#dalstongarden

The sun has been shining today, the official first day of Spring, after a week of rain and even hailstorms, so it seems a good time to share a snapshot of the plants we are enjoying in Dalston Curve Garden right now. 

Today is St David’s Day, a day of national celebration for Wales, and as Daffodils are the Welsh national flower, first on our list is Narcissus ‘Tete a Tete’. This is the earliest of the Daffodils that emerge here and this year they’ve been flowering since the beginning of February. We aim to have Daffodil varieties in flower one after the other, right through to the end of April, planted in the ground and in tins and containers. 

Our tins of yellow Daffodils look good next to purple Crocus. As well as planting them in containers, we grow Crocus tommasinianus ‘Ruby Giant’ under trees, and in our ‘Bee Bed’. We love the way Crocus open their ‘faces’ when the sun is shining, but as we’ve had so many overcast days of late, sadly they’ve remained more closed than open this year!

Several years ago we planted a tiny clump of Dog Violet (Viola riviniana) and have been happy to see them spread more and more ever since. Although the pretty little flowers are not scented like those of Sweet Violet, they are attractive to bees and as their leaves are evergreen, Dog Violets do a good job of covering bare ground all year round.   

The Hellebores have started to clump up nicely in our ‘woodland’ bed. Lovely as they are, their downward facing ‘sulky’ flowers are best appreciated from a low crouching position. Alongside them, we are enjoying the spotty leaves of Pulmonaria (Lungwort) Their strange bi-coloured, pink & purple flowers are a good source of nectar for any Bumble or Solitary Bees emerging from hibernation on warm days in early Spring, when there are not many other flowers available. 

Although Alkanet (Pentaglottis sempervirens) can take over if not kept in check, it is another Spring flowering plant that’s good for several bee species and other pollinators, so we are happy to make it welcome in some parts of the Garden. Bees are also supported by the unusual dusky pink Primroses that were donated to us last year from a garden in Wales and are settling happily in their new Hackney home. 

With so many beautiful flowering bulbs and plants emerging after winter, this really is an uplifting time in the Garden. Many thanks to our hard-working team of volunteers who planted hundreds of bulbs last Autumn that are now bringing so much joy to Dalston in early Spring.  

Wow! What a day it has been at the Garden! If you missed out today, there’s still a chance to carve a pumpkin tomorrow! All the carved pumpkins will stay in the Garden for our first big lantern light up tomorrow evening! Here’s what you need to know; 

- Carving tomorrow is between 12-3pm

- The Garden closes to the public between 4pm - 6pm for our volunteers to prepare for the lantern light up.

- Carvers from this weekend have special entry (with the ticket we give you) 6pm - 8pm

- Dalston Pumpkin Lantern Show is open to all 8pm - 10pm

"Beautiful Beetles and Snazzy Snails"

Summer 2024

This summer you may have seen the “Beautiful Beetles and Snazzy Snails” mini-exhibition in our Rainbow House. These artworks were created here by children from Holy Trinity Primary School in Dalston. Every Summer term our education team works with their Year 1 children, immersing them in nature and the environment of Dalston Curve Garden, through our 'Inspired by Nature' program of weekly, hands-on learning sessions. 

The children love searching for 'minibeasts' and this year they were very excited to find Stag Beetles in among our log piles! Their discoveries inspired jewel-coloured beetles and rainbow snail artworks. Their creatures were accompanied by collaged plants and creatures, made by Holy Trinity children who, in previous years, have been 'Inspired by Nature' at the Garden.

The children were so proud when they returned to the Garden at the start of this term, now as Year 2, and saw their artworks on display. When we asked how they felt they all shouted out “We are artists!”  Now there's a result!

Exploring the Garden and its plants and minibeasts is an opportunity for the children to grow in confidence and to develop a love of and respect for nature. Planting seeds and watching them grow and become part of the landscape of Dalston Curve Garden offers them a chance to nurture a precious green space right here on their doorstep. 

Late Summer Plants and Flowers at Dalston Curve Garden

August 2024

Herbs, fruit & veg, and Summer pots packed full of scent and colour, bringing joy to visitors and keeping and pollinating insects happy.

Plant highlights in the Curve Garden, April 2021

We might have all been complaining about how cold it’s been this April, especially at night when having long-overdue meet ups with friends outside! However the silver lining has been that it has been perfect weather for the spring-flowering bulbs in the Curve Garden, with the low temperatures extending the blooms for much longer periods than in previous years. As many of you know, we work very hard with our volunteer team every Autumn to plant hundreds of bulbs, to make a joyful display of fresh growth, colour and scent every Spring. This year, though we say so ourselves, the Garden has never looked more beautiful in April! This time last year, we could only share the season’s botanical beauty by cutting these flowers to give to people who needed cheering up during the lockdown, so it has filled our hearts with joy to see visitors back relaxing among all the floral abundance. 

All this beauty has made it especially hard this month to choose just 10 ‘highlight’ plant photos to share and that’s before we even start on our Tulips!

One of our favourite April flowers is the Dogs Tooth Violet, Erythronium ‘Pagoda’. Pictured in our first two photos, they have beautiful pale yellow, swept back flowers rising above large leaves with mottled markings. They are dainty and rather magical. 

Visitors often ask us how we still have such beautiful Snowdrops growing in the Garden in April. The subjects of all this admiration are in fact Leucojum aestivum ‘Gravetye Giant’, commonly named Summer Snowflakes, which do indeed look like Snowdrops on the end of very tall stems. To confuse matters more, they flower in March and April, not Summer, despite their name. Each stem has a head of white bell-shaped flowers with green spots on every petal and some plants have up to six nodding flowers per stem. They are good, if indeed not best growing in a partially shady spot. We grow them throughout the Garden - in the woodland beds, under the Birch trees, mixed with little Daffodils and all along the woodland bank at the bottom of the Garden, where there is very little sun. They also flower for a long time, so we think they are all round floral superstars. 

We grow several varieties of Epimedium, mainly for their lovely heart-shaped leaves and because they flourish all year round under the shade of our Birch and Alder trees, even in the dry Summer months. We haven’t always given too much thought to their flowers, but in recent years have really come to love their delicate beauty. The variety pictured here is Epimedium x warleyense, with clouds of tiny orange flowers rising above evergreen leaves. It has never looked better here than this Spring, probably due to the hard cut-back we gave to all of its old leaves right back in March, just as the new flowers and leaves were emerging. 

Every year we plant hundreds of Grape Hyacinth/Muscari bulbs, often combining them with Narcissus ‘Pipit’ in containers. Visitors often complain that Muscari takes over their gardens, growing ‘like a weed’. We recommend planting Muscari latifolium, because each flower stem emerges from just one or two leaves. They are also tall and very striking because of their two-tone blue colour and as our sign in the Garden says, ‘Bees love Muscari’! This year we tried out a new variety, planting Muscari armeniacum ‘Valerie Finnis’, named after the renowned plantswoman and flower photographer, in our recycled tins, as pictured above. 

Last Autumn we planted about seven varieties of Daffodil (Narcissi) bulbs, to make sure that we always had at least one Daffodil variety growing in the Curve Garden every day from early March - May. April’s blooms have included Pipit, Hawera and Thalia. Narcissus ‘Pipit’ is a favourite, not least as it has the most beautiful scent. We grow it directly in the ground, as well as in tins for the tables, in boxes, mixed with Muscari latitfolium and in our ever-changing entrance display of seasonal flowers in pots and containers. Although many people prefer Daffodils to be yellow, we grow a lot of the white Narcissus ‘Thalia’, as they are great for cutting to display in vases. Our third April flowering Daffodil this year was the dainty Narcissus ‘Hawera’, which has a delicate scent and looks particularly beautiful peeping out from among the Summer Snowflakes, underneath the Birch trees.

Look out for our next plant blog, where we will be sharing photos of some of our beautiful tulips! 

Alliums, May 2020.

How can you not love a sunflower? Ours are extra special because they have all been nurtured, from seed, by children from Holy Trinity Primary School. The school is 5 minutes walk from the Dalston Curve Garden, so throughout every summer term Year 1 children take part in our immersive ‘Inspired by Nature’ programme. They explore every corner of the Garden, discovering and learning about bees, butterflies and other mini beasts, sow and grow their own sunflowers, nasturtiums, beans and squash and make mini-beast puppets and other creations in art sessions. Over the weeks as they engage and connect with Nature right here in the heart of their own neighbourhood, we see them grow in confidence.  We love making this annual journey in the Garden with the children from Holy Trinity.