Diarmuid Gavin: My new garden for the ‘Dancing at Lughnasa’ house in Glenties will pay homage to lovely laurels

For the past couple of months, I have been taking regular trips to the delightful town of Glenties in Co Donegal. It’s not a place I’d visited previously, being slightly off the beaten track, but on these occasions, I’ve had a wonderful reason.

I’ve been commissioned to design a garden for a property called The Laurels, situated just outside the town. The Laurels is known for its connection to renowned playwright Brian Friel and serves as a setting for some of his most famous works, including Dancing at Lughnasa.

Through the Brian Friel Trust and Donegal County Council, it will become part of a collection of buildings in the town that celebrate his work. My job is to reimagine the garden and bring an essence of some of the magic of his writing to that design.

The first step in a situation like that is to listen — to listen to the landscape itself and what people who are interested in this building, the place and Friel’s work have to say. Listening to the landscape started out with making a decision. Much of the boundaries of The Laurels are planted with the species after which the property is named. Laurel, or Prunus laurocerasus, is a fast-growing evergreen hedge, which isn’t native, and smothers any other species that tries to grow in the shadow of its dense canopy.

The other issue concerns the ash trees on site. Some are suffering from ash dieback disease. Most are relatively healthy at the moment so rather than take them all out, the plan is to manage them by cutting back dead and diseased wood.

The laurel boundary will also be cut back. Its positive attributes will be embraced — the driveway up to the house is now covered in an archway of its evergreen foliage, creating a dancing, dappled light on a sunny day. For the design, we’re considering a soundscape using the magical rhythms of Irish traditional music as evoked in the play, to lead people in a ghostly, lively dance around the property. Here the laurels could be a distinct advantage, creating a green wall off which the sound will vibrate. Once renewed with a heavy pruning, these plants will be kept restricted, and all species that we introduce to the site will be plants that are native to our small island.

Around the back of the house, the plan that is in my head at the moment is to develop an oval terrace surrounded by the existing ribbon of ash and sycamore where performance, be it storytelling or dance, can take place.

The new garden will hopefully be a joy for visitors and a haven for wildlife. My planting list includes holly, which is evergreen, slow-growing, has year-round interest and will provide plenty of winter fruit for birds. Hazel trees produce early catkins, which are a great source of pollen for bees, and the nuts supply food for birds and small mammals.

This site will be perfect for the rowan tree, Sorbus aucuparia. Commonly known as mountain ash, rowan offers beautiful clusters of berries in the autumn. And on the ground, I’ll have sprinklings of wood anemones, which are charming, early spring-flowering plants with delicate white blossoms. They will thrive in the dappled shade and will naturalise to form a carpet beneath the trees.

The primrose, Primula vulgaris, which we know and love, will also do well here. Foxglove will flourish here too, and give us a cheerful splash of colour a little later in the summer months, with its tall spikes of pinkish purple flowers.

The common dog violet, with its heart-shaped leaves and purple flowers, will mingle through the wood anemones; and red campion, a perennial with deep pink flowers that blossoms in late spring through to early summer, will add a pop of colour.

With these native flora, I’m seeking to echo the colour, delight and exuberance of nature. Brian celebrated Lughnasa, the old pagan harvest festival, in his play and movie. To plant some of that celebration will be a pleasure.

Plant of the week

Cress If you don’t have a garden or outdoor space but want to grow some food, have a go at microgreens. These include cress and can be grown on a sunny windowsill. You can use a shallow tray or pots, and surface-sow the seed on to moist compost, or even moist cotton wool or kitchen cloth. Cover with cling film to retain moisture until the seeds germinate, which will be in a few days. Uncover and keep growing medium moist, and your crop will be ready to harvest in another fortnight.

Reader Q&A

Hi Diarmuid,

How do you care for heleniums over winter? Do I need to cut them down?

Thanks, Moira

Helenium is a perennial and, like most perennials, can be cut back now to within a few inches of the base. Layer some mulch or compost around the base and it’s all set for winter.

Submit your gardening questions to Diarmuid via his Instagram @diarmuidgavin using the hashtag #weekendgarden