I’ve been dreaming of blue skies, vibrantly coloured flowers and warm sun thanks to a new book that landed on my desk. Create a Mediterranean Garden by Pattie Barron has been a welcome distraction from miserable weather and even worse world news.
It’s a comprehensive guide to creating gardens that Richard Mabey in his foreword describes as an “oasis of sunlight”. Not only that, they are drought resistant making them easier on maintenance – no lugging watering cans every night during summer.
I was sent a copy of the book in return for a fair review.
The book’s starting point is the scrubland countryside of the Mediterranean – the maquis and the garrigue – where plants native to the area cope with the harsh conditions. Many of them are familiar to us in our herb gardens, including sage, rosemary and thyme. Others, such as Lychnis coronaria and phlomis, are already commonly grown in borders.
What makes this style different is that plants are allowed to mingle freely without too much concern about clashing colours or heights. It is we’re told the type of garden that “somehow puts itself together with little intervention from the gardener – no planting plans required”.
Create a Mediterranean Garden begins by debunking the myth that “Mediterranean plants are tender and delicate”, pointing out that if that were the case they wouldn’t thrive on mountains in poor, dry soil.
Even frost can be shrugged off if the drainage is good enough. Drawing on personal experience of growing in a frost pocket, Pattie tells us that “so long as you keep the roots dry and the crowns from rotting, you will have few failures.”
Those that are borderline can be easily protected although she warns agains fleecing “everything in sight”, pointing out it “might just be easier simply to pull a duvet over the garden.”
Indeed, this sort of personal experience underpins much of the advice from how to build terraces, and whether to have a lawn or gravel, to soil conditioning and plant choice.
Recommended plants cover every angle – climbers, fragrant, shade-tolerant – and all the seasons with plant profiles that include a hardiness guide.
Food, such an important part of Mediterranean life, isn’t forgotten with herb cultivation and propagation and suggestions of what to grow for a ‘sunshine harvest’.
There’s information on those finishing touches that complete the scene: how to paint your own tiles; choosing pots; making a mosaic table; turning a rendered wall into ‘aged terracotta’.
The book bucks the trend for short snippets of information with long sentences and chunky paragraphs. What does shine through is the author’s knowledge and passion for the subject.
Create a Mediterranean Garden by Pattie Barron is published by Lorenz Books with a RRP of £15.
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