Montreal: Big Ideas, Small Gardens
Montreal’s Flora Exhibit: A Must See of City Landscape Designs
Reclaimed industrial land is recycled to prove that small urban gardens can be exciting and innovative outdoor living spaces, even in Canada's cold northern climate.
Begin with a derelict industrial space, between huge grain elevators on one side and a disused barge canal on the other. Apply ingenuity and imagination and the result is one of the most exciting gardening exhibitions in North America.
Montreal, just a short distance from the Canadian-US border, has done just that. Lining both banks of a lock in the historic but now retired La Chine Canal, the International Flora Montreal has created a garden unlike any other, to serve as a teaching tool and inspiration to city-dwelling property owners.
At the foot of a massive tall grain elevator that may one day become a museum of contemporary art, the flat spaces, the sloping canal embankments and even the water surface have become designer gardens, each one carefully planned to fit onto the footprint of tiny urban lots, even decks and rooftops.
One garden is made of small raised beds with walls of stone, each bed about a foot tall and five by ten feet in size. Inside the beds a large variety of vegetable plants is carefully arranged so that the heights and growing patterns complement each other, a stunning and edible green feast for eye and table.
A well planned low platform or deck can be combined with simple plants, such as grasses with a small tree or a few shrubs. Bright colors – one of the platforms was painted shocking green -- set off the plantings and a well-placed bench.
Wood is an attractive and comfortable surface for decks, but stone and colored sand work well for paths and focal points. An area 15’ by 20 ‘ can become a restful open space filled with white marble chips of about 8’ by 9’ -- off-set to leave a one foot space along one wall and a 6’ space on each of two other sides for plantings.
Parallel curved rows of dark stone, set on end with the space between them filled by contrasting sand provides a stunning foreground for a small mound of low growing plants.
And for limited spaces or those requiring a visual barrier, Flora also provides the answer -- a vertical garden of low-growing plants that will drape downward over the face of the planting wall. Plants of differing textures and colors can form stripes and even checkerboard patterns.
The people of Montreal are particularly fortunate to have this asset in their city, but one of the joys of travel is the ability to bring new ideas home. For gardeners, especially those looking for the solution for a small or un-scenic yard overlooking an alley, the Flora Exhibit in Montreal is a must see.
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