Last Sunday I was meeting a potential client for the first time and he taught me something valuable that I hadn’t been able to put into words before.
Let’s call him Bob for now because I haven’t asked if I could use him in my story yet.
Anyways, Bob was showing me his beautiful garden. It was really everything I could dream of. It was packed fence to fence with native flowers, trees, raised garden beds with chicken wire wrapped around them for growing veggies, and a web of walkways connecting it all. I thought it had everything.
The garden was amazing, but Bob still had lots of plans for it. He wanted to fill every nook and cranny with new native species and had called me to help him think of new ones.
He told me that the flowers were already attracting lots of pollinators, but he still wanted to attract more wildlife.
Bob wanted to build a wildlife pond.
A pond is amazing for attracting wildlife because it provides all three basic needs for life: shelter, food, and (of course) water.
A pond provides valuable habitat for fish, frogs, toads, dragonflies, ducks, hedgehogs, and much more. Not to mention all the new plants that will be able to grow with the increased moisture. Everything needs water to survive and Bob hopes to see new animals stopping by for a sip every day.
What Bob said next described exactly how I feel about design problems I deal with on a regular basis.
He said: “The thing I love about my garden is that every inch has a purpose.”
The native flowers attract pollinators, the trees and shrubs provides shelter and food for wildlife, the chicken wire saves some for Bob and his family, the walkways get them from one corner to the other, and the pond will attract more life to the yard. Everything has a purpose.
Like Bob, I strive more than anything to bring purpose to the gardens I design.
Bob finds purpose in his garden by sustaining life. However, we all have different values and different needs.
It’s always a welcome challenge to find a solution that can make a client happy while standing for what I believe in. Some clients simply aren’t the right fit for me, but I do my best to stay true to myself while keeping an open mind and learning from new perspectives.
A beautiful garden can bring us peace and inspiration, but beauty alone does not satisfy me; a garden needs to bring some greater value.
If it were up to me, I would optimize every garden for carbon storage and food production.
What about you?
Where do you find purpose in your garden?
Let me know in the comments below or shoot me an email at scott@carrollpropertyservices.ca
