some earlier rain, were perfect. A large Quercus ilex provides shade to much of the area.

Members organised themselves into teams (some rather competitive!), were provided with copies of the planting plan and began the task of setting out, then digging in, a superb range of over thirty different plants including varieties of artemisia, ballota, cistus, geraniums, helichrysum, lavenders, rosemary, irises, salvias, sisyrinchium and santolina – all very suitable for a water-wise garden and taking into account Jocelyn’s preference for aromatic and grey-leaved plants.

A typically generous lunch followed the hard work with almost everyone having discovered a new variety or planting combination to try in their own gardens. Above all, our host was delighted with the finished result.

Eighteen members gathered at Jocelyn van Riemsdijk’s new home for the first meeting of 2010. Our objective was to learn how to measure and draw up the layout of her plot of land, then to produce a plan which would act as a basis for a garden design.

Hilary Ivey, a member who is a qualified garden designer, talked us through the process and went through a check list of things to consider.

Jocelyn explained that the house had been built on what was an old forest and that she would like to retain the feel of the oak wood and garrigue with a natural garden, low in water usage and maintenance.

Hilary provided each of us with a large plan showing an outline of the house and perimeter fencing. As the sun appeared, out we went with tape measures and drawing pads, ‘triangulating’ the trees, and imagining steps, paths and planting. By the end of the afternoon we had come up with suggestions that were, we hoped, respectful of Jocelyn’s wishes and from which she will be able to select ideas for the layout of her garden and some of the plants that she might put in it.

Thank you, Hilary, for guiding us through a thoroughly interesting and enjoyable exercise, no mean feat in one short February day. We hope, in the autumn, to meet again for another ‘hands on’ day helping Jocelyn to plant.

On a hot day in early September we were privileged to spend a day in the company of Marc Nucera, renowned tree sculptor. With Marc as our guide, forty-five of us visited the private gardens of Mas Benoît and Mas de Michel, both close to Eygalières, in the foothills of the Alpilles, and his own experimental garden “Le Terrain” in nearby Noves.

Marc started his career as the student and disciple of the professor, sculptor and then garden designer and Land Art practitioner, Alain-David Idoux.  Although Idoux died tragically young, he left behind a legacy of ground-breaking design, including that of the beautiful Mas Benoît.

The garden surrounding this traditional Provençal farmhouse or mas lies on a low hill with the magnificent backdrop of the Alpilles in the distance. Lines of sight to the horizon are emphasised by the approach path of grasses and clipped cypresses in the foreground.

We admired Idoux’s spiral of field stones and almond trees in the meadow and the clipped cistuses, santolinas and rosemary planted under olive trees pruned by Marc.

The triangular field of lavender was breathtaking and the enchanting copse of Quercus ilex, delicately shaped by Marc, with its stone bench, created a defined space of calm and reflection.

Working with Idoux, Marc learned to adapt and formulate his own style, encouraged also by local garden designers and friends, including Dominique Lafourcade and the legendary Nicole de Vésian.

And so to Mas de Michel, where we saw Marc’s guiding principles in action: adaption to environmental constraints, respect for the subject and harmony of the ensemble. Armed only with a chainsaw (a paradoxical tool for such a calm, natural and Zen man), Marc set out to sculpt the trees – both living and dead – to effect the minimum intervention consistent with bringing out the best in the innate structure of the tree in front of him.

He adopted some simple strategies to open up the land around the mas to create a natural flow of space.

The entrance and driveway to the house were moved from the side of the house to the back and olive trees were re-sited into the middle distance to throw the eye towards the horizon, whilst at the same time becoming part of it. A border of pebbles was added around a terrace so that it became proportionate to and balanced the façade of the house behind: a simple and elegant device.

Gravel or stone platforms around the base of certain tree trunks subtly highlighted the carefully considered and tactical pruning. Other astonishing pruning of a box hedge produced breath-taking results.

Marc’s work encourages the visitor to look at the garden in new ways, literally. We enjoyed descending into a viewing pit sunk into the wild flower meadow to sit on seats at the same height as the adjoining soil surface, the better to appreciate being amongst the grasses and flowers.

Then we climbed up on to a simple viewing platform to look down on the old almond orchard, only to find our eyes being drawn towards the previously hidden view of the magnificent Mont Ventoux in the distance.

After a shared picnic lunch in Marc’s own experimental garden “Le Terrain” in nearby Noves, we marvelled at his sculptured hommages to Hans Arp, Constantin Brancusi and Louise Bourgeois and he explained to us what he was seeking to achieve with his work.

He “intervenes” with his trees to enhance them and to highlight their best features to enable them to be read more clearly within the landscape in which they are set.

Marc talked of his veneration and respect for all trees – not just living trees but those that are in the process of dying, or which are now dead. He has spent many years saving some of the centuries-old trees “les patriarches et les remarquables” of Provence.

But when these ancient trees have finally died, he has kept their hearts, literally. Taking wood from their core, he sculpts huge cubes, often into benches and chairs so you can sit within the very soul of a tree that took hundreds of years to grow.

To transform a dead tree into a work of art is a way of continuing its cycle. In giving it a new form, there is rebirth. Examples of Marc’s extraordinary and thought-provoking work in his own garden and at Mas Benoît, Mas de Michel, La Verrière, La Louve and other gardens in our area can be admired in his book “A l’écoute des arbres” with a foreword by Louisa Jones (published by Actes Sud). Tou can borrow this book from the MGF library.

It is not often that a garden visit enables us to contemplate our own mortality so vividly: this was a special day when we did so and it will not be forgotten by those who were there.