Farm1 writes
"Janet Tweedy" wrote in message
Farm1 writes
No. I've seen pics of "tropical" gardens in London and all sorts
of
other places. Lots of tropical style palms, musa etc and I hate
the
look of them in temperate climates. It's sort of like building a
Hacienda in the middle of a bunch of Eucalypts. Just looks wrong,
wrong,wrong.


Sounds like a gross generalisation but I'm afraid I do to.

It could be a gross generalisation but the problem is that the
architecture needs to match the locale and the plants. A terrace
house with a small narrow alley type back yard and tropical just
doesn't match. Tropical needs decks and wide windows and lots of air
movement between the house and the outside and then one could do
tropical (or tropical look alike)

I don't know if we have the same picture of tropical, but I reckon that
if you're going to be penned in by walls, you might as well be penned in
by plants instead, therefore in that situation I'd go for the lush
overgrown look. Maybe more temperate-overgrown-with-ferns look.


But the real beauty of a real tropical garden is that they are very
much lingering places as they are shady and lush and cool in
comparison to the house and full of birdlife. They aren't as you say
worth lingering in when planted in a temperate climate. Too cool, too
little birdlife and just not right somehow.

Shady, lush and cool is still nice in a temperate climate, especially
when the weather's like last July. And you've got more chance of it
being green rather than bare in winter.


--
Kay