the Occasional Gardener ~ About

Coming Soon

2011-08-27T03:08:00.000-04:00

COMING SOON

Arts & Craft

2009-11-24T10:31:00.005-05:00

Apostles of Beauty

Message Me

2009-03-13T00:49:00.002-04:00

From Nature

2009-01-26T13:37:00.000-05:00

The overriding theme of this blog is- from Nature. We are drawn to art like the image above from Andy Goldsworthy's book Wood, design, food, botanicals - just about anything that is inspired by and connected to nature.

Slow Food

2009-01-26T13:34:00.000-05:00

Slow Food is an idea, a way of living and a way of eating. It is a global, grassroots movement with thousands of members around the world that links the pleasure of food with a commitment to community and the environment.

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Green

2009-01-26T13:33:00.001-05:00

The concept of Green as interpreted here is not a rigid one - its an intention. An intention to be as knowledgeable as possible about what are the best choices. An intention to act in the best and most mindful way with regard to these choices knowing that they have an impact and consequence. The image above reflects this- asparagus from the farmers market- not organic, but local- one step in the right direction where every step counts.

Wabi Sabi

2009-01-26T13:32:00.002-05:00

"Wabi-sabi is a beauty of things imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete. It is a beauty of things modest and humble. It is a beauty of things unconventional. ... The closest English word to wabi-sabi is probably "rustic". ... Things wabi-sabi are unstudied and inevitable looking. .. unpretentious. .. Their craftsmanship may be impossible to discern. "
"A Culture of Simplicity" , Leonard Koren

"Originally, the Japanese words wabi and sabi had quite different meanings. Sabi originally meant 'chill', 'lean' or 'withered'. Wabi originally meant the misery of living alone in nature, away from society... Around the 14th century, the meanings of both words began to evolve in the direction of more positive aesthetic values. ... Over the intervening centuries, the meanings of wabi and sabi have crossed over so much that today the line separating them is very blurry indeed."

"Wabi-Sabi for Artists, Designers, Poets and Philosophers", Leonard Koren

In Search of Wabi Sabi

Books on Wabi Sabi

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Gertrude Jekyll

2008-12-15T00:58:00.001-05:00

Upton Grey Manor House on Flickr

Kitchen Garden

2008-11-08T16:45:00.001-05:00

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Gertrude Jekyll

2008-10-25T00:21:00.003-04:00

Upton Grey on flickr

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Beth Chatto

2008-10-22T21:23:00.004-04:00

Beth Chatto Garden on flickr

Beth Chatto chats to Roy Lancaster

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Sissinghurst

2008-10-22T20:49:00.012-04:00

Sissinghurst on flickr

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Featured from Vita Sackville-West's weekly column called In Your Garden for the Observer.

Mamaroneck

2008-05-09T15:47:00.001-04:00

This garden is owned by my friends Heidi and Jim, their three children and Maisie the family dog. Impressed by my efforts in the Westerly garden- a summer house that we once shared, they not only let me have a hand in helping them design the stone walled cottage garden as part of a renovation of their garage/barn but continue to allow me to actively garden the now transformed space. My visits there are a wonderful mixture of gardening, being creative and of course the tending of a wonderful friendship. The proverb at the foot of this blog- "More in a garden grows, than what the gardener sows" could not describe more aptly what happens here in the Mamaroneck garden

About: The Occasional Gardener

2007-04-08T19:38:00.021-04:00

To me gardens are part larder, part medicine cabinet, part sanctuary, part living painting. Many years ago I had my own garden in London, a thin narrow plot in East London which I turned into a brick paved cottage garden after much trial and error and with many an inspirational trip to legendary gardens like Sissinghurst and Beth Chatto's garden. This connection with nature is important to me, but what does a gardener do when he no longer has a garden - ~~I now live in a five floor walkup apartment in New York City?~~

~~I garden occasionally-almost weekly in the summer at a friend's garden in~~ ~~Mamaroneck~~. I also cultivate and tend indoors an assortment of jars and pots that huddle on the window ledges of my apartment that come to life when the summer sun is high enough and the winter radiators are turned off and I roam the public gardens of New York City as if they were my own.

**update** In May 2010 I returned to Malaysia.

This digital plot is a visual journal of my activities in these borrowed, urban and random spaces. From my hotch potch garden I enjoy and cultivate the very same things that artists, medieval monks, peasants and all the folk that identify with the term' gardener' have done for centuries- food, medicine, sanctuary and art.

I'm a graphic artist and textile designer with an interest in a variety of visual arts. The Occasional gardener is aesthetics, inspiration and ideas from and for a garden. I also curate interesting things foraged on the wild web on things botanic and horticultural in OGMedia , modern nature and urban life in Occasional Oasis and green topics particularly arts and crafts in GreenKraft

The name Occasional Gardener (and the Occasional Oasis Supply Association) are from a short story by H H Munro