Mario Bautista
SERIES 35 | Episode 15
Jerry visits a home where providing green space is a focus.
Featured Garden |
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Owner: |
Sonia Graham |
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Location: |
Turrbal Country in Samford Village, Qld |
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Climate Zone: |
Subtropical |
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Garden Established: |
2021 |
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Style: |
Productive, functional garden integrated with an open-plan house. |
Key features
Architects Sonia Graham and Chris Bligh created a new style of dwelling, comprising a three-bedroom house, a one-bedroom ‘granny’ flat and work studio for the couple’s architectural business – all on a 600m2 block.
They called it the ‘Live Work Share House’.
The move was prompted by a decision to move from acreage to a smaller block when the couple’s children hit their teens.
Buildings cover about 40% of the land. There are two street frontages with gardens at either end, and in between the buildings are green spaces and courtyards, creating a “mini tropical village”. These spaces are perfect for rainforest ‘indoor’ plants. Hoyas are a favourite.
A central pathway between the buildings allows cooling breezes to be drawn from the green spaces into the buildings. The pathway means you can walk from one street to the other without entering a building. You could actually take a wheelbarrow through from one garden to the other!
Low-cost everyday materials have been used where possible, include cyclone fencing at one boundary, bent and covered by a climbing frangipani to create a green, airy arbour.
The vegie patch is front a centre of the main garden spaces. It mostly received only dappled light but it’s still very productive. The lawn is a tapestry of zoysia grass, dichondra, basket grass and sedums.
In front of the office entrance is a thriving verge garden that receives morning sun and is full of perennial food plants.
The family has extended their gardening interests to an adjoining space where a few remnant plants survived among many weedy ones, so they helped set up a small Landcare project to restore it.
“Having a garden as a central feature of your house makes life so much more enjoyable,” says Sonia.
Featured Plants |
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CLIMBING FRANGIPANI |
Chonemorpha fragrans |
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CARDINAL CREEPER |
Ipomoea horsfalliae |
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HOYA |
Hoya cv. |
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TREE MARIGOLD |
Tagetes lemmonii |
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ROCKET |
Eruca sativa cv. |
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MUSTARD |
Brassica juncea cv. |
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SAMBUNG |
Gynura procumbens |
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OKINAWA SPINACH |
Gynura bicolor |
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ZOYSIA |
Zoysia cv. |
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BASKET GRASS |
Oplismenus hirtellus |
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POMEGRANATE |
Punica granatum cv. * |
* Check before planting: this may be an environmental weed in your area
Filmed on Turrbal Country | Samford Village, Qld
