Garden of the Week

A keen organic gardener has created a plant and wildlife haven within a mile of Edinburgh’s city centre

April in Esther Mendelssohn’s garden is alive with activity. Birds are busy nest building, there’s frogspawn in the ponds, bees are buzzing around beehives, the trees are heavy with pink and white blossom, foliage is unfurling and primroses and cowslips add delicate strokes of colour. This plant-packed walled garden, just a mile from Edinburgh’s city centre, has been gardened organically for 30 years and it’s a haven for wildlife with a tapestry of habitats created in a relatively small space. “When it comes to plants, I’m in favour of ‘good do-ers’ rather than weird and wonderful ones,” says Esther. “For me, they’re the backbone of any garden.”

The sheltered, square-shaped plot includes numerous trees, with a small orchard of apples, pears, plums, quinces, medlars and a black mulberry. Esther is enthusiastic about reliable evergreens, including yew, holly, bay and box, and even conifers. “There’s no such thing as a bad tree in my view,” she says.

When she moved in, the garden had potential, but it was badly laid out. “There was a 9m (30ft) high

mixed hedge that cut across the garden about 6m (20ft) from the back of the house and it made the garden look half the size it really is,” says Esther. “There was also a beautiful greenhouse but it was in completely the wrong place, just outside the kitchen window. We reconstructed the base and managed to move it into a more appropriate spot.” She took things slowly at first. “When you inherit a garden, I think it’s best to let it be and see what happens, even if it doesn’t look promising,” she says. Esther didn’t formally plan the garden on paper, but she did have a wish list. “I wanted water, and I now have a total of four ponds, some formal and some not so.” One