As summer winds down, my already relaxed gardening habits become even more lackadaisacal, and suddenly I notice that the weeds are winning and the shrubs need trimming.
The offhand loveliness I prize suddenly seems to be a garden run wild.
But I don't think the disorderly bedlam I'm facing is what garden writer and landscape design consultant Rick Darke means by "The New Wild Garden."
That's the topic of a talk he will give at the Connecticut Horticultural Society's meeting Thursday evening, Sept. 13, in West Hartford.
Darke recently published an expanded edition of William Robinson's 19th-century classic, "The Wild Garden," adding seven new chapters and more than 100 photographs (Timber Press, 2009).
Fist published in 1870, Robinson's passionate book was considered revolutionary, and at times it reads almost like a diatribe against the gardening conventions of his day -- the rigidly geometrical garden beds planted with showy masses of colorful but short-lived subtropical bedding plants. He considered them trite, monotonous and wasteful.
Robinson, who started as a lowly garden boy in Ireland and went on to become a prolific gardening writer and editor of numerous gardening publications, was ahead of his time, in so many ways.
He advocated more naturalized plantings that mingled native plants with hardy exotics adapted to the climate. He called for merging the garden with the larger landscape. He even called for providing green spaces in cities where the poor could grow their own healthful food.
Darke regards Robinson's ground-breaking book as "stunningly relevant" to 21st-century gardeners and landscape stewards seeking to combine aesthetic design with "dynamic biological diversity and sustainable management practices."
He puts Robinson's views in a modern context, noting that the essence of his idea is to place plants "where they will thrive without further care."
Darke's talk is at 7:30 p.m. Thursday at Emanuel Synagoguge, 160 Mohegan Drive in West Hartford. The fee is $10; free for students with a valid ID.
For details, go to www.cthort.org or call 860-529-8713.
