There’s an spot in Ireland’s Wicklow Mountains where reds, oranges, yellows and pinks reign supremeNestled in the mountains in West Wicklow, Ireland, sits a remarkable modernist garden. By high summer, it is a riot of reds, oranges, yellows and pinks: the intense red of Crocosmia ‘Lucifer’ goes off like a firecracker between waves of Leontodon ringens, a sort of aristocratic hawkbit that has golden heads of flowers above deeply toothed, leathery leaves; in the background, the smoke bushes smoulder and path edges are lined with Fuchsia ‘Corallina’, blazing like embers.But these are more than just splashes of colour: this is a garden that unfolds its melody in great gestures and allows you to peer up close at its drama. This is painting with broad brushstrokes; vast numbers of plants are used, with hundreds of dahlias grown from seed flowering in their first year, often earlier than those grown from tubers. This allows owner June Blake to experiment with colour. “I’ve grown 400 to 500 dahlias to get the colours I like,” she says. “You collect the seed at the end of the season and sow the following spring, editing out the colours you don’t like.” Continue reading…
Source : theguardian.com
Read more…Gardens: a riot of colour on the Emerald Isle
