A distinctly New Zealand gem Gillian Vine
Visits a sixstar garden with the ‘‘wow’’ factor in spades.
NO matter how many gardens I visit, there’s always another cracker to see.
Broadfield Garden, in Rolleston, is one.
It was justifiably given six stars by the New Zealand Gardens Trust, and that rating means Broadfield has been assessed as a garden of international significance.
Rather than attempting to emulate an overseas design, owner David Hobbs says originality has always been a priority. New Zealand plants, both natives those bred here from imported species, are a vital aspect of that approach.
In 1992, landscaper Robert Watson drew up plans for a 3ha garden on the bare, flat site on the outskirts of Rolleston, ‘‘but the plant choice is mine’’, David says.
The first step was cultivating the ground ‘‘half a dozen times’’ to clear it of weeds, then came the hedges, about 1.5km of them in native totara, miro and Corokia Frosted
Chocolate. David cheerfully admits to getting the sequence wrong, as shelter should have been the priority but it was not a huge issue.
The landscaper wanted the twin 6mwide borders to be planted in the English style. David rejected that, saying the 120mlong beds had to be easy to maintain by himself with one fulltime helper, so he chose natives.
The result is stunning: it is worth visiting Broadfield just to see how numerous species and cultivars come together in shades of green, bronze and gold.
Lessusual species include Stephens Island pittosporum, the D’Urville Island form of toothed lancewood
(Pseudopanax ferox) and the threatened Pittosporum dallii from the Nelson region, as well as bronze and variegated coprosmas, the latter slightly frost tender, David says.
Giving what he describes as rhythm within the borders are poles of totara, while sculptures add elegant touches or little bits of whimsy in a limestone buzzy bee and a ‘‘bedding plant’’ where
Clematis Sweet Hart scrambles over an old bed end.
‘‘I’m a hoarder [of plants] and I’d buy anything that took my fancy,’’ David says, when complimented on the array.
As a result, it would be easy to spend an entire visit in these borders, but there is much more to see at Broadfield, each area screened from the next by the beautifully maintained hedges.