Naturalistic Planting Designs
The high profile work of influential designers in Holland, Germany, UK and the United States has in recent years led to a meteoric rise of the planting style known as ‘new naturalism’. The approach, which is both aesthetic and scientific, uses plant combinations that mimic wild landscapes, such as the American prairie and central European steppe grasslands, with herbaceous and evergreen perennials and ornamental grasses set out in bold sinuous swathes or smaller groupings.
Leading practitioners in the UK have also been influential, and include garden designers Tom Stuart-Smith and Dan Pearson, together with landscape architects and researchers Professor James Hitchmough and Professor Nigel Dunnett of Sheffield University, who designed the inspirational planting for London’s 2012 Olympic Park with garden designer Sarah Price. New methods of establishing sustainable and maintainable naturalistic plant communities devised by the University of Sheffield team, together with those by Professor Wolfram Kirchner at Anhalt University of Applied Sciences in Germany, not only include wildlife conservation, but management of rainwater run off to prevent flash flooding, and these innovations are now filtering down into techniques usable for home gardeners.
Long-lasting effects
The proportion of ornamental grasses to perennials determines the character and performance of new naturalism style, conveying either a sweep of grassland or more colorful perennial meadow. The planting mix also affects the length of the flowering period, with late-flowering grasses and their subsequent dried stems and seed heads helping to prolong interest into winter, after the perennials are over.
Perennials used in naturalistic approaches are chosen for their robustness, impact, weather resistance and long performance. In terms of growth habit the species and varieties used form tight clumps, or creep very slowly, and are designed to gently mingle, without one more rampageous partner swamping its neighbours. As a result, they require little management, such as staking or use of fertilizer, only cutting back and removing spent foliage in late winter. Designers inject excitement by creating different levels of flowering within the planting with groundcover and compact forms filling gaps between taller species, which may flower earlier in the year to provide a succession of bloom.
Naturalistic plantings can be freeform, like a grassland, or fitted into more formal geometric borders and contrasted with clipped hedges or topiary. Shrubs and trees, such as viburnum, cotoneaster or Amelanchier, can also be introduced, reflecting the way these plants grow in the natural landscape.