Surrey Homes | SH43 | May 2018 | Restoration & New Build supplement inside

Garden
Shining in
the shade
It’s not all about the sunny spots - Sue Whigham celebrates
the beauty of the darker parts of the garden
There has been a garden at the Inner Temple in London
since the 12th century and mediaeval papers record
an orchard on the site at that time. By the 14th
century much was made of the garden’s roses and it was
the venue for the RHS’s Great Spring Show from 1888 to
1911 before it outgrew the space and moved to Chelsea.
Now you’ll see a rather wonderful three-acre garden
sweeping down to the Thames, complete with rare
trees and the most sumptuously planted borders.
There has been a major regeneration of the garden
under the guidance of Andrea Brunsendorf, the current
Head Gardener, who combines an artistic eye with
superb plantsmanship. It will be interesting to see how
the new Head Gardener, Sean Harkin, influences the
planting in the future. His previous appointment was at
Kensington Palace so he comes with great credentials.
It’s a splendid thing to have right in the heart of the
capital and best of all, to my mind, is the lovely planting
under the trees to the east of the rolling lawns, a wonderful
source of inspiration for making the most of shady
areas, which can be a challenge to home gardeners.
When you are choosing plants for shade, it is useful
to know their provenance. There are so many bulbs,
perennials, woody plants and ferns that originally thrived
in forests and woodland and of course for the happiest
plants it is ideal to emulate their original ‘home’.
We’re spoilt for choice really and I think that as we seem to
have such dry summers down here in the South East, shady
borders have the benefit of not scorching in a hot sun as they
are in soil that does not immediately dry out. Provided that
the borders have had the benefit of added organic matter,
the shade will reduce the need to water and by mid to late
summer all should be looking good, as the shaded areas of
Shade in the garden comes in
a lot of different guises:
• Light shade, created by walls, fences and buildings.
• Deep shade, under evergreen trees or in
alleys between houses and buildings.
• Partial shade, created by the position of the sun
as it moves round (there are very many plants
that can cope with sun/or partial shade)
• Dappled shade, created under the
canopy of deciduous trees.
• Damp shade and dry shade.
your garden are less exposed to extremes of temperature.
The areas under the trees at Inner Temple, when I saw
them in May a couple of years ago, were a marvellous
mix of ferns, Smyrnium perfoliatum, wonderful creamy
foxgloves - from memory, D. ‘Camelot Cream’; some large
yellow aquilegia – possibly Aquilegia chrysantha ‘Yellow
Queen’ – and the promise of martagon lilies to come.
This particular aquilegia is one of the largest, longest
spurred varieties you’ll find and it has the added bonus of
blue/green filigree leaves. As for the smyrnium, I’ve never
been successful with it, but it is well worth persevering with
as once you’ve got the plant established, it will naturalise in
your shady areas. Its combination of airy greeny yellow flowers
and shield-like leaves which decrease in size as they climb
the stem, are intriguing and for anyone who likes euphorbias
and fresh limes and yellows, it’s a must. Some nurseries sell
small plants now and as long as you don’t hoe them out
and remember that they are biennials, they will bulk up.
A really good evergreen fern which can cope with dry
conditions and partial shade and which may well have
been the one growing at the Inner Temple is Dryopteris
wallichiana, otherwise known as Wallich’s Wood Fern. Its
beautiful fronds form a big shuttlecock and if you provide
it with rich soil, it can reach about three foot (90cm).
Splashes of bright foliage in darker shadier areas could
be provided by one of the many lovely pulmonarias
153 surrey-homes.co.uk