Gardening Space: Front Garden

Directly below my balcony is my front garden. Every morning, as soon as the sun has risen, I would go to the balcony and look down my front garden, and spend a couple of minutes enjoying the view. It's a beauty, especially after a dawn rain. Droplets of rain would glisten the leaves and flowers, saturating the colors to intense vividness. From above, I observe the majestic bird's nest ferns and the eye-catching heliconia leaves, but I am really enamored by the pink-tipped neoregelia bromeliad peeking through the dense foliage

the front garden view from the balcony

Christmas season starts early in the Philippines, and my house is already bedecked with Christmas lights. For the front garden we chose to hang several dozens of white parols. I find the juxtaposition of the Balinese design elements of our house and the very Filipino Christmas decor amusing.

the garden view approaching the house

At about 6 a.m., I have a hasty breakfast of homemade bread, or Budong's pandesal, whichever is available, and a sip here and there of my morning coffee. Once husband and kids are on their way to work and school, I start watering my plants, pruning diseased leaves, making mental notes on what plants to add and where -- while finishing my coffee. I usually start the visit with my balcony plants, then go back down to tend to my front garden.

the front garden view from the living room

This garden is a hodge-podge of hardy tropical plants, most I inherited from my late mother-in-law, others I got as cuttings from gardens of friendly gardeners, and the flowering plants recently bought from my fave plant nurseries.

bird's nest fern, my fave neoregelia bromeliad, pretty-in-pink canna lilies, a yucca with sharp pointy leaves, and snake plant cultivars as border

As a novice gardener, I am still concentrating on hardy tropical perennials, plants that are easy to grow and maintain. I feel that I should first focus on knowing the basics of growing plants, before I would venture on more exotic and high-maintenance tropical plants. These plants I have now and their various cultivars are already beauties in themselves, and I am enjoying knowing what makes them tick slowly but surely.

dracaenas, dumb canes, palms, a begonia (Begonia semperflorens) in bloom, rooster's comb flowers, and a not-yet-flowering rosal (Gardenia jasminoides)

I have a second Balinese door opening to an enclosed garden, a secret garden, for now.

the second Balinese door to the side of the main one; the plants to the left are bougainvillea (Bougainvillea glabra), shaped by wires into a heart, and a couple more rooster's comb plants; the plants to the right are the bromeliads, rosals, yellow dahlias (Dahlia pinnata) and marigolds (Tagetes)

On both sides of this Balinese door are antique santoses, two of the many collected by my husband over the years.

a wooden santos beautifully framed by the elegant leaves of the hanging bird's nest fern (Asplenium nidus)

For this part of the garden, I am trying the achieve the dense rain forest tropical look. Ha! I actually just mixed and matched various plants I already have in my hands and just hoped for the best in terms of look. The fake heron is my husband's idea. He said it matches the surrounding lobster claw (Heliconia rostrata) blossoms. I don't buy it. I think the bird will fly away when he is on one of his business trips. Hehe.

heliconias, palms, and rosal on the foreground; dracaena, miniature palm plants, kalipay, Philippine oregano on ledge

Okay, I really think bromeliads are pretty. That my two neoregelias birthed one daughter pup each tickles me to no end. They were bathing in the searing heat of my roof garden, and I took pity on them, so I transferred the whole family to this more shady area. I hope they like their new home, surrounded by the other flowering plants.

neoregelia bromeliad and her two daughter pups, rosals, dahlias, marigolds, Malaysian mums, lobster claw, bird's nest fern

Moving to the right, we still have a happy mix of tropical shade and rain-loving plants, different shades of brilliant greens, with some peek-a-booing reds and pinks from the flowers.

bird's nest ferns, yucca, canna lilies in the ground; dracaenas, kalipay, aloe vera (Aloe barbadensis Miller) on the ledge