See the arrival of spring with snowdrops, narcissi and hellebores at the Dutch garden of Tuinfleur
When Rika and Pieter van Delden’s youngest child left home 25 years ago, the couple decided the time had come to get their garden in order. To start the ball rolling, Pieter picked up a spade and began digging a pond. Two years later, he finally completed the job and vowed never to do anything like that by hand again. In the meantime, Rika had created a couple of flower borders and been bitten by the plant collecting bug. In the quarter century since then, the couple have developed a garden that is now firmly on the garden visitor’s map of the northern region of Groningen in the Netherlands.
‘We never had a master plan,’ says Rika. ‘We did it all ourselves, so it just had to evolve gradually.’ Given that the Van Deldens’ garden, Tuinfleur, is a somewhat daunting 15 metres wide by 450 metres long, it made sense both practically and aesthetically for them to divide it into a series of rooms and complete one before moving on to the next. Today, there are 12 distinct sections delineated by 3.5 kilometres of hedges, which Pieter clips with extraordinary precision. These dozen rooms have been given general themes – including sculpture, shade, reflection and horticultural curiosities – but none is devoted to just one particular season.
MAY WE SUGGEST: Hortus Bulborum, a secret garden with 2,500 varieties of rare and historic tulips
‘I don’t want a garden that is intended to be enjoyed only in spring, for example. I believe every garden should look interesting from at least March until November,’ says Rika. Her New Year’s present to herself each year is a display of snowdrops, which has grown in interest and rarity over the years, but by the time that spring has fully sprung, there is a positive riot of colour throughout the garden. ‘It just makes me very happy,’ she says.
This display really begins the autumn before, when Rika sits down to plan her colour palettes for the coming spring. She loves to try out new varieties and rework existing schemes, so every year she puts in around 15,000 bulbs with her bare hands (and has the war wounds to prove it). ‘I can afford to be adventurous because we have paying visitors on Sundays from the end of February to October and I put all the money we make from ticket sales into buying new plants for the garden,’ she explains.
Although she experiments with daffodils, as she does with everything else, Rika admits to having a particular fondness for the more refined varieties, especially when they are multi-headed. The floriferous pure white Narcissus ‘Thalia’ and pretty N. ‘Sailboat’ (with trumpets that fade from buttery yellow to a soft cream) have colonised large areas and, since both are scented, on still days they fill the air with a delicious perfume. In some places, these grow in unbroken carpets of a single variety, elsewhere in a cheerful jumble of different cultivars. Often they are underplanted with vivid blue scillas or interspersed with hellebores in shades from dusty pink to deep maroon.
‘It is important to remember that there are lots of lovely things in flower at this time of year – not just the bulbs, but also hellebores, primulas, pansies and some wonderful shrubs.’ With her collector’s eye, Rika makes a point of tracking down the best varieties, such as Stachyurus chinensis ‘Joy Forever’, which has the same dangling clusters of pale yellow flowers as the species, but with yellow splashes on its green leaves, turning bronze in autumn. In England, the RHS has awarded this elegant variety an Award of Garden Merit, and it is well worth tracking down.
Her garden may already be packed with choice plants, but Rika will be looking for new or better cultivars again this year. ‘I get great joy from what we have created, but I know it can always look better,’ she says. ‘I am constantly experimenting with changes and new combinations. For me, this is the best part of gardening.’
tuinfleur.nl[/i]
Sietske De Vries1/6Rika and her husband Pieter conceived their garden as a series of ‘rooms’, which provide colour and interest throughout the year. Dangling yellow clusters of Stachyurus chinensis ‘Joy Forever’ bloom in late winter and early spring.
Sietske De Vries2/6Varieties of white narcissus line the long pond.
Sietske De Vries3/6Rika particularly likes the pure white Narcissus ‘Thalia’ and creamy N. ‘Sailboat’, which she plants liberally around the garden’s winding pathways and which fill the air with perfume.
Sietske De Vries4/6Contrast is provided by the chequered petals of Fritillaria meleagris and dusty pink hellebores.
Sietske De Vries5/6Pink and maroon-coloured hellebores break up the abundant carpets of narcissus.
Sietske De Vries6/6Delicate snowdrops – which Rika adores and adds to each year – are planted along the pathways. Each section of this long, thin garden is enclosed by immaculately clipped hedges
