working with the visual palette of seasonal change
When creating a bespoke planting design for a garden it is crucial to think about seasonality and how time will influence its look and feel, especially during autumn and winter months.
The move from Autumn to Winter brings many changes into our gardens. One of the first signs that we notice would be the changing colours of the leaves on deciduous trees - the rusty, bronze, and golden hues.
And if it is a bright and sunny day, how amazing it is to experience the light shining through golden coloured foliage, almost sparkling in the intensity of the light, contrasting against the dramatic blue sky.
Then we are left with a skeleton, the shape of a trunk and branches against the sky, like an ink brush stroke on a paper.
Perennial plants also experience seasonal change. This gives us the opportunity to be amazed by the variations and intensity of colours that the flowers, foliage, and stalks of the perennial plants fill a garden with.
The colours of perennials are often muted, mixed with bronze undertones, and a pop of colour, here and there, delivered by late flowering asters or fading, dark skeletons of yarrow, and their last, shy efforts in producing yellow umbels.
Another element that adds a different feel to the late season garden is the light.
Have you noticed the positioning of the sun at this time of the year?
Low autumn light beautifully illuminates the structures of perennials and ornamental grasses, that can act to frame the garden. This dry decoration also serves as a refuge for wildlife; hence it is important to leave these brittle structures for the winter months.
Faded perennials and grasses in straw tones decorate gardens in late autumn and winter. We can learn so much by just observing these gentle, subtle changes.
In our fast-paced lives allowing ourselves to participate and reflect on the changes that the late season brings will help us to learn to be more in the present.
Immersing ourselves and truly experiencing the garden and all these changes that this time of the year brings, can help us attune with nature and with ourselves.
We are entering into the late season as nature prepares for the well-deserved rest. We also cannot remain indifferent to the influence of seasonality on us and our bodies.
This is time to pause, slow down, rest, reflect, recuperate, observe and be gentle to ourselves.
