![\"Colour](\"http:\/\/glenvillaartgarden.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/Gresgarth-Hall-038.jpg\")
<\/a>The colour and shape of the red hot poker smacked me in the face, but in a delightful way.<\/p><\/div>\n
<\/p>\n
A\u00a0tall outburst of colour, so different from the colours seen in other parts of the garden, created a real Wow! moment. Literally, my eyes widened with surprise. The red hot pokers were visible from other parts of the garden, too, always drawing the eye and acting as a focal point. They were a Wow! from every direction.<\/p>\n
At Charles Jencks’ Garden of Cosmic Speculation, two red\u00a0bridges stood\u00a0out from the\u00a0verdant\u00a0surroundings. While the shape and colour of both were striking, they weren’t really unexpected or unpredictable. Red is often used for bridges in Chinese gardens or in gardens inspired by traditional Chinese garden design. Since the spiral mounds which are the centrepiece of The Garden of Cosmic Speculation rise out of\u00a0that tradition, painting them\u00a0red was\u00a0not a surprise.<\/p>\n
The red bridge Jencks designed for Jupiter Artland, a sculpture garden near Edinburgh, was. The mounds\u00a0there bore no relationship to Chinese tradition, so the colour could have been anything. Did Jencks pick red for aesthetic reasons or was there some other motivation? To my eyes the colour seemed chosen deliberately to startle viewers and jolt their senses. (Was the jolt pleasant or unpleasant? That depended on who you asked. I was a fan but not everyone in the group I was leading liked it. Even the head gardener who was showing our group around preferred the bridge’s original gun-metal colour.)<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/a>The lines of the bridge mimic the spiral paths on the three mounds visible here. The path through the grass, worn by visitors and passers-by, could do with some improvement.<\/p><\/div>\n
<\/p>\n
Still, this difference pointed out something important. To be unexpected\u00a0the surprise element — whether it is a colour, a shape or an object —\u00a0needs to differ in some significant way\u00a0from the rest of the garden. It\u00a0has to vary markedly from the garden’s\u00a0norm, whatever that norm may be. In a formal garden a curving path can be unexpected. In a garden with\u00a0Arts and Crafts elements, it can be a white line drawn on the grass.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/a>Througham Court is full of surpises. You can read my review of this garden<\/a>\u00a0dated February 25, 2015 at ThinkinGardens.co.uk<\/p><\/div>\n <\/p>\n Unusual flowers or flowers arranged in an unusual way, like the muscari path at Glen Villa, can be a surprise.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n This photo is from 2007, the spring after we planted the muscari bulbs for the second time.<\/p><\/div>\n <\/p>\n So can hedges trimmed in an unpredictable way,\u00a0like these at Le Jardin Plume in Normandy.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Hedges cut in unusual ways are a feature of le Jardin Plume. On my recent UK tour I saw equally inventive hedges at The Garden of Cosmic Speculation, Scampston Hall’s Walled Garden and Shepherd House, a small personal garden near Edinburgh.<\/p><\/div>\n <\/p>\n And without doubt, objects that you wouldn’t expect to find in a garden any where can surprise the stuffing\u00a0out of you.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n A fire hydrant could be useful in a garden, I suppose, but only if it is connected to the mains. This one was\u00a0not. Without dispute, however, it acted as an unexpected focal point, drawing your eye irresistibly.<\/p><\/div>\n <\/p>\n At York Gate, a garden near Leeds, I turned a corner and came unexpectedly across a stark white\u00a0fire hydrant. To say I was taken aback is an understatement. I actually blinked to make sure that I was seeing what I thought I was.<\/p>\n I admired the way the white hydrant\u00a0was positioned, beside a variegated shrub and in front of white birch trees, reinforcing the tonalities of both. But a fire hydrant? Possibly there was some personal or historic reason that accounted for it, some reason I still don’t understand. But for me\u00a0the fire hydrant came dangerously close to kitsch.<\/p>\n I’m not a fan of kitsch, in gardens or anywhere else. Bicycles hanging from trees are unexpected, and can occasionally make me smile, but that doesn’t mean I like them.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n These bicycles at Bryan’s Ground near Presteigne, Herefordshire are definitely unexpected. You may find these amusing, I don’t. But then humour is a very personal thing.<\/p><\/div>\n <\/p>\n The same goes for garden utensils that look like pink flamingoes. I get the joke. It just doesn’t amuse me.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n At Mt Cuba, an American garden that specializes in plants of the mid-Atlantic states, a pink flamingo made of spades and trowels seems decidedly out of place.<\/p><\/div>\n <\/p>\n Doing the unexpected can be risky. It takes courage to go beyond the usual, and going there doesn’t always succeed. But when it does, it lifts a garden out of the ordinary.<\/p>\n At Broadwoodside, a garden near Edinburgh, maple tree are arranged in a grid in a courtyard. Each tree\u00a0bears a label, hung like a sign on a decanter of Scotch. Each label identifies the tree — and\u00a0every identification is wrong.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n<\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a>