plants in the village

So we went out to a village during Easter week, to enjoy the lovely Oxfordshire countryside pfeeyeahright.

This wasn't any old thatch and pubs village, this is Bicester Village, an outlet shopping centre which somehow morphed into a megamassive tourist attraction, on the strength of, um, cut-price designer shoes? Maybe? Its attractions are often felt by the locals to be somewhat obscure, but no-one minds the economic muckspread which has fuelled one of the fastest-growing garden towns in the Midlands. It's a home-grown success story, with its own hanging-garden themed multistorey carpark. But that's a post in its own right. Today we're park-and-riding it straight into the belly of the best, the main drag, the shopping spine.

Built in 1995 in the luxury Cotswold shed aesthetic, and kept primped and perked by an army of cleaners, gardeners and hosts, the effect is akin to a luxury shopping-themed episode of The Prisoner. Everything feels like a filmset, in the old style, all cardboard luxury in dense colours. Striding the main street you feel your hips start to jut out, a slight supermodel swagger creeps in. It's a catwalk, complete with OTT floral stylings, fresh fantasy planters (in the rustic style) and even a blossom-curtain to welcome you as you walk in.

Grab your bags, because we're going shopping:



The blossom curtain at the entrance is one of the few faux-botanicals on display. But really, on a place that's open 365 days a year, what are you going to rely on to rain blossom down on your visitors? Wisteria?



Oh, the rusticity. Note the flat-tired bike - part of the display, and a nod to Oxford down the road; and these galvanised watering cans, how many of them did I lug around in my childhood back on the farm? Eventually they go through on the bottom after one too many times left sitting in a muck-heap and hey-presto, the perfect container for fancy copperish foliage plants.



This planter is good. Nice colour, nice mix of plants.The camellias are going over but their quality still shines through.



But these planters are amazing, like little mid-century modern piglets made of perfect white concrete. Never mind the Dior darling, where did you get the plant pots?



And speaking of objects of desire, what about this little growhouse? What a thing! It would be perfect for miniature tender fruit trees, or to ram full of improbable amounts of tomato:



And just to prove that there is no fear of cliche here, observe that Pinterest favourite, plants in a birdcage (on a distressed vintage trestle table):



This side street full of delicate lampshade-cut birch standards felt more Instagrammatic, and had its fair share of people taking selfies among the glittering leaves.



Some inspired spring colours, especially in the bigger planters. Check out this cherry blossom and peach broom combination, spring in a pot:



And of course, only the finest tulips:



Outside the main street, the planting takes on a more defensive air. The curtain wall is barred with espaliers, some of it softened with fat curds of blossom:







Where a wall isn't possible, the shop backs are protected by ivy-topped traffic barriers in Oxford Gold concrete. These will stop ram-raiders making off with vansfull of designer trainers, keep the cars off the pedestrians, and look good while they're doing it:



What a combination of beauty and utility. I could have photographed these all day, except someone would probably have thought I was casing the joint.

Anyway, we got what we came for (a small Le Creuset casserole dish and wallets to replace our old broken ones) and what we didn't (an overly designed snack bowl and, yes, some designer trainers). We ate of the artisanal doughnuts and other currently fashionable street food. Time for the short walk to the bus stop, under scrubbed white birches, improbably huge for their container-bound life:



Oh gosh, almost forgot. Just time for a #BicesterVillage selfie. In the toilets, of course, because although this camera does have a selfie mode, my self portrait habits were set by the Mirror Project.

hanami in an english garden

We got back in time to see the cherry blossom as the sun was going down.



We drank tea in the evening sunlight.



The tree was jewelled with snails, ladybirds, shield bugs, pollen beetles.



Every branch of the tree was humming with bees of every kind.



We had all stages of blossom, from emerging to fading, to over.



The evergreen hedge was a stern backdrop to the delicate petals.



The sky was blue, fading to white, then to gold as evening came.



The sun shone through the petals of the cherry blossom.

apple blossom for easter

I was around at a friend's for Good Friday Cherry Blossom viewing (more of that to come) where I had, some years ago, abandoned an unsuccessful grafting experiment. The scions have become dwarf apple trees in their own right now, but they will slump across the path. I was reshaping one and pinning it back when a huge soft, blossom-laden branch came off in my hand.

Apple blossom makes for an amazing cut flower - buds open, softly, in the vase, delicately scented and perfectly flushed with softest pink. But who has the heart to cut a tree in flower?

Still, if it happens by accident...

revisiting the cleared corner garden by the Westgate

A month or so ago, I blogged about a ripped-out garden in the gentrification blast zone of the New Westgate Centre. It happened in drive-by stages, over the course of a week, so I never saw anyone working on it, but here's what became of it:



Some kind of powered root-puller has come in to remove the remainder of the old congested shrubs. I missed these being cleared, but by the next time I passed by, it looked like this:



Topsoil refreshed, new shrubbery in place. A closer looks reveals nothing surprising; Skimmia, Lavender, Rosemary, Lonerica, boot-tough municipal shrublets ready to take on the exhaust fumes and stumbling students. Maybe it was a council bed all along, or maybe the owner is rolling with the streetside aesthetic.



Either way, there's nothing uncared for about this space now.

gardens on the north bank

The South Bank is the party zone in London -- the concrete people's pleasure palace where we take to safety glass flight over the streetfood, skaters and interactive installations. North Bank is more austere, more businesslike. The spaces are smaller and the views are longer.




But the wet air, rolling up off the Thames, won't let the world stay grey. Here it has built a multicoloured lichen garden on a parapet overlooking the river. And here, weeds sprout from stone stairs, not yet fried by the dry or burned off by municipal weeders:



An air of tragedy clings to the bleak black beaches that are exposed at low tide. The graffiti is small and mean, or dark and troubling. The views that should feel commanding instead feel overshadowed by the weight of deadlocked government and turgid indecision.






And over everything, Big Ben rising, bell silenced, wrapped in grey and nets like an art gallery reinterpretation of a pagoda:

glimpses of garden

It's the approach to London, yet again, and the unsecret gardens under the Hammersmith and Shepherd's Bush exit from Westway. These include all manner of excitement, but today I was more interested in the concrete pillars, so you only catch a fast glimpse of bushes and graffitied walls in the vernacular yardspace.

The leisured sports-space which shares this under roundabout zone, all climbing walls and horses, has its own style; poppy bright colours, smart screening trees, vast mid-grey walls:

Westfield's big green wall creates the impression of greenery being dominant here, but this is almost the only greenery visible from the road:

Yes, that tiny sprig on the roof there. Notting Hill is way leafier; here's a typical frontage. Nice concrete pineapple there.

It's the gardens glimpsed over walls here that really excite, though. From the top deck of the bus, you get privileged glimpses of a great deal of privilege:

Not everywhere is so greenery friendly. Look at this balcony. Could you even grow anything on it?



And from here on in, almost all the greenery is in parks, municipal trees of stature against green backgrounds...



...and construction and cranes dominate the skies: