Tuesday, 21 April 2009
4-Season Border at the New York Botanical Garden
In April 2008 the Long Border at the New York Botanical Garden looked like this:
A tapestry of color, the Tulip Walk was an expensive, labor-intensive operation.
Each fall the summer display of annuals must be ripped out and discarded,
the site dug over, and hundreds and hundreds of tulip bulbs then planted.
There might be a hot spell in April, and the tulips would come and go in the
blink of an eye. In any event, after flowering the tulips would be dug and
discarded, replaced by the summer display of annuals and tender perennials.
.
Jump forward 7 months. Last November I was at the New York Botanical Garden at the press preview for the Four Season Border.
This year-round-interest replacement for the tulip walk was designed by Piet Oudolf / perennials, and Jacqueline van der Kloet / bulbs.
Tulips, daffodils, little bulbs such as grape hyacinths and Grecian windflower, colchicums for next fall . . . .
.
Wait patiently through winter's dormancy as the year cycles around to Spring and here's the result.
.
There are areas thick with bulbs, like these daffodils.
A miscellany of tulips, a sprinkling of daffodils, accompanied by Phlox divaricata.
This daffodil might be 'Foundling', a pink-cupped Group VI cyclamineus cultivar
accentuated with the soft blue of a grape hyacinth, Muscari armeniacum cultivar.
Here, a rain-spattered daffodil nods its head, accompanied by
Muscari armeniacum 'Album' and daisy-like
Grecian windflower, Anemone blanda 'White Splendour'.
Clearly I'm not the only one who finds this new border of interest. There are
ornamental onions to come along in May, tender bulbs for seasonal interest,
and all the perennials - sedum and prairie conflower and grasses and more -
to offer extended interest around the seasons. As all gardeners know, gardens
take time. This 4-season border will look good this year, even better next year.
Back to April 2009