Colour blind design

After writing my last post on colour in planting schemes it seemed a natural progression to write advice on how to design for someone who is colour blind.

If you are colour blind yourself then you will already know from experience what looks good and what doesn't but for those of us who aren't then it can be difficult to picture your world.

Colour blindness affects around 1-20 men and around 1-200 women according to the BBC Health website.

When designing for someone who is colour blind you must discover the form their colour blindness takes, it is in fact very rare for a person to have the severe form in which all colours appear as black and white or hues of grey.

Protanomaly, a common form, affects the red pigment meaning that reds, oranges and yellows will appear duller and violets and purples will have a stronger green pigment than red making them actually appear blue.













Another slightly less common form, Deuteranomaly, does the same to green pigments meaning reds, oranges and yellows all appear slightly more red and therefor more vibrant.









Another form, Protanopia, that also affects the red, yellow and orange pigments. This will have more of an affect on design as reds are often seen as black or grey. This affects the red pigment in other colours causing yellow hues to show very little difference and blue hues are similarly affected. Green is seen as another hue of yellow and purple as another blue.
An example of the effect on garden design will be when Pink flowers are seen as blue due to missing red pigment.










Deuteranopia affects the green pigment in the same way and therefor the person will see blues and reds with greens appearing as a hue of grey with tints of red and blue. Reds and oranges and yellows as hues of red.
There for grass will appear as a grey with a slight red and blue tint.

Designing a garden in this way can be challanging as a beautiful combination to you could to your client look awful and even clashing. After this type of design job I have never looked at flower and foliage colour in the same way again.

Colour and planting schemes

Colour is an important aspect of any planting scheme, when planning your garden plant foliage and flower colour will often be determined by the style of your garden.

Styles like the cottage garden will imply a multi-coloured scheme but what may seem like haphazard prettiness will more than likely be carefully orchestrated chaos.
Someone has put a lot of energy into the mix and match of colourful flowers.

A contemporary colour scheme can include a mono-chromatic colour scheme, this means that one colour has been chosen but the flowers and foliage are all different hues of this one colour.




When planning a colour scheme it is a good idea to consult a colour wheel
to find colours that will compliment each other. This chart from an Australian website gives a detailed image of how the colour wheel can be used to choose colours.




Colour schemes that are predominantly blue or silver can feel cold so the addition of a warm colour such as red, orange or yellow(gold)in small amounts can help to take that edge off or perhaps that's the scheme you want to achieve.

Don't forget that its not just the colour of the plants that will affect the look of your garden, Any features, furniture or boundaries can also be colour matched to suit your scheme. A bright painted boundary such as a wall or fence can help to enhance your planting colour scheme by either complimenting it or as a contrast.

The important thing is to have fun but don't forget if any of your friends or family are colour blind their view of your garden will be completely different.

Water wise

As I write this the garden is looking parched with the long run of dry sunny days stretching into weeks we may be enjoying the summer sun but the plants most certainly are not. Vegetable plants in particular suffer at the mercy of the heat; they need water to swell the pods, tubers and fruit that we enjoy so much.

There are several ways to help save water and also reduce the need for extra watering when hose pipe bans seem likely.

Most people keep a water butt if don’t already it may be time to invest in one although you will have to wait for it to fill up which may take some months. If you have a large garden two or more butts can be joined together.
Grey water recycling is the re-use of water that has been used for the washing up, from the washing machine or after a bath. As long as no strong detergents are used this water can be taken to your thirsty plants by bucket or siphon. Larger water harvesting systems are available and if you feel like going even greener why not try reed bed water recycling systems.

Water is lost from plants and soil by evaporation so you can reduce the need for watering by using mulch around your flower beds.
Common mulch’s include organic mulch’s such as leaf mould, bark chippings, mushroom compost and your grass clippings. Inorganic mulch’s include pebbles, sand, gravel and recycled glass chippings.
Another way to reduce evaporation is to avoid watering the foliage of plants and water early in the morning or late in the evening.
If possible you can bury a foot of drain pipe close to the base of larger shrubs and plants. Watering into this pipe instead of the soil gets the water straight to the roots.

You could also plant your garden with drought tolerant species garden styles such as the desert garden are very striking and often include lots of architectural plants.
Most drought tolerant plants have features that are easily recognisable, plants with hairy or spiny foliage are good at trapping moisture and small or thin foliage will loose less water through evaporation than large foliage.
Drought tolerant plants include Achillea, Berberis and most grass species.

One last thing to remember when weeding avoid digging the soil over to much as this exposes more moisture to the elements. Carefully pull weeds making sure to remove the entire root or hoe the ground allowing the weeds to bake in the sun although if it does rain they will re-establish so plan ahead.

Papaver Perfection

This year I have had such a beautiful and vide variety of colourful self seeded Papaver or Poppy's that I thought I would give them the coverage they deserved.

Definition of Poppy from the Oxford english dictionary:
a herbaceous plant with showy flowers, milky sap, and rounded seed capsules. Many poppies contain alkaloids and are a source of drugs such as morphine and codeine

Papaver and other genera, family Papaveraceae (the poppy family): many species, including the wild red-flowered corn poppy (P. rhoeas). The poppy family also includes the corydalis, greater celandine, and bloodroot
Origin:
Old English popig, papæg, from a medieval Latin alteration of Latin papaver

Enjoy your garden whatever the weather

With the weather in England being so unpredictable these days its worth considering some additions to the garden that will allow you to spend time in it no matter what the weather.
The obvious solution to a summer day, that is actually sunny, would be sheltered areas that give shade when you need it most. There are lots of options on the market ranging from sail shades to thatched African style huts. It could also be as simple as a pergola covered in your favorite climbing plants. Why not choose some evergreen climbers such as clematis armandii, this is also scented giving an option for a seated area during the colder months.

Strong winds are something I am seeing more of in our garden and windbreaks will help not only you but any tender plants that would otherwise struggle. You can of course plant trees or hedges that will cut down the wind and also provide habitats for wildlife but even these will need protection to begin with. Other products are available that will be aesthetically pleasing as well as practical such as screens.

Windbreaks must not be solid as this will create its own problems but must simply break the power of the wind by filtering it. Using materials such as rolls of natural fencing is a great value way of introducing a beautiful windbreak that will blend well with its surroundings.

Rain shelters are similar to shade areas but must generally have a solid roof. The options are wide ranging and if you live in an area that is particularly wet you can even opt for covered walkways and glass veranda's.

Winter can be a time when the garden is almost forgotten as a place to relax or entertain. This need not be the case as making use of design elements such as the firepit and even fireplace will heat a small area and are a great excuse to cuddle up to a loved one. For those on a smaller budget there are well priced chimenea's that are widely available.

As long as you plan your garden carefully there need not be a time in the year when it is not practical to enjoy it comfortably. So why not make use of this important space and remember to have fun with it.

The question of sustainability

I know its the year of bio-diversity but the question of Sustainability has been nagging at me recently and with articles on Landscape juice such as the 'acute oak decline disease' and the recent forum post on permeable paving I thought I would investigate my thoughts further.
I have just completed a project using new oak sleepers, this is what started it all, until this time I believed oak to be a sustainable resource but the article on the oak disease has made me rethink this notion. An oak tree takes 30 years to become useful as frame timber and it takes 120 years to reach its peak, so does this really fit with the description of sustainability.

Brundtland (1987): Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the needs of future generations to meet their own needs. (http://www.ecifm.rdg.ac.uk/definitions.htm university of reading)
Even if we are planting Oak to replace the harvested they will not be ready for several generations to come.
So does this mean there are different levels of sustainability for example:
Short term: plants and shrubs and recycles products such as composite deck
Medium term: Pine and other quick growing trees
Long term: aggregates, sand and slow growing trees
After all even gravel will be replaced but it takes millions of years for the mountains to erode. So what does this mean for garden designers and landscapers. Well I try to be sustainable but can I really claim to be if you apply the rule of meeting future generations? How important is it to the industry and the people who work in it?
No I don't think this has answered any questions other than maybe we should be rethinking the uses of any product that falls under the long term sustainable category as our future generations cannot benefit from them. Not being an expert any input from others would be appreciated.

My most recent design and build project

A holiday cottage design and build in Blakeney Norfolk. After lots of hard work we are finished and I am very happy with the result of this low maintenance seaside garden.