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Bricks in the Garden
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| The days are shorter, flowers fewer, and it's getting cold. We are
sliding into winter ever so gradually. This time of year is excellent for
reflecting, and for making changes. If you want to redo part of your landscape,
or add a tree, do so before next spring buries you with garden work or
other distractions. In my garden, as the wooden borders rot, I replace
them with brick. |
| Bricks weigh 5 pounds apiece, and a typical project uses at least 50
of them, often hundreds. Mortar comes in 60 pound bags. Depending
on how thick you apply it, and your brick size, a bag may do anywhere
from 20 to 40 bricks. So bricklaying is weighty enough that it shouldn't be
done except in the garden's slack season. Mixing mortar is a dusty job, and
it makes one's hair difficult to lather with shampoo. But spreading
the moist gray mortar, snuggling it between the bricks, wiping away
the excess --is a bit like icing a cake, and is a relaxing, meditative job.
Building with bricks is at once satisfying and wholly practical, as well as a
lasting improvement. |
| Bricks and stones not only outlast wood, but also add a hard edge
of great contrast to the garden's soft greenery and flowers. It is
energizing and pleasing to behold the combination of the human-built and
natural plants or soil. Landscape designers know that a mere plant collection
is not so welcoming as a garden that includes paths, seating places,
sculpture, borders, arches, columns, etc. A yard or garden should feature
both your favorite plants and human things. An ornate terra cotta pot
spilling with flowers and vines is an example that even an apartment dweller
can appreciate. |
| Both plantings and hardscape elements can be done either formally
or informally. The clean looks of a formal approach are best on a grand
scale; in ordinary Seattle yards, an informal or intermediate blend is
usually done. Everyone follows his or her own preferences. I never lay bricks
in straight lines, only in curves. Most of my garden beds are not
square-angled, but rather irregular shapes defined by gently sweeping
lines (AS SHOWN IN THE PHOTO ABOVE). Where existing straight lines such as sidewalks are present, the
stiffness of the look is softened by using overflowing vegetation; vines are
perfect for such usage. |
Most good gardens have a water feature of some kind, be it a
birdbath, stream or pond. All I have is a shallow little basin about the size of a
loaf of bread. So, to use up bricks and improve the garden, I am devising
an ornamental brick "stream" to catch the gutter rainfall runoff from
my house and my neighbor's, and swirl the water to thirsty plants on a
dry, sunny hillside. Right now, an insatiable cedar and rampant ivy are
the only beneficiaries of the overflow rainfall. My kiwi-vine and Asian
pear tree would dearly love more water. Not only will water be
reallocated, but a better system of terracing and retaining soil, as well as a new
seating spot, will result. If you have access to bricks, let your imagination fly.
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(originally written for, but not published in, The Seattle Weekly, October 1996)
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