'Tranquillity through dappled light' at Ellerslie

11 February 2013

A tranquil courtyard garden for a modern architecturally designed house is the inspiration for designer Kevin Gillespie's exhibit at this year's Ellerslie International Flower Show.

The Manawatu landscape architect, formerly from the United Kingdom, is working hard on his design Tranquillity through dappled light and will be arriving in Christchurch later this week to start building the garden in North Hagley Park.

"The garden is a tranquil restful space for quiet reading and relaxation. The interplay of hard and soft landscape features highlight the contrasting light characteristics introduced by shadows into the design, especially in a country such as New Zealand with strong natural light."

Caption:
Manawatu landscape architect Kevin Gillespie's design for Ellerslie International Flower Show 2013 is based on creating a tranquil courtyard garden for a modern architecturally designed house.

Kevin, who owns his own landscape design business GLD, entered in last year's show but his exhibit - A Garden of Two Halves - was not judged as it was not quite finished. He had also entered into the 2011 show, which was disrupted because of the 22 February 2011 earthquake.

"Last year I was very ambitious with the size of my garden, but I received a lot of great feedback from the judges who encouraged me to come back again in 2013.

"This year I have made my exhibit a bit smaller, 13m x 6m, and have been focussing on it full time for the last couple of months. Ellerslie is a lot of fun every year and I am looking forward to seeing a lot of familiar faces down there."

The elongated site has a linear design that can be viewed from three sides. This linear axis is the ideal initial viewing point of the design which has two dominant features; the first being a striking wildflower meadow planting to the foreground and the second being the series of macracarpa arches.

"The arches form a 'tunnel' with supporting horizontal timber and steel tubes topped off with overlapping planar (two dimensional) features that are used for visual interest and to diffuse the natural light into the interior spaces," Kevin says.

He has always been interested in the relationship between architecture and the natural world, having originally studied architecture at university. However, his interest in landscape was greater than his interest in buildings so he changed his degree to landscape and archaeology.

"Ellerslie gives me the best of both worlds and it is fantastic to be able to share that with others."

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• To book any of the Edible Ellerslie sessions go to www.ellerslieflowershow.co.nz

• Discounted tickets for Ellerslie International Flower Show, at Early Bird prices, are available until midnight on 18 February 2013 from the website www.ellerslieflowershow.co.nz all open Christchurch City Council Service Centres, Mitre 10 Mega Stores in Christchurch, Ashburton and Timaru, Terra Viva, EziBuy at Tower Junction and Nichols Garden Centres.

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