Go up in the world with a stylish vertical garden
IF YOU thought vertical gardening was simply having a few hanging baskets on your porch, it’s time to take a look above and beyond your usual common-or-garden schemes.
Vertical gardens are increasingly popular, and while many of the most stunning examples would be hard to recreate at home, the principle is well worth adopting in your own plot, especially if you’re tight on space.
Perhaps it’s fashion, a bid to attract clients or visitors, or maybe a sheer shortage of space in built-up areas, but lots of the world’s most stylish buildings are going green.
Whole buildings are clad from base to apex in foliage (such as the Athenaeum Hotel in London, opposite Royal Green Park).
It’s done by fixing slats to the walls and securing a special kind of felt, onto which plants root, all watered by an internal automatic irrigation system that also supplies liquid feeds.
The plants selected are suited to local climates and conditions and the green wall cladding provides a habitat for birds and insects, as well as acting as a natural air conditioner.
Roof gardens have also hit the news with the striking Sky Garden at one of London’s landmark buildings, 20 Fenchurch Street (better known as theWalkieTalkie because of its distinctive shape).
The garden resembles a high-altitude Eden Project, all ultra-modern design with glass and steel struts, and it has a huge open balcony on one side with amazing views over the capital.
Although this is a commercial building with space rented out to a range of companies, the garden itself is open to the public and free to visit, although only 400 can be admitted at one time so you have to book in advance.
If you have limited space, vertical gardening is a good way to make the best use of it. Grow climbers on trellis structures, train “pillar roses” to spiral round posts in the back of a border, or create a patchwork of vines over your pergola.
Plant borders in tiers and plant bulbs under low-ground cover plants and under shrubs and trees, with climbers growing up through their branches.
This packs in maximum colour, besides doubling or trebling your usable gardening space. Plant your walls, too. Use fan-trained espalier or cordon fruit trees to cover them, or grow wall shrubs (wall space is especially valuable for semi-tender shrubs that may not survive out in the open, since walls store warmth).
Plan showy vertical features too. Plant a dry-stone wall with rosette-shaped alpines growing on their sides in the gaps between stones, as they would grow naturally in the wild.
Alternatively, source the sort of hi-tech containers that interlock to form a honeycomb-style wall for your patio, or simply pack soil between a stack of logs to make a natural garden divider packed with plants.
Create a trellis structure and grow climbers over it – a fast way to screen off unsightly views.
To plant climbers up through trees dig a large planting hole some distance from the trunk, at the “drip line” round the edge of the leaf-canopy. Plant your climber there, and lead the stems up into the tree via ropes or a sloping pole so that the tree roots won’t compete with the new plant for food and water.
You can also plant climbers or wall-trained trees and shrubs against walls. Dig out existing soil along the base of the wall, then replace it with good topsoil mixed with well-rotted compost.
Put in an irrigation system if you want to grow fruit or exotic plants against a south-facing wall (this will combat dryness caused by the foundations soaking up moisture and the “rain shadow” of the wall).
In confined spaces, use half baskets fixed to bare walls in narrow alleyways or on outbuildings, to create planting pockets in wasted spaces.