AIMING HIGH A small idea that grew and grew
Ping Ng supplies top chefs with culinary herbs grown on his tiny rooftop garden plot. Mark Diacono meets him
One road back from the bustle and din of London’s Notting Hill Gate sits Ping Ng’s terraced house. He has no garden or soil, and yet he has created an island of peace and beautiful productivity. From the basement his view is a striking topiary wall, but it’s culinary herbs for which Ng has developed a reputation.
Within just a few square metres of flat roof, I found lush lemon verbena, black peppermint, sweet cicely, orange thyme, strawberries, cocktail kiwis, grape vines, peaches, apple and plums. Ng keeps the fruit for himself; the herbs, he shares with a handful of chefs.
I ask him how he came to growing herbs. “They seemed to be the answer to my aesthetic leanings as well as the limitations and opportunities of where I live,” he says. “As a trained architect, I always wanted a beautiful home, and when I got into gardening and a chef friend encouraged me to supply him with herbs, it fell into place. I’m also drawn to scent as much as their flavour; I find I don’t notice unscented flowers – if I buy tulips I forget about them in the vase – yet I look at the roses constantly. Because I feel so attached to scent, I think I remain more conscious of scented plants even when they aren’t offering their perfume. It’s certainly one of the reasons I love herbs.”
It’s not only a shortage of space that constrains what Ng can grow: he spends frequent periods in Malaysia. Almost accidentally, this satisfies his “inclination for order and precision, and the need for the beauty of a little wildness and unpredictability”.
“Even when I have been away, when the garden is neglected, the herbs thrive,” he says. “They are perhaps in their best moment: unpicked, they have a chance to flourish, to fill out and become more themselves.”
A squeeze it may be, a jumble it is not: successful container growing of any kind requires planning and a system. Ng grows most of his plants using the French Bacsac system of lightweight geotextile grow bags.
“I don’t use pots as they require so much watering,” he says. “These bags hold water better, the semi-permeable fabric allows the roots to breathe more as they might in the soil, and it acts as a kind of root- pruner. They also work as well hanging from wires on walls as they do sat on the ground.”
A watering system is crucial. “A drip system ensures that plants are never overwatered, that there aren’t
FLAVOUR TO SAVOUR
Sweet cicely forms piquant seeds, below; and bergamot, above right, is an intriguing mix of mint and lemon. Both are supplied by Ping Ng to top chefs pools of water everywhere or rivers running down the walls, and that I don’t have to be here to water everything,” says Ng. “It doesn’t take much once the system is in place: I put it on for one minute twice a day for the roof garden and three times a day when watering plants growing against walls.”
Of course, as many a city dweller knows, you have to make allowances for the ongoing procession of soil and compost going upstairs, and prunings, dead leaves and other material coming down. “Annoyingly, I brought slugs to the garden in the first lot of topsoil,” says Ng, “so I now top up with compost, and ferry the prunings and so on down in their empty bags – it’s a real shame that it’s impractical to dedicate space to making compost at this scale.”
Accessibility is fundamental to an easy life, too. “There are few herbs on the walls as I don’t want to be running up a ladder all the time, hence the herbs are largely on the flat roof where I can get to them,” says Ng. “I train climbers like the roses up the walls, along with an elder for the flowers and berries that I might pick once a year. Of course, there are some herbs I cannot resist growing against the sunny wall, but I keep them either in containers at the base or – like the lavender – where I can get to them by opening a window.”
Getting the most from a limited space leaves little room for annuals. “Almost everything is perennial – they are productive for more of the year and need little from me other than my appreciative gaze,” he says. “I always leave little spaces every year for a few annuals, though – plants like tagetes for the chefs – and for when I discover something new.”
Not only are perennial herbs forgiving, you can easily find out about growing them if you are not an expert. “My advice is look at the websites of specialist nurseries, the RHS and other similar resources rather than forums,” says Ng.
As well as limitations, Ng says there are advantages that come with growing in the city, such as shelter, a few warming degrees of temperature and the residual heat of buildings: “Chefs tell me that with even familiar herbs like rosemary, what I give them is the best they have ever tasted. Yes, varieties are important, but so too is getting maximum light and heat as they do up here. And the warmer winter temperature means marginals will be OK outside”.
Perhaps more than the gardening itself, it’s the connectivity that growing and supplying herbs that Ng has found so rewarding. “I’ve been here since 1983 but I’ve only felt so at home in the last decade, and herbs are a good part of that,” he says. “I now feel that I belong to both Malaysia and here.
“My relationship with the chefs is a big thing for me – it makes me feel more attached to where I am and to the food world. Even at this scale, I see myself more as a restaurant grower than a gardener, part of what makes the menu and brings pleasure to the people eating. This is one of the reasons I grow so many herbs: even when you have limited space, growing highly scented, flavourful herbs means I can offer something that changes what you eat so positively even in small amounts.
“Restaurants like Noble Rot, Clove Club and St John are all about big flavours; the herbs I grow fit that perfectly. I like that it becomes a relationship and I get pleasure from seeing the chefs’ creativity: the black peppermint sorbet that Magnus Reid made at Legs in Hackney is a perfect example.” When I ask whether Ng has any plans for expansion, he says: “People always say to me, you should get a big piece of ground in the country, but they don’t understand that part of the challenge – and so much of the pleasure – is being so constricted, of using my architectural training and growing skills; it stimulates the brain. We establish order and nature imposes chaos, and that’s often where you get the most appealing creations even on this scale – an expression of the opportunities and limitations on offer.”
‘I can offer something that changes what you eat so positively even in small amounts’