THE PROMISE OF A ROSE GARDEN
An abundance of roses and historic fruit trees brings old-fashioned charm to a cottage garden surrounding a fairytale thatched house
Historic fruit trees and roses abound in this country cottage garden
THE DETAILS
STYLE Rustic cottage garden, planted with old roses, flowering perennials, vegetables and fruit trees
SEASONS OF INTEREST From late May to June, when the roses are in bloom
SIZE ¾ of an acre (3,000 square metres)
SOIL Heavy clay
"It’s the time of the roses and everything is at its height – mellow, warm and full of fragrance.” This is how Michael Chalupka describes the garden he has created with his wife, Heidi, in Schleswig Holstein, north Germany, once June arrives. The couple’s painterly planting scheme, composed of more than a hundred rose varieties, interspersed with towering delphiniums, hollyhocks and campanulas, draws thousands of visitors every year, along with an abundance of bees, butterflies and other wildlife.
Dating back to 1756, the half-timbered thatched cottage and former smallholding owned by the Chalupkas is the inspiration behind the rustic garden design, which also includes productive vegetable beds and mature fruit trees. On a latitude similar to that of North Yorkshire, it stands on the edge of the village of Hestoft, just 40 miles from the Danish border, and close to the Schlei Fjord: a narrow inlet of the Baltic Sea, edged by fields and hills.
Michael and Heidi first came across the Hansel and Gretel- style property as a near-ruin, while holidaying in the area in 1993. At the time, they were living in Nord-rhine Westphalia, where Michael ran his own architectural practice, with Heidi working alongside him. “My wife fell in love with the house but I didn’t want it,” Michael admits. “I could see the structural damage that it had.” Nonetheless, they took on the project, relocating to Schleswig Holstein, and Michael – who specialised in the renovation of historic buildings using natural materials – undertook the seven-year restoration.
Back then, apart from a few fruit trees, there was no garden to speak of. “All there was around the house was wilderness, rubble and waste,” Michael says. But the east-facing parcel of land – amounting to three-quarters of an acre – had huge potential, so the Chalupkas gradually planned a fresh layout together, using the house as the anchor point.
The natural-looking plot is now sub-divided by a network of gravel paths that lead through the various borders. These are contained by low box hedging, while above them old apple trees (such as ‘Belle de Boskoop’, ‘Royal Jubilee’ and ‘Gravenstein’) provide
dappled shade. The seven or eight fruit trees that came with the house are more than a century old, say the Chalupkas, who planted 13 more as they developed the garden, among them varieties of pear, plum and cherry.
A key feature is, of course, the profusion of roses. “We have more than 120 varieties,” Michael says. “They are old roses (which have not been grafted) and are very robust.” As well as suiting the pastoral setting, the older varieties are able to withstand the climate, which is harsh by British standards, with February temperatures dipping as low as -20°F on occasion. By contrast, the summers have been extremely warm in recent years but, fortunately, the garden’s clay soil is relatively water-retentive.
Michael and Heidi care for the roses by feeding the roots with mycorrhizal fungi, which strengthens the plants, and by spraying the leaves with Biplantol (biolago.org) – a homeopathic treatment aimed at boosting their natural resistance to fungal diseases. “We don’t water too frequently,” Michael says. “Once a week, if necessary.” Among the interesting varieties grown here is the candy-striped Rosa ‘Ferdinand Pichard’, which works well alongside the red-and-white backdrop of the cottage. Michael and
Heidi also like to cultivate roses with open petals, such as the dark-pink Rosa rugosa, as they attract pollinating insects. The rambling roses ‘Bobbie James’ (white) and ‘Félicité Perpétue’ (creamy blush pink), along with spreading shrub roses such as ‘Raubritter’ with semi-double pink blooms, have been encouraged to climb trees and intertwine with fences, lending colour and heady scent to every corner.
These historic blooms are teamed with other cottage-garden staples – foxgloves, delphiniums, poppies and lysimachia – to create dense beds governed by nature. “It is not a controlled garden,” Michael says. The couple use homemade compost to enrich the soil, plus organic fertiliser with a high nitrogen content. The biodiversity of the garden is paramount, and so they deal with pests such as slugs by supporting their natural predators. These include Roman or edible snails, which feed on the slugs’ eggs (luckily, this species of snail eats dead rather than living plants), and also hedgehogs, for whom Michael makes shelters.
He has built small outhouses around the garden, too, in keeping with the period of the property. There is a bee house made out of clay bricks and oak beams, topped with a thatched roof, which can accommodate three bee colonies. And the henhouse, like an old-fashioned bleaching hut, is home to the Chalupkas’ Japanese Chabo chickens. Above the deep well in the garden – providing water for the plants in summer – Michael has fashioned a wooden winch mechanism, based on a Hungarian design.
More than 2,000 visitors annually come to experience the flower-filled enclave and also to see the small museum that Michael has established inside the cottage. Here, he displays his collection of old garden tools and curios, giving a sense of how life was lived on the smallholding in the past. The Chalupkas can delight in the outdoor space themselves, now that they are both retired. Living close to the land and creating a place of beauty has given them a sense of balance, the couple say. “You can set your spirit free here,” Michael confirms. “You’re surrounded by nature and you can dream.”
THIS PAGE, ABOVE LEFT The well provides water for the plants in summer. Michael built the winch mechanism on top using oak planks and tree branches, from which hangs a wooden bucket for drawing water ABOVE RIGHT The pink spreading shrub rose ‘Raubritter’ entwines itself around the picket fence OPPOSITE The thatched bee house is shaded by old fruit trees and colourful borders
– the lilac Campanula lactiflora and yellow dotted loosestrife ( Lysimachia punctata) lend a painterly feel
“You’re surrounded by nature and you can dream”