Jane Powers discovers a garden combining the conservatively classic and the wildly impulsive.
There are gardeners who collect plants, and there are gardeners who make lovely gardens. And so often they are entirely different species. The proud collectors' domains may be such a jangle of mismatched specimens that there is no peace to be had for the visitor. And the other kind of garden, the pretty patch, while restful, may have little to challenge the discerning plantsperson - who likes nothing better than spotting an unfamiliar plant and excitedly inquiring: "What's that?"
Well, a place that is that rare thing, both lovely and full of "what's-thats", is a certain Shankill garden, behind a small 1930s cottage. Its owner is an incurable collector, "I can't resist a new plant," admits Carmel Duignan. "And I never believe these people who tell you not to buy a plant unless you know where to put it. That's not my philosophy at all," she adds. "If I see a plant I like, it doesn't matter if I have room. I find room for it."
But not only does she find room, she manages to place the plant with congenial neighbours so that it blends in artfully. There are no discordant specimens standing up and shrieking "Look at me! I'm an impulse buy!" Her plant combinations are ingenious, often combining difficult colours. The new rose, 'Rhapsody in Blue' is not a proper blue (the holy grail of rose breeders). It's more a weary mauve, the kind of colour that looks out of place with everything else. But Carmel has teamed it with the beefy, black parsley, Melanoselinum decipiens, a rare plant endemic to Madeira, which has wonderfully muddy-pink, frothy umbels of flower. A bronze cordyline makes a backdrop of brown leather leaves, and completes the sophisticated picture.
Carmel likes offbeat colours: purple- and wine-foliaged, woody plants rise up again and again in her borders, like dark clouds. But instead of being oppressive, the dusky maples, cotinus and elder are a recurring theme that pulls the planting together.
Another feature that lends coherence to the garden is a perfect lawn - something so rarely seen today. The central strip of green velvet is a quiet pause that balances the busyness of her borders. "So I don't want daisies or clover in my lawn," and she absent-mindedly snips with a small secateurs a few errant blades of grass that are sticking up an inch higher than their mates. Her attention to the green sward is admirable: mowing twice a week, feeding twice a year, and scarifying and spiking each autumn (when she also digs up and replaces any rough patches). Yet she is mindful of water conservation: "I wouldn't dream of wasting water on my lawn, so it can get a bit brown."
Carmel is retired now, having worked for years with RTÉ, and latterly as a producer on the Garden Heaven programme. "I don't do any work now, except in my garden" - which claims her for six or seven hours each day. She loves all plants, but there are certain groups that are special to her.
The Araliaceae family has long had a place in her heart, with its boldly architectural trees and shrubs, such as Pseudopanax (she has at least 10 of them), Aralia, and the plant that featured in Diarmuid Gavin's Chelsea garden, Schefflera taiwaniana, a gorgeous-looking thing with leaves like many-fingered outspread hands. The family, which includes ivy, is remarkably disease - and pest-proof. This, combined with its structural appearance, has made it very fashionable just now (which makes Carmel a trend-setter, rather than a follower).
She's also keen on ordinary plants, and puts them to good use in her garden. In early summer, her borders are liberally sprinkled with self-sown aquilegias in pretty shades of blue, purple and wine, "none of them are posh, they've just spread all over the place because I didn't get to deadhead them."
They belong to the Ranunculaceae (or buttercup) family, which also includes one of Carmel's favourite plant clans: "Clematis is my big thing. I'm getting very keen on the species kinds now." These are varieties that occur naturally in the wild. A pet plant (and it really is creature-like) is C. fusca from northern China and the islands north of Japan. Its deep-maroon, fleshy flowers are covered in woolly, brown hairs - a protection against moisture loss, but also a deterrent to browsing animals.
She also grows lots of the late-flowering clematis: "They're such good value: easy to keep, easy to grow. And I love roses as well, but there are so few that are trouble-free." Nonetheless, her many specimens are expertly grown and without blemish, including the aptly-named 'Brown Velvet', and a very rare Chinese plant, R. cymosa 'Red Dragon', with dainty white flowers and ruby-tinged foliage. The shell-pink rose, 'Souvenir de St Anne's', is one of Carmel's numerous Irish cultivars, that is, plants that have arisen or been bred in this country. They are an important part of our horticultural heritage, and are being carefully minded in this Shankill back garden. jpowers@irish-times.ie
Carmel Duignan's garden at 21 Library Road, Shankill, Co Dublin, is open in aid of the Blackrock Hospice on Saturday, August 14th, 2-5 p.m. 5. Open at other times by appointment to groups of 10 or more (4.50 per person). Contact 01-2824885. The garden is part of the Dublin Garden Group, a consortium of 13 remarkable gardens in Dublin and Wicklow, some of which are not normally open to the public. For details, click on www.dublingardens.com