A promise yet to be fulfilled [03/24]

I’m Nathan Langley and this is A promise yet to be fulfilled, a seasonal weekly newsletter on my garden developments at home in Sudbury, Ontario!

More cold and lots of rain this past week — a great excuse to continue planning the new garden inside. I took the base plan I made last week and began reshaping the space.

To start, I made note of the three requirements I have for the space:

1. keep a semi-open barrier along the forest edge to maintain sight lines (no one likes a black bear sneaking up on you)
2. maintain a solid visual barrier along the N / NE edge to block views into the neighbouring property
3. move the existing fire pit into a more enjoyable and less dangerous place (it’s currently situated under a spruce tree)

With those reminders down on paper, I began blobbing out different spaces throughout the backyard. My first pass didn’t change too much apart from increasing the size of the existing garden beds and removing some of the turf. In my experience, this is a typical course of action clients want to achieve — more gardens and less grass to mow.

But this approach isn’t perfect. While it increases the enjoyment from the primary viewpoint inside the house (pink quarter circles), it does little to add interesting perspectives from anywhere else. The driveway continues to have a clear view of the backyard (and the now moved fire pit), while the bridge over the pond really doesn’t have much of a purpose besides staring at it. It doesn’t go anywhere, and it doesn’t provide any interest or surprise.

When I work with a space this size, I want to entice people out into the garden to explore and wander. The last thing I want is to give everything away from one viewpoint or have people walk aimlessly because, if the garden is set up that way, people just stop moving through the space entirely at some point. I can do better.

My second pass at shaping the garden fixes a lot of these issues. The existing garden around the pond doesn’t change too much (it’s a little bigger), but the surrounding pathways, and the garden on the north side of the fire pit are all placed with purpose.

This time there is a loop to stroll around the pond garden and into the fire pit area. In addition, as you move through the space, each perspective terminates looking at a garden bed. There are hints from various points that pull you into the space (ex: looking from the driveway into the backyard, you can see the edge of the fire pit area). And more importantly, no one viewpoint can see everything. There is surprise and intrigue. Perfect!

What do you think? The next step in my design process is to create a plant wish list for the space. It won’t be exhaustive, and I will likely cut a bunch from the list as I go, but it will help bring some clarity to the fuzzy picture I have in my head.

Expect lots of plant pictures and mood boards next week!

n

The Video: