“Would you like to open your garden to the public next spring?” How does that question make you feel? Shocked… surprised … flattered … terrified … all of these?

It is a rite of passage for a gardener. Opening your garden means exposing a part of your personality, your true self, as expressed through your garden. But it can be an enriching experience too, and an opportunity to share your passion with like-minded souls.

For me the anticipation of visitors to my garden is rather more stressful than sitting A levels and taking a driving test – simultaneously. The panic starts to set in the previous autumn: “Oh no, only six months and they will be HERE”.

But as the last few stragglers disappear down the drive, I always feel uplifted from having shared the garden – for better or worse – with fellow gardeners. So here are some thoughts on making your Garden Opening less of a trauma.

I won’t offer any advice on the garden itself: yours is bound to be perfect, I am sure. Even if it isn’t then that in itself is a talking point. One of the most memorable visits I have made was where the owner confided in us that they had seen no rain for more than a year and had suffered an extremely hard frost at Easter which had destroyed many plants. We not only commiserated but shared our thoughts on survival tactics and suitable re-planting.

Now before you say “But my garden is too small / ordinary / weedy” and stop reading, do remember how much we all enjoy seeing gardens belonging to “real” people. Grand parks with scores of staff are nothing like so fascinating. Visits need not be a one-off: a group returning after three years pointed out to me how much the garden had developed and matured which I hadn’t really noticed.

Phone a Friend
A visit cannot be managed single handed. Whilst you are guiding the group round the garden there will always be one person who wants to go to the loo / take an aspirin / sit down with their bad leg. Your Friend can handle all this. The Friend can also take photos of the group; hand round cake and act as sheep dog to round up the group when the time comes to leave.

The Friend needs to be able to answer basic questions like: When did you move here and from where; Do you have help; Who made the cake because it really is yummy?

The Friend will be invaluable in an emergency: once when a large bus couldn’t make it to the house – even though I had warned them the lane was very narrow – it parked at bottom of the hill and then I and my Friend spent half an hour ferrying them up in our cars.

Seize the day
By far the safest option is to be the first appointment in the day: delays will build up as the day goes on and it can be really infuriating. One group was nearly 2 hours late arriving in the afternoon: one person got lost after lunch and a search party combed the small town. Meanwhile I – and the Friend – were stuck there waiting. I could have spent that time weeding, or having my hair done, or taking a power nap.

The Name of the Rose
You know the names of all your plants, don’t you? Of course you do. Until someone asks you what that common-or-garden shrub in the hedge is called… It’s worth drawing up a crib sheet. I have not gone as far as putting labels on the plants, but after I have repeated “Paul’s Himalayan Musk” for the umpteenth time I start to think perhaps I should.

Let them eat cake
No garden visit is complete without cake. Buy the cake, don’t waste time making it; whether you own up to this is then a matter for your conscience. Stick to cold drinks only and don’t bother with plates – paper napkins are fine. Do provide plenty of seating for people to rest their tired feet.

Open house too?
People seem to like to get to know the gardener inside out. This often means their house too: decide in advance how you want to deal with this. I am embarrassed to report that at a famous garden in Tuscany, the Marchioness found a swarm of visitors inspecting her bedroom. She dispatched them politely but firmly. Another gardener tells me she found all her visitors in the kitchen reading her cookery books. Bizarre.

The nitty gritty
What is the biggest group you can manage? More than about 20 and it is difficult to talk to everyone at once.

Will you charge a fee? Only to cover out of pocket expenses – cakes – of course. I know that you will not doing this for the money, but it does make a bargain between you and the visitors. This means that you feel obliged to carry on even if it’s not convenient. One group who I agreed to host with no fee then failed to show up and their leader wouldn’t even answer her phone. Grrr.

Nonna’s seeds
The visitors start to trickle away, brimming with compliments and thanks. Have we rounded everyone up? Oh no, there is still one lady over there. She steps forward and presses a small parcel into my hands. It is some seeds from a rare plant that her grandmother grew and she wants me to have some. How touching. This thoughtful gesture makes it all worthwhile.

Come back soon – and I mean it.

Le Jardin Champêtre, owned by MGF members Imogen Checketts and Kate Dumbleton, is a new plant nursery and garden in the village of Caunes-Minervois in the Aude department.

Imogen and Kate plan to give us updates from time to time on the garden’s progress.

Le Jardin Champêtre, dont les propriétaires sont Imogen Checketts et Kate Dumbleton, membres de la MGF, est un nouveau jardin-pépinière situé dans le village de Caunes-Minervois dans l’Aude.

Imogen et Kate ont l’intention de nous donner de temps en temps des nouvelles sur la progression du jardin.

Two members, Catriona McLean and Duncan Munford, came up with an interesting idea when lunching after a visit to Olivier Filippi’s garden near Mèze in May 2011. They decided that this garden would be perfect for the ‘Garden Diary’ concept that was suggested at our last annual meeting. After discussing the idea with Olivier they visited the garden in mid August for a tour and to take photographs. The result is here – an occasional diary in words and pictures, starting with a view of the garden at the hottest and driest time of year.

Deux membres, Catriona McLean et Duncan Munford, ont eu une idée intéressante lors d’un déjeuner qui a suivi une visite au jardin d’Olivier Filippi près de Mèze, en mai 2011. Ils ont décidé que ce jardin se prêterait parfaitement à la formule ‘Journal d’un jardin’ qui avait été suggérée lors de notre dernière réunion annuelle. Après en avoir parlé avec Olivier, ils ont visité le jardin à la mi-août pour l’observer et prendre des photographies. Le résultat est présenté ici, sous forme de journal épisodique en mots et en images, qui commence par une vue du jardin au moment le plus chaud et le plus sec de l’année.

With a gardening autobiography starting in chilly rain sodden Glasgow, followed by moist and mellow London, the culture shock of a Roussillon garden in France on the Mediterranean coast was an intriguing challenge.

At 42°N 30’ with 300 days a year of sun, relatively low rainfall, and only occasional brief frosts, it was, as I discovered, ideally suited to many Australian and Mexican plants, so I had a new template from which to paint a garden. The main section of the garden faced south, the front north and the dry garden east. The soil was acidic, extremely stony, turning to dust in summer.

My initial design response was sheer panic at the haphazard weed and tree strewn main area, with not one piece on a level with anything else. It sloped up, down, sideways, wherever you looked. Alan Titchmarsh may start with a carefully considered overall design on paper but for us lesser mortals it’s about exerting control over ten square feet at a time and praying all the bits will pull together somehow at the end of five years.

Lavender – of unknown variety since French and Spanish nurseries don’t fuss too much with detail – was planted in an oblong around plastic sheeting covered with volcanic ash with an elegantly sparse Eriobotrya japonica (neflier) and a nectarine tree inside.

So initially there was one area of sanity in a wilderness of ferociously relentless weeds which sprouted, spread their seeds and subsided only to hand the baton onto their eager brethren-in-waiting. Mimosas sneakily thrust their subterranean roots everywhere. Lavateras popped up beside seedling pines.

I’m no great distinguisher between weeds and cultivars. If it’s pretty, it can stay. The ribwort plantain (Plantago lanceolata) made an elegant statement solo, with its seed heads standing proud, until I discovered it was followed by several hundred of the same ilk. If you spied it at Chelsea in one of the competition gardens and were tempted, be warned. The wild geraniums and field marigolds were cute, but likewise too much of a good thing and had to go. Umbilicus rupestris stays since its spiky pink flowers brighten the spring then fade to nothing. And I hadn’t the heart to remove the friendly wild violets which the previous owner bequeathed to me in quantity. They bounced in like a pet that knows it is adored and won’t be rejected, flower happily, were pulled up as they faded and reappeared the next year.

Several large mimosa trees were cut down much to the neighbour’s relief since the seeds clogged his swimming pool filter. Sixteen parasol pine trees were despatched in an afternoon by my first helper, an excitable Frenchman with a serious coke habit. In a hyper-manic fit he also mistakenly turned his chain saw on a giant grey aloe blocking the drive way. Despite their health giving name the juice causes an allergic reaction on the skin. He was covered in hives.

Like most ex-pats I arrived with memories of dainty snowdrops and bluebells, blousy clematis, busy lizzies and green swathes of grass which were too comforting to let go. Some were tried on the unyielding terrain, all summarily despatched by months of scorching summer sun. Gradually I tossed out all my old ideas and learned to love euphorbias and succulents, neither of which had been favourites before. In this climate you develop a more than healthy respect for the indigenous plants such as the vines which stay green on the parched hillsides with no rain for five months. Ditto Euphorbia characias, deemed ‘exotique’ in England but growing wild beside the mountain road to Spain, a splash of grey-green where you think nothing could survive.

I also arrived with spade, fork, hoe and trowel. The soil, standard vineyard dust and rubble with mountain rock close to the surface, was entirely spade resistant, so they all had to be tossed away in favour of a blacksmith crafted heavy iron ‘shadyk’ pickaxe which serves as hoe, hole digger, tree chopper, rock splitter – a veritable snake oil of an implement. There’s nothing it can’t cure.

One third of the garden facing south was drip-watered so there I had some latitude with plant choices, though the David Austin pale cream roses, so suited to soft English landscape, just looked wrong in the harsher Mediterranean light. Plus they acquired rust, black spot and their heads drooped.

Luckily I have been well taught that the first prerequisite for a gardener is ruthlessness, so they went and were replaced by pest-resistant white carpet roses, Rosa ‘Snow Princess’ and Artemisia arborescens ‘Porquerolles’, small fluffy balls of grey.

The great successes were the climbers on the west wall including the Australian Hardenbergia violacea with its reams of purple legume flowers from January to March just when you need a lift. The brilliant pink Passiflora jamesonii exasperated my Scottish soul when it produced one flower the first year but having discovered that it thrived when fed, it then festooned itself for a good twenty yards from a burgeoning tree-like base and flowered almost twelve months of the year.

The Abutilon megapotanicum with its small yellow and red flowers also did its duty colour-wise all year round. The best climbing rose was the Meilland Rosa ‘Pierre de Ronsard’, with its luminous deep pink centres fading to cream border petals. If fed it flowered all summer.

The ornamental strawberries were undoubtedly a mistake since they galloped away, but ground cover was essential and they certainly do that. Aptenia cordifolia (succulent with tiny red/purple flowers) was also a useful ground cover if you remember to clear its dead undergrowth to keep the snails down and hack it back to the root every four years to tidy it up. The purple trailing Lantana montevidensis (such an improvement on the orange/red lantana of village tubs) blooms profusely in an exuberant swathe ten months a year beside the red, winter-flowering prostrate Grevillea lanigera ‘Mount Tamboritha’.

In summer the white Gaura lindheimeri and Pennisetum orientales grass add a dash of white. The other heart-warmer was a small field of golden Stipa tenuissima at the far corner, which was my tranquillity spot. I would sit on a shady stone bench, watching its silky tops waft gently in the breeze and sometimes wave violently, yanked by the cats playing tigers in the savannah in its undergrowth.

The blue Plumbago auriculata flourished profusely, helped by a coastal situation, giving mid-summer to late autumn colour, growing up walls, trees and in one huge freestanding bush.

The bird of paradise Caesalpinia gilliesii, a small exotic tree, also splashed up the colour scheme. But the pink-flowered Lagerstroemia indica (Cape Myrtle) was a definite mistake beside the blue plumbago – too Barbara Cartland.

Gardening to me is about having fun, experimenting and not always listening to the know-it-alls who tell you it won’t work. Asking around about methods of disguising the ugly Mediterranean pines, with their bald feet and scraggy midriffs whose tops provide a necessary wind shield round the garden, everyone said nothing grows under pines. Well it took time, and it does have leaky hose watering, but you can grow plumbago, solanum, honeysuckle, jasmine and wild wisteria beside and up pines. Though don’t try climbers on your leylandii since it kills off any foliage which is covered.

The other necessity was grass replacements since what is a garden without an oasis of flat green? Dichondra repens (tiny flat green leaves) grew wild here, takes light walking, likes a touch of shade and water but seems to survive without either if necessary – and best of all it keeps the wild oxalis at bay. Not completely, since life is never perfect, but it’s certainly a huge improvement on the Phyla nodiflora which I planted extensively in the open in full sun. Phyla is deciduous in cold winters, grows weeds like crazy between its bare roots and I discovered too late it is only 3.5 on Filippi’s scale of drought resistance – which means not very. Hint on phyla – if you get bored, as I did, with its early struggles and ladle on the grass feed, it responds with great delight, shoots up and gets too leggy.

I also experimented in the walkable-but-not-grass category with Frankenia leavis (rather too sombre green foliage, tiny pink flowers) and Achillea millefolium (somewhat messy, grey leaf, yellow flowers).

In the front square of the garden, north-west facing, old vineyard steps were planted with a long top row of Rosmarinus ‘Punta Canelle’ (tumbling deep blue, no water, no feeding, blissfully robust); Pennisetum villosum (fluffy white seed heads, appreciates some water) around an almond tree in the middle. There was supposed to be a carpet of lavender below but the less said about that the better since I gave up after the third planting.

Lavender is not the easy option it sounds, being devilishly temperamental and even when it survives getting leggy and scraggy underneath. I have a theory about gardeners, that some plants like them and will grow delightedly no matter how they are treated, while other plants have a personal antipathy and even placed in the perfect milieu will just turn their toes up out of spite. Lavender and I have parted company and won’t be reconciling anytime soon.

The bordering pines were camouflaged with bamboo, a mistake I won’t repeat since their water requirements initially are not eco-friendly.

A shady nook to the side became a small Japanese-style garden, a nonsensical idea in this climate, but some of the indoor azaleas survived outside beside the claret-leafed Loropetalum chinense var. rubrum ‘Fire Dance’, the dichondra was content and the camellia hedge did grow though impossibly slowly. Nearby the Trachelospermum wilsonii made an excellent ground cover for an awkward bare patch, an idea from New Zealand, flowering fragrant white into summer, with reddening leaves over winter. The water barrels grew water lilies along with mosquito larvae munching Gambusia affinis fish.

The two terraces around the house with long raised beds started out with bedding plants, until I became tired of the fuss and expense of twice yearly switches. So instead of the riotous petunias, portulucas and dipladenias which appeal to my somewhat vulgar need for flashy colour, I was persuaded by my second garden helper, Vincent, an inspirational gardener with quieter tastes than mine, into an elegant line of bright green Pittosporum nanum balls interspersed with the grey leaved, white flowering Convolulus cneorum.

I wouldn’t have chosen it but it is a triumph. The dark green, tiny-leafed Muehlenbeckia complexa (maiden hair vine) also makes an interesting interweave with the variegated Trachelospermum jasminoides ‘Variegatum’, carpeting up a wall.

The two front triangles on either side of the main drive were a headache since they took the full brunt of the Tramontane wind which howled at positively North Atlantic pitch for days on end, had even worse soil and more mountain surfacing than elsewhere, and were edged as per usual, though not protected, by pine trees.

Feng shui, however, dictates that the entrance is of prime importance. Eventually Garry the stone was summoned, an ex-busker from Reading, who learned his new craft in the vineyards. He gave structure to the steeply sloping triangles with meticulously built small vineyard walls constructed round the protruding chunks of bare mountain rock à la Andy Goldsworthy. The local rock is grey schist which most often arrives helpfully flat from striated layers.

Eventually, after much dithering, blue was selected as the plant colour of choice to make a statement against the hard stony landscape. The pale blue Agave victoriae reginae sat star-shaped in a row above fluffy blue Festuca glauca grasses and eye-catching Euphorbia myrsinites with a line below of slender-stemmed bright blue Helictotrichon sempervirens (Kentucky Blue Grass). Across the drive in another triangle a mass of delicious blue Senecio mandraliscae (aka Kleinia repens) glowed like iridescent seaweed. The large leafed red and blue succulent Kalanchoe thyrsiflora gave a pleasing contrast to the blue hues, their rounded form softening down the aggressively spiked agaves, though they did sag badly with heavy frost.

The final third of the garden to be tackled was essentially a wild olive grove which hosted a riot of wild flowers in spring until the wheat grass smothered them, turning into a brown eyesore after the mandatory summer strimming for fire risk. It faced east, so got sun in the very early morning or late afternoon, ideal for succulents which dislike sitting all day in the baking sun.

The cactuses left by the previous owner dotted around willy-nilly in the main garden were the first to be despatched to the wild garden en masse, initially more for health and safety than aesthetic reasons since I nursed many swollen fingers embedded with fine cactus spikes which caught me unawares. But once congregated in a group surrounded by chunks of schist they looked more meaningful.

The wild garden slowly graduated towards being a dry garden with cactus, agaves, aloes and succulents in the lower half, and a Filippi-style ‘sans arrosage’ on the level above.

Bulbs went in with varying success. The undoubted winner was the brilliant Chinese-yellow, crocus-shaped Sternbergia lutea which popped up out of parched soil for autumn cheer.

The deep blue Scilla peruviana just about held its own as did the massive white leucojums, though bulbs don’t seem to multiply here as they do back in the UK. The small, pale blue, star-shaped Ipheieon uniflorum were the ones which seemed most at home and happy to spread. I still hadn’t lost old habits so daffodils went in by the sackful.

Spring isn’t spring without a splash of yellow trumpet heads. And yet and yet. They do look extremely odd beside the red flowering aloes, agaves and Cotyledon macrantha. The white narcissus are fine, but daffodils look out of place, in the wrong genre. And since they also come out beside the early flowering white daisy, Rhodanthemum hosmariense, they look completely out of season.

In the dry, unmulched garden the successes were the Bulbine frutescens, the orange variety flowering in spring and autumn, and the yellow, spring-flowering only.

The cistus in various varieties were glorious for their ten day show but I never found a match for my London cistus that flowered for a solid ten months every year. The purple bulbous-rooted Tulbaghia violacae were more constant through the summer.

The Euphorbia ceratocarpa and the ferny Euphorbia cyparissias with bright green foliage and lime green flowers thrived and expanded.

Similarly, the ‘big grass’ Ampelodesmos mauritanicus which grows one metre of foliage plus two metre-high flowers for a more elegant look than pampas grass.

Tanacetum densum, with its grey foliage, stretched itself out alongside the cineraria, as did several of the low growing teucrium. The best of these was Teucrium ackermanii which flowers purple in spring, then retains its leaves as others go into deciduous summer hibernation. The crassula family, which is vast, provided several stalwarts including the pink flowering Crassula multicava which grows in dry shade and under pines even in heavy drought.

The absolute gold medal winner was the Convolvulus cneorum, dove grey leaves and white flowers, which provided a soft contrast to the sharp edged agaves and aloes. It loathes water as I discovered, initially having disregarded advice and reduced one plant to black mould.

What I found in the dry garden was if I could hold my nerve in the first year and barely water at all, then the plants thrived. OK, there were losses but the ones that kept going were in better shape thereafter than ones which had been mollycoddled through the initial stages. Leave well alone and the fittest survive.

In amongst the cultivars in spring the wild alliums rocketed up from nowhere after the soil had been turned over for the first time, probably, ever. The purple wild sweet peas were a delight, wrapping themselves round the irises. The wild lavender and helichrysum revived every spring. The wild scabious barely broke stride at the summer strimming to continue flowering till the cold came.

The gardening climate in coastal Roussillon at 42°N 30’, almost frost free and low in rainfall was admittedly luckier than I knew. Having since moved to the Var, a degree further north and 10 kilometres from the sea, I am facing a whole new learning curve.

Plumbago barely over-winters here, nor does the Lantana montividensis. Crassulas loathe the wetter winters as do some of the agaves.

But as Olivier Filippi always says when plants die – “it’s an opportunity.” New plants to explore. Years of happy experimentation ahead to see what thrives.

We normally visit the Chaumont festival every other year, as not only are the show gardens a talking point but we also enjoy the land art and sculptures exhibited within the grounds and the art within parts of the chateau. The theme for the 28th festival, Paradise Gardens, interested us particularly.

Nous nous nous rendons habituellement au festival de Chaumont une année sur deux, car non seulement les créations paysagères sont des sujets de discussion, mais nous apprécions également le land art et les sculptures exposées dans les jardins ainsi que les œuvres d’art montrées dans certaines parties du château. Le thème du 28e festival, « Jardins de Paradis », nous a particulièrement intéressées.

I had assisted students from the University of Greenwich on a show garden four years ago, so not only did I realise how tight the 11,000-euro budget was, but also the potential and constrictions of the build which would take place over two months, from February to April. The planting has to look ‘verdant’ from day one and continue, with seasonal changes, until November. The in-house maintenance team gave us good advice on the climate and soil conditions in this part of the Loire valley.

Il y a quatre ans, j’avais aidé des étudiants de l’Université de Greenwich pour un jardin d’exposition. Je me suis ainsi rendu compte à quel point le budget de 11 000 euros était serré, mais j’ai aussi réalisé à la fois le potentiel et les contraintes de la création qui se déroulerait sur deux mois, de février à avril. L’installation paysagère devait avoir un aspect «verdoyant» dès le premier jour et durer, avec les changements de saison, jusqu’en novembre. L’équipe de maintenance interne nous a donné de bons conseils sur les conditions de climat et de sol dans cette partie de la vallée de la Loire.

Following our application (Anny’s visual formed the centre piece), we heard nothing for a long time.

À la suite de notre demande (dont le visuel d’Anny a été la pièce maîtresse), nous n’avons plus entendu parler de rien pendant longtemps

However, when we got the nod, work began in earnest, including the creation of a more detailed set of drawings, sourcing a sound consultant who assisted with technicalities such as advising on the amplifiers and loudspeakers which were to be housed in the surrounding hedging, and sourcing a willow worker, Blaise Cayol, who works from Tavel in the Gard for the screen and the nests which were to be hung in the 14 crab apple trees, Malus ‘Evereste’. Plants were to be sourced via the Domaine de Chaumont-sur-Loire and were mostly of good quality but a few, less so. The main contractor was local and efficient – thank you Julien Bourdin. We made three visits of about four days each during the build with final planting taking place in the second week of April. A frost followed us across the Loire…

Cependant, lorsque nous avons reçu le feu vert, les travaux ont commencé sérieusement, notamment la production d’une série de dessins plus détaillés, ce qui a permis de faire intervenir un consultant expérimenté qui a apporté son aide pour des détails techniques, tels que des conseils sur les amplificateurs et les haut-parleurs qui devaient être placés dans la couverture et trouver un vannier, Blaise Cayol, qui travaille à Tavel dans le Gard, pour le paravent et les nids qui devaient être suspendus dans les 14 pommiers Evereste, Malus perpetu «Evereste». Les plantes devaient provenir du Domaine de Chaumont-sur-Loire et étaient pour la plupart de bonne qualité sauf quelques-unes. L’entrepreneur principal était local et efficace – merci Julien Bourdin. Nous avons effectué trois visites d’environ quatre jours chacune pendant la construction et les dernières plantations ont été faites la deuxième semaine d’avril. Un froid glacial nous a accompagnées…

Once the garden was complete and open to the public on April 25th, the maintenance team took control. It was good to see and hear the public’s response, especially to the sound element within the garden. This was particularly interesting when we observed visits from school groups during May and July.

Une fois le jardin terminé et ouvert au public le 25 avril, l’équipe de maintenance en a pris le contrôle. Il était réjouissant de voir et d’entendre les réactions du public, en particulier pour l’élément sonore dans le jardin. Cela a été particulièrement intéressant lorsque nous avons observé les visites de groupes scolaires en mai et juillet.

I would have liked to have ‘finessed’ the planting early on, as all the digitalis disappeared and the substituted roses were very disappointing – but that was a no-no.

J’aurais bien voulu ‘affiner’ la plantation précocement, car toutes les digitales ont disparu et les roses de substitution ont été très décevantes – mais ça a été un non-non.

All in all, we are happy with the result, so much so that we are preparing a proposal for the Jardins de la paix, to be constructed in 2020 on the site near Cambrai that houses the tank museum.

Au final, nous sommes satisfaits du résultat, à tel point que nous préparons une proposition pour les Jardins de la paix, qui seront construits en 2020 sur le site près de Cambrai qui abrite le musée Cambrai Tank 1917.

Le Jardin qui chante invites us into the Persan Pairidaeza of the Koran: in the shade of the fruit trees, the melodious birdsong reminds us of a time of harmony between humans and nature.

Le Jardin qui chante nous invite dans le Pairidaëza persan du Coran : à l’ombre des arbres fruitiers, le chant mélodieux des oiseaux nous remémore une époque d’harmonie entre les hommes et la nature.

Behind a willow screen lies an orchard providing refreshing cool air and a pleasant place to rest, lying on cushions, looking up at the sky through the foliage and observing the nests of exotic birds in the branches. On the ground, the protective wicker sanctuary echoes these cosy shelters. Young and old alike will be struck by the magic.

Derrière un épais rideau végétal, se dévoile un verger dans la fraîcheur duquel il fait bon se reposer, allongé sur des coussins, regardant le ciel à travers les feuillages et observant dans les branches les nids d’oiseaux exotiques. Au sol, un écrin d’osier protecteur fait écho à ces abris douillets. La magie opère pour les enfants comme pour les adultes.

Le Jardin qui chante questions our perception of nature and the enclosed space. The use of sound evokes the fragile but resilient nature of the natural world. The sound will get louder and stop, reminding us that the impact humans have on the world we share can be destructive to other life forms.

Le Jardin qui chante nous interroge sur notre perception de la nature et de l’espace clos. L’utilisation du son évoque le caractère fragile, mais résilient du monde naturel. Le son va croître et s’éteindre, nous rappelant que l’impact humain sur le monde que nous partageons peut-être destructeur pour d’autres formes de vie.

The planted areas are inspired by four mythical rivers containing milk, honey, wine and water. The use of recycled materials will subtly highlight the environmental challenges we are currently facing. It is about creating a peaceful place while addressing important issues linked to cultivated and wild spaces.

Les zones plantées sont inspirées par quatre fleuves mythiques dans lesquels coulent le lait, le miel, le vin et l’eau. L’usage de matériaux recyclés pointe subtilement les difficultés écologiques auxquelles nous sommes aujourd’hui confrontés. Il s’agit de créer un lieu de paix tout en abordant les questions importantes liées aux espaces cultivés et sauvages.