How to Create a Beautiful, Peaceful Garden Shed
And is this plant invasive? Here's how to find out.
Dear Avant Gardener, With your encouragement, I toured a residential garden opened by the Garden Conservancy. The most memorable part was the shed approached on a path lined with bird houses from Thailand. It literally stopped me in my tracks. I walked away wanting to turn one of our 10’ x 13’ stables into a gardening shed. I like to cut flowers for the house and want to plant a cutting garden in the paddock onto which the stables open. I’d like to read out there and also make a place for my 18-month old granddaughter, who likes to garden. — Seeking Tranquility, Pasadena, CA
I love, love, love a good shed! The impact is more than the outbuilding itself: A shed creates a destination and – equally or even more importantly – a delightful walk through the garden to reach it. And a “shed” can serve various functions; for example, it can be an office, a guest room, or a gym, like our new shed in Rhode Island.
For inspiration for your classic potting shed, I called my interiors guru, Jonathan Berger. “Channel Bunny Mellon.” he said immediately. “Tools as decoration.” Yes!
Mellon, a self-taught gardener who designed the rose garden at the White House for Jackie Kennedy, took the tools-as-decoration idea to an extreme when she commissioned French artist Fernand Renard to paint a trompe l’oeil mural of a garden shed to hide an actual potting area.
Design is intention.
The functional sheds at Mellon’s Virginia estate similarly elevate humble rakes, baskets, and terracotta pots to create gorgeous yet practical shed interiors. The key is to treat these humble items as objects of beauty, collecting and displaying them as if in a museum.
Some suggestions for how to achieve the shed of your dreams using Mellon’s approach:
Jettison anything you don’t find beautiful or useful (remembering William Morris’s edict).
Fit the scale to the room. For your narrow room, build or buy one long counter-height table with a shelf underneath.
On the opposite wall, artfully display tools, pots, vases, baskets, supplies, and even books – see image below. At the far end, you might fit a comfortable reading chair big enough to fit an adult and a child.
For another place to read, I’d love to see two comfortable outdoor chairs in the paddock, facing the door to the shed. They will draw you through the shed into the paddock garden.
For your granddaughter, consider a step stool so she can reach the potting bench and make her own arrangements by your side, as well as a section of the display wall she can reach with sturdy child-size tools, nature books, and so on. Keep in mind that plants grow painfully slowly; children enjoy the more immediate gratification of observing and experimenting in nature – and getting dirty. (See my article, Kids Will Love Nature if You Do These 10 Things.)
Here’s to a tranquil, Mellon-inspired shed in your future!
Dear Avant Gardener, In January of this year I moved into a house bordered in the back by forest and I'm working toward planting the yard and forest edges entirely with natives. I have my work cut out for me! It's overrun with Japanese stiltgrass and vinca and other nasty stuff. There is also a small weeping, lace-leaf Japanese maple not far from the forest edge. I've been seeing that Japanese maples are invasive in New York State, but I'm also seeing conflicting advice. I am ready to cut it down if necessary, but I'd prefer not. — Protecting the Forest, Hudson Valley, NY
Ick, invasives! They can feel frightening, like a virus. And checking the Invasive Plant Atlas of the United States can fan this fear, because it lists any plant identified in a wild area out of its native range. For example, pokeweed — a northeast native I recommend you consider to outcompete stiltgrass — is listed as invasive.
To answer your question, I asked Director and Senior Public Service Associate Chuck Bargeron at the Center for Invasive Species and Ecosystem Health, which maintains the database, how a residential gardener can know whether a plant is invasive in their area and how invasive. He replied:
If you view the page for the species then it shows who lists the species as invasive. For example, pokeweed is listed by the California Invasive Plant Council and Japanese Maple is listed in a National Park Service survey and by Arlington County, Virginia. This shows [Japanese maple] as a problem in the greater DC area, which could also mean it could be a problem in New York, although I am not sure there is any evidence that it is that aggressive of a species. I think it would be worth checking with your local county extension office for specific local advice.
In other words, there’s a lot of reading between the lines involved in interpreting the definitive source! For example, Bargeron ignored the scary language about the invasiveness of Japanese maple in Australia and the map of sightings in the United States. It’s evident Japanese maples are not a glaring problem in New York.
But it’s worth checking with Cornell, the land grant university that runs the extension program in New York, bringing scientific knowledge to citizens through master gardener, master naturalist, and other programs. Cornell’s online invasive species list includes Japanese angelica tree (“prohibited invasive”) and Norway maple (“regulated invasive”), but not Japanese maples. That doesn’t mean they are not invasive, however, just not listed as invasive by the state. Invasive legislation varies widely by state and some states don’t even have invasive species regulations.
So what’s my advice? Leave your tree for now. Japanese maples are so common in front yards that you would see them in the woods if they were highly invasive and the woods of New York are not filled with Japanese maples. You can always cut it down in the future, leaving the roots to rot in the ground.
Congratulations on your new wilding adventure!
— The Avant Gardener
Why, How, Wow!
Why?
When we plant for biodiversity, we are creating a legacy of sorts. We are planting for the future.
In addition to her style legacy, Bunny Mellon left us the Oak Spring Garden Foundation. It’s mission is to support and inspire fresh thinking and bold action on the history and future of plants, including the art and culture of plants, gardens and landscapes. It includes one of the most compelling horticultural book repositories in the nation (open to researchers by appointment).
Still, the magic of a landscape is not to be found in books, she believed. "Too much should not be explained about a garden," she wrote in 1965. "Its greatest reality is not a reality, for a garden, hovering always in a state of becoming, sums up its own past and its future." — Architectural Digest
Bunny Mellon (source: Oak Spring Garden Foundation)
How
To create an attractive arrangement of tools in your shed, group like items together and devise a consistent hanging system — which can be as simple as nails hammered into the wood wall — and keep in mind the basic design principles of balance and symmetry. Then do your best to channel Bunny Mellon — or a museum curator.
For more examples of scrumptious sheds, see my Great Garden Sheds Pinterest board. Interested in seeing more of the beautiful world she created? Check out The Gardens of Bunny Mellon.
Source: madeon23rd.com
Wow!
Each item in the trompe l’oeil murals that cover the walls of Mellon’s greenhouse vestibule had a special meaning to her:
… whether it was a shell from her property in Antigua to a treasured piece of china to baskets of rare fruits; most especially, replications of books in her storied collection at the Oak Spring library along with personal letters scattered or collected in a basket. And let’s not forget her signature favorite gardening coat and hat. — Private Newport
Bunny Mellon’s greenhouse vestibule at Oak Spring Farm (photo: Bettie Bearden Pardee, privatenewport.com)
Gorgeous Native Gardens
A tastefully designed dry creek bed meanders through the front and side of this private school property, providing a calm space for strolling and a way to direct stormwater into underground infiltration pits. Planted in 2014, the 7,600 sq. ft. garden features an attractive mix of native woodland and grassland species. — Theodore Payne Native Plant Garden Tour
