Showing posts with label inspiration. Show all posts
Showing posts with label inspiration. Show all posts

Wednesday, 13 November 2013

Eden Inspiration

We love going to the Eden Project in Cornwall. Admittedly the show stopper of the place is the fabulous Rainforest Biome. It's were all my dreams of growing tamarind and climbing trees come from. Also there is a big ass waterfall. But if you can pull yourself away from a rainforest in coastal Cornwall there is a huge amount of inspiration that you can take away with you for your own edible landscape.

The Mediterranean Biome - otherwise known as the one less likely to make you pass out - has more attainable edibles. Especially if you are blessed with the Devon coastal climate like we are. There are the herbs, the rosemary, basils, thymes. Stuff we're all well acquainted with. But have you thought about olives? We've had a single olive charming us with it's old man nature and evergreen leaves out on the balcony for three years or so. We've never had fruit because there isn't another one for it to make babies with so we scooped up two more olive trees in the Eden project shop. They are living on the allotment now and we're hoping to encourage them to perform.

He likes to stare out to sea and complain about the youth of today

Speaking of performances I was enticed by all of the wonderful chillies displaying their best. I've not really explored growing chillies before. I've bought the occasional plant but in more of an impulse buy than any well thought out effort to provide myself with all the heat I'll need. These two changed my mind.

The charmingly named 'Stumpy'

The appallingly whimsically named 'Fairy Lights' 
Of course we picked up seeds in the shop. From Sea Spring Seeds if you are interested.

Our other main inspiration stop was the Global Allotment. Which is the allotment I'd like mine to look like in a parallel universe where I could get permission for a Banana Tree.

Can't exactly get this one past the committee
It was full of stunning edibles that aren't that unusual on our plates but raise eyebrows when they are in our plots.

I'll give you three guesses
I also love the plant markers.


Both of these can be grown from supermarket produce (if your supermarket sells lemon grass and tumeric that is) so I didn't buy any of them in the shop.

So did I mention Eden Project has a shop? Well it does and it's not your average souvenir shop. If it was my local garden centre I'd be there all the time. As it's not I'll just wish it was and drop a bunch of cash each time we go out there. Why? Well...

  • The book selection is amazing. They have not just a book but a good book for any aspect of sustainable living you can think of. 
  • They have a really cool deli section with lovely local produce. Get a big tub of the Cornish sea salt if you've never had it before. 
  • T-shirts. Eden project logo, well made and adorable. 
  • All of the ethical goods you can think of 
and then...
  • gardening supplies
From the amazing, huge and - frankly - orgasmic selection of seeds and plants we took home... a lot. We promised ourselves a miniature tea plantation as a wedding present and finally got around to buying our first tea plant. It's out on the allotment now, we'll tuck it under fleece in case of cold weather and this time next year I expect to be sipping home grown green tea. The other plant we took home, this time for a life of indoor/outdoor living is a kafir lime. I imagine it's leaves are going to get exploited around here soon too. 

Following on from other inspirations we picked up some Quinoa seeds, some French Beans (Triofono Violetto) recommended by Gayla Trail and some tulip bulbs as fallen in love with on our honeymoon. I've always though tat plants make the best reminder of an amazing trip. 

Thursday, 6 June 2013

Grow Write Guild Prompt #6: Landscapes

Describing where I grew up to people who haven't been there is hard.

I grew up in a small town, yes, but a small town that was part of a sprawling conurbation. As people from Heywood we have our own identity (oh how we have our own identity) but we're never more than 45 minutes away from the centre of Manchester (by bus).

Miller Street, it's called that for a reason...
The house I grew up in was an end terrace. The yard outside contained a coal shed and an outdoor toilet (no longer used, I might add) Although it was built to be stuffed with a family on each floor we had the whole place for a small family of three, two, three, four, then five before we moved on. Most of the time it was just enough space.
The view from my childhood bedroom window (or rather the view from the street, camera angled up. Close enough) 

From my bedroom window you could see a cotton mill, closed down now, and it wasn't a rare site in my town. Clearly this was a place born in the industrial revolution. But for all of it's industrial ghosts we didn't want for green.  Even without taking into account into account how little time it took to walk into countryside proper and feed a horse with your palms flat. There was always some green. A road side verge filled with daisies, vast school playing fields, overgrown orphan patches and parks.

Parks. The biggest, the most beautiful and the crown jewel of the park is Queen's Park. I adored it as a child, it was my sanctuary when I was home from uni in the summers, I still stroll around it whenever I have the chance and remember it fondly from the other side of the country. You can sum up how the town and how I grew up like this: I may have lived on Miller Street but Queen's Park was at the end of it.

Once a boating lake in summer and ice rink in winter, now a home to some wonderful water loving birds
Queen's Park is a park in the most stunning Victorian tradition. When the family that originally owned it died out the ownership went to the crown. Queen Victoria who presumably heard the news and said 'I own land where now?' gave the land to the people of Heywood.

This park separates the park from the 'woods'. The wilderness of my childhood.

Let's leave behind Victorian England and go to the early nineties of last century when I was young. By this time the park had decayed to it's worst. Recently the park has been lucky enough to have been the recipient of a major regeneration. This is a good thing in that the park is stunning and a great place for the local people however it does mean I have no pictures of my park.

One of the only features without improvement: A pool left to fill in and full of  'weeds'

Let me describe it. My park is a park of decay. The gorgeous fountain, turned back on when I turned 19, had no water in it. It was covered in 'weeds' like a giant, stunning planter. I seem to remember roses growing over it but my plant identification wasn't as good back then. There where plinths without statues, the old turnstiles of the boat shed (but not much else of it) and every so often something would turn up missing or burnt out.
A jolly nice office
But my park is also a park of dignity. As a kid the biggest crime was stepping onto the flower beds. They where heroically kept perfect. In that working class way of finding someone commoner than you and looking down on them, absolute scorn was reserved for people who let their children ruin our flowers. The grass was always nicely clipped, the bowling green thriving, the band stand was full of graffiti and bands, and once a year the park was host to a fare.

Restored: the stunning fountain though I think it worked equally well as a planter

Those twin lessons shaped the gardener I am today. Watching nature overrun it's intricate Victorian confines gave me a respect for it's power and a taste for the aesthetics of decay. Watching a community take ownership of a space taught me that growing is not an individual pursuit but something that effects our community at it's core.

[This post was written as a response to the 6th prompt of Gayla Trail's Grow Write Guild. Check it out.]


Friday, 24 May 2013

Honeymoon In Bath: Things To Take Home


While we where in Bath we stopped at a couple of really cool gardens and parks. I came home with bags of ideas about designing spaces, planting combinations and fell in love with a few new plants. This post is to catalogue all that inspiration. Standby for pictures.

Things That I Could Possibly Do Now

Lettuce grown in teacups for baby leaf. How adorable.
Possibly for the first time in my life I fall in love with tulips especially when they are...
Precious specimen plants raised in gorgeous planers. Hostas, of course, are also edible

Things That Will Take A Little Planning 

The Herschel Museum handles it's small space really well, keeping you intrigued
Wisteria, another new love
One Day (Or Perhaps Just In Dreams)

If I had a lawn... wild parts and tightly clipped grass paths look fabulous.
Not in my lifetime, I don't think

Monday, 17 May 2010

The Birthday Books

I love my Boyfriend. He bought me books. Well not just because he bought me books but we all know I'm rather obsessed with books so... No, really I do love him for many other reasons. Like how he manages to look prettiest first thing in the morning when I'm at my grumpiest and other things you will no doubt find nauseating. However this post is about the books he (lovingly) bought me for my Birthday and which I've spent all weekend practising with.

First up is the one that's actually about cooking. This was my surprise book. I mentioned that I'd like a bread making book that was a little more advanced, a little more artisan breads and a little less 'see how quick and easy it is to make your own bread at home'. Frankly I wanted beyond quick and easy. I wanted more kinds of bread. I wanted something that saw bread as serious.

I didn't quite want as much detail as there is in Bread: A Baker's Book of Techniques and Recipes at least I wouldn't have chosen it for myself (Stephens belief in my intelligence is reassuring, if misguided) but reading it (much in the same way as Joyce, ploughing through with the faith that I could go back on my confusion later, although with Joyce I never did, see the last lot of parenthesis) and working with it I've come too a truce with it's depth. Or perhaps it's more Stockholm syndrome; I love it for it.

Well not all of it. Granted it's a bit Western-centric - there is an Aloo Paratha as a nod to bread culture elsewhere - but then books like this generally will be. And as an American book all the home baking measurements are given in imperial. Which confuses me only in that they have points of ounces and we have fractions (and if you have point something why not have metric? Metric is nice, metric is easy. Honest!) and confuses Stephen because the scales are being left on imperial.

For my fist experiment I went for Baguettes with Poolish. They aren't anywhere near perfect. The scoring looks like the diagram of 'improper scoring techniques', the crust is cracked and the crumb is a bit too uniform. But I love them. Almost as much as Stephen.


On to the gardening books then! No surprises here, he bought me The Edible Garden. We kind of adore Alys Fowler. There is the red hair, the quirky dress sense, the enthusiasm and that is without coming to the bits where she is interested in skip diving, foraging and other things we find super exciting. In fact it's kind of a running joke in this flat that if Alys says so, we have to do it.

With The Edible Garden she is after our own hearts mixing attractive edibles and the purely decorative to get a productive garden that looks good. Also foraging, skip diving, preserving, baking and having a quirky dress sense and red hair. It adds up to a book that you can simultaneously open up and loose yourself in and get fantastic practical information from. No easy feat looking at the rest of my bookshelf.

As a nice bonus it has an (all too short!) recipe section. So I had Chard, Garlic and Hot Pepper with Instant Noodles with my own home grown chard for that extra smug taste. It was delicious.


Finally Grow Your Own Drugs: A Year With James Wong, also not terribly surprising. We love Grow Your Own Drugs, okay me quite a bit more than Stephen, for the sheer ingenuity and horticultural geekery. And how cool is it to have a book that discusses natural remedies and skin care stuff by bragging about the chemical contents in plants rather than knocking modern medicine and claiming to be chemical free. Very cool, that's how.

For a test drive I went for the Oats and Chamomile Bath Bag. Both precious emollients that hopefully would let me have a bath that benefits my eczema rather than irritating it (if you're wondering 'why have a bath at all then?' my eczema gets irritated then too. My skin is in a constant state of loose-loose.)

I suffer from eczema on my lower legs and occasionally -though rarely - higher up. It's manly a problem in summer (heat) and winter (dry) letting me be in spring and autumn. Although the prolonged winter weather gave me no respite this year. I manly let it be, treating with emollient cream and avoiding anything likely to cause agony, like scratching.

I only seek medical attention if it's particularly bad. Although a dose of topical steroids can clear it up rather quickly applying it is irritating and uncomfortable. I know. It sucks. So I only show my legs off to the doctor when they are over run or infected, and yes they are rather hairy. I'd rather be a laughing stock than in constant pain.

Anyway, that's my medical history. Back to the bath bag. It was luscious. It felt lovely in the bath and not only didn't it irritate my legs any further but it reduced the existing irritation, the itchiness and the pain. Cool.

Saturday, 15 May 2010

Straight from the camera...

Where have we been? Well it was my Birthday so we went to Northumberland with my Dad and Watson, his dog. We'll be back to normal shortly but until then here are some pictures of horticultural interest from Alnwick Gardens

Wednesday, 10 March 2010

Buy This Book

A spot of father-daughter bonding before I left the north left me with a copy of No Nettles Required (Amazon link on the pick) for the train home. I'd read it by Bristol and was left entertained, educated and buzzing with energy. Too bad I had two hours on the train left to go.

First of all what makes this book so special. Well have you ever read a gardening book that says you must plant your daffodil bulbs the right way up and you think 'yeah? Sez who?'* Well that's kind of the feeling you can have reading about wildlife gardening. It's mostly based on common knowledge and not evidence based understanding of the way our gardens work.

No Nettles Required however is based on a study. Not the most exhaustive in the world but they readily admit that and they are open and transparent about methods and the why and how it was conducted. Indeed the only reason I'd suggest to avoid this book is if you have ethical concerns about the study which included trapping and preserving mini beasts.

So we start with good scientific foundations and from there offer practical tips that work. In gardens. In a real life study. Sure there aren't great big planting lists, the book explains why you don't need them. And no there aren't any guaranteed tips to get foxes in your yard, the book explains that wildlife isn't just mammals and birds. If you are concerned about real wildlife in real gardens this is a book you need to read.

And now a word for our balcony gardeners...

As a balcony gardener this is especially good news because, short of a hedgehog scaling the building, mammals aren't going to happen. Birds may not happen. Mini beasts though? Yes. We can have our wildlife. And considering our space is so lacking it's reassuring to know that we can do that without setting up a patch of nettles.

*Not only can you plant them any which way you please and they will right themselves with no time lost but they will also move up and down in the soil to get the the required depth. Is this creepy or cool... Who can tell...

Thursday, 14 May 2009

Throwing koans

We went away from my birthday so we missed wild Wednesday. Instead here are some offerings from Chester Zoo's (an annual birthday thing) green houses and gardens.


Yeah, as well as being an amazing zoo full of well kept animals with many successful breeding programmes Chester Zoo is also committed to plants.

The gardens and the plants in and around the animal exhibits are truly fascinating. I enjoyed seeing the medicinal plants such as tea tree and eucalyptus up close as well as what some of my herbs (pictured: chives) will look like when they grow up.


So we popped in the green house for a quick visit. The orchids, cacti, carnivorous plants and other tropical yummies kept our cameras occupied.



Unfortunately some of the most adorably coloured flowers weren't real These fabric flowers had a small cup inside for feeding the butterflies of the show stopping butterfly house.


Some of the other animal exhibits had tantalizing horticultural displays. This one I was tempted to pick. I've never had a Durian before but I'd love to try some.



Sunday, 7 September 2008

Going tourist in Totnes


This weekend we got off our bottoms and did something (aside from working, volunteering and playing the sims that is) we went to Totnes. Let me just get this out of the way first, I want to live there. There are basically three types of shops in Totnes, ones with green in the title, ones with cake in the window and ones with shiny, shiny things.


We started our day by hopping off the bus. Well it started before then but that was mostly us arguing over weather or not we should take out coats. We found the nearest place to get a chocolate croissant and ate them Vire Island. From there we could covet the gorgeous waterfront properties, wish I had a canoe with me and spot a few birds.


Then onward and upwards for the shopping trip/exploration First up was a crystal shop. This one was distinguished amongst the others in Totness by having both lovely jewellery, pretty polished stones and fantastic specimens that made the geologist in me weep. I couldn’t leave without smokey quartz, blue goldstone and fluorite bracelets or this picture of their wonderful tumble polished gem display.


Up and up, coming next to a health food shop that was actually a supermarket. Jesus Christ they had Sheese. On our way back we bought some of the vegan supplies I’d only read about. With any luck we should be cooking with them soon.


Next we miraculously popped up a side street and found a gallery open day. There where some excellent sea scapes and a photography project by Christine Sweetman. Tralling trough some of the other galleries we found delights like embroidered pictures of sugar skulls (beautiful although very clearly Jenny Heart inspired) in massive matching frames and a woman who embroiders over water colours to create wonderful local scenes. All of the art was far too expensive for me though.


After that we rampart walked it up to the church yard and found this adorable window and drooled at the beautiful front of the guild hall (which will be open for tourists in two weeks!) Then it was time to attempt to follow signs for the castle, pay our two pound fifties and walk up.


Totnes castle is an example of an old Mote and Bailey castle (that is a man made hill with a wooden castle on top) where the old wooden structure was replaced with stone. You can now see some of the foundations, and an impressive circle of stone. Oh and wonderful, wonderful views.


We continued up for craft supplies, drooling over fabric, wool and bears and a new diablo string for Stephen. Although there are vegetarian cafes in Totnes the meues didn’t seem that appetising to Stephen so we went to The Green CafĂ© which had signs advertising it’s greeniosity attached to everything from the recycled tables to the lights. The service was slow and friendly and the food was cheap and lovely, I got the vegetarian breakfast, Stephen went with the baked potato with cheese (duh).


After brief stops for fudge and sheese we stepped onto the bus and returned to Torquay. It was raining.