Well, guess who came to visit?
Yep, it’s Marianne. Thinking about making trouble.
We had lunch, a good gossip, and then a quick garden tour. And we went to see my latest brilliant idea:
What’s the point of wonky posts, I hear you ask?
Hm, well, – I have begun to think about how dodgy it is walking round a garden with steep slopes and steps. We thought a lot about this particularly steep bit through our coppice. We hated the idea of adding railings, which would be expensive, hard to install and a bit institutional. Then, inspiration struck – posts! You just need to be able to grab them to steady yourself on the up or down. Brilliant. And then I also loved the idea of painting them. To me it brightens up and sharpens the surrounding greenery.
So Charles and Angus got to work. They are a bit wonky but very solidly installed.
And then came Marianne.
A bit unsure about the wonkiness. Well, that’s reasonable, but we’re stuck with it and our underlying boulders.
She went on contemplating. Had a go.
Decided she could live with the wonkiness. But not the tops!
She don’t care that Charles got those specially to protect the posts from rotting or splitting.
They’ve got to go.
So they did.
That’s fine – they’ll rot at the bottom before the tops, and splitting is a wood glue job. So Charles graciously accepted her verdict.
And then later also accepted her verdict about the bronze fennel in his own part of the garden. We were treated to a brilliant exposition about the merits the plant offers in this particular garden which is full of greys and purples. I love its generous seedling so I was delighted when this was also accepted by Charles.
The fennel stays.
You can hardly see it at this stage in its life, but Marianne knew what it would be offering.
Actually, this is one of the great joys of having a knowledgeable and discerning visitor who is happy to speak her mind.
We’ve always wanted it and believed it helps us improve the garden. See here.
These were good, helpful interventions. Thank you, Marianne. Come again!
But we never worked out how to make these (weedy) steps easier……
Any ideas?