The project to create a new Memorial Garden began months ago. Discussions and suggestions came and went. Though the old roses, planted some ten years before, were once wonderful they had declined such that two did not flower at all. This was probably due to too much shade. Fast forward and a conversation inspired by our Biodiversity advocate, Ang, led to our Grave advocate, Sue, suggesting we ‘put it down on paper’.
Sharing the ideas with other Heene volunteers things became instantly more concrete. Lavender, bee-friendly Hebe and Rosemary, particularly appropriate for a memorial garden as it means, in flower lore, remembrance seemed to fit the brief.
For a while the name of the garden was deliberated until we decided to keep the original. The Memorial Garden conjuring up exactly what it is for: a place to remember not only 71 men women and children buried here without formal graves but other loses, other memories. A place of serenity and peace.
Plant by plant the idea of a physic garden came to life, evoking the monks who eons ago may well have grown such a garden alongside the church and its meadowland.
Availability is always an issue but once we arrived at the beautiful Culberry Nursery in Angmering, while keeping roughly to prior plans, we also bought what simply looked good, though keeping a vigilant eye on their usefulness for pollinators. Thus the herbaceous perennial Penstemon, the annual Coreopsis and the semi-evergreen shrub Salvia were added to the group.
The soil is clay-rich with an acidity of around or just below neutral and as a result of the roses, has been well fed with organic fertilizer. Fortunately the long dry summer had been followed by a few good downpours, all the same, it was hard graft digging. We framed the planting with logs from previous pruning giving it an informal yet distinctive outline and added a few trunk pieces as impromptu coffee tables next to Maggi’s bench. A striking hazel hurdle edges the whole and a thick rubber mat has been laid down to protect it from become muddy and allow access for all.
Plant List:
6 x Lavandula angustifolia ‘Platinum Blonde’ - variegated leaf
6 x Lavandula angustifolia ‘Aromatico Blue’ - upright, grey leaf.
3 x Rosmarinus officinalis ‘Miss Jessopps Upright’
3 x Salvia ‘Hot Lips’
2 x Penstemon ‘Firebird’
1 x Coreopsis ‘Big Bang Redshift’.
3 x Penstemon ‘Thundercloud’
1 x Hebe ‘Sutherlandii’
1 x Hebe ‘Green Globe’
1 x Hebe pimeloides
1 x Hebe spp. At present has purple and pink flowers - variety or cultivar unknown.
1 x Honeysuckle, Lonicera x purpusii
3 x Oxalis articulata - pink sorrel
Already there :
Rosa damascena 'Rose de Rescht’
Rosa x hybrida 'Mme Grégoire Staechelin’
Rosa x alba ‘Semi-Plena’.
Philippa Matthews