An exotic jungle garden (before and after)
carletonexotic
Posts: 89
Hi everyone, since there's not much gardening to be done at the minute, I thought I'd share the progress I've made with my oextic jungle style garden. The before pictures are from summer 2019 when we first moved in. The after pictures are from the end of summer 2021. 
As you can see, the previous owner had done some hard landscaping (a koi pond, a stream / waterfall with bridge, decking and split level lawn edges with stones). At the start of the first lockdown I decided to dig some beds in, and order plants online.
My inspiration was Christopher Lloyd's exotic garden at Great Dixter and Will Giles' exotic garden in Norwich. I bought books by both and researched online as to planting schemes.
Being constrained by a tight budget, I've managed to acquire most of the plants as cheaply as possible, on eBay and local garden centres, by buying small plants and looking for bargains. My largest trachycarpus I was given by a friend who was clearing their garden!
The next step for this year is to think about replaces the lawn paths with something else - paving stones / gravel / wood chippings - and to edge the beds properly. The lower circular lawn will stay until the children are older!
My big aim in terms of planting this year is to create drama and height to make the space feel more enclosed. I've planted arundo donax, miccanthus giganteus and paulownia tormentosa to give some strong tall foliage, and I'm sowing things like giant scabious and ricinus this spring.
This is my first garden and I can't wait to get out there again this spring!
Please feel free to add your own before and after photos to the thread, I love seeing how others have transformed their gardens.
As you can see, the previous owner had done some hard landscaping (a koi pond, a stream / waterfall with bridge, decking and split level lawn edges with stones). At the start of the first lockdown I decided to dig some beds in, and order plants online.
My inspiration was Christopher Lloyd's exotic garden at Great Dixter and Will Giles' exotic garden in Norwich. I bought books by both and researched online as to planting schemes.
Being constrained by a tight budget, I've managed to acquire most of the plants as cheaply as possible, on eBay and local garden centres, by buying small plants and looking for bargains. My largest trachycarpus I was given by a friend who was clearing their garden!
The next step for this year is to think about replaces the lawn paths with something else - paving stones / gravel / wood chippings - and to edge the beds properly. The lower circular lawn will stay until the children are older!
My big aim in terms of planting this year is to create drama and height to make the space feel more enclosed. I've planted arundo donax, miccanthus giganteus and paulownia tormentosa to give some strong tall foliage, and I'm sowing things like giant scabious and ricinus this spring.
This is my first garden and I can't wait to get out there again this spring!
Please feel free to add your own before and after photos to the thread, I love seeing how others have transformed their gardens.
An exotic jungle garden in West Yorkshire: instagram.com/greatnorthernexotic / youtube.com/@greatnorthernexotic
10
Posts
Cambridgeshire/Norfolk border.
You’ll enjoy this thread
https://forum.gardenersworld.com/discussion/1061363/before-and-after-show-us-what-youve-done/p1
One of the things I love about this style of gardening is that everything grows so fast you notice something new each time you walk into the garden - from the gunneras to the giant miscanthus, pollarded paulownia etc.
You'll notice the as-yet-unbuilt greenhouse on the lawn, which is going in the top left corner to replace to pond. The pond was downsized to a barrel pond earlier in the year.
The other thing I was itching to do was to remove the trampoline and replace it with a new bed. The view from the house has been much improved!
Roll on summer!