Costa visits floral designer Sean Cook, whose small inner-city home contrasts a colourful interior with a verdant, foliage-filled garden. Subscribe 🔔 ab.co/GA-subscribe
Sean Cook is known for his flamboyant floral designs and his inner-city home is full of colour. As a contrast, he has focused on foliage and texture in the garden.
“I really didn’t want any flowers in the garden - I wanted a green calming garden to offset all the colour in the house,” he says.
The garden was very bare when Sean moved in.
His love of gardening started with time spent with his granny in Parkes, who had lots of staghorn and other ferns.
They created a retaining wall along the side and planted with a climbing fig up the wall, luxurious lush leafy plants, and rhipsalis hanging from containers. Dracaena trifasciata gives it a vertical element.
The staircase to the upper area has been widened to a space with clumping bamboo for privacy, a small pond with a water feature for sounds and motion, and a mirror, which makes the space look larger than it is.
Sean trims the leaves from the bottom of the bamboo poles to show the poles and lets the tops go wild.
There are staghorns on many walls as a tribute to Sean’s grandmother.
Large pots are clustered in corners for extra interest.
A cacti is thriving in semi shade.
Apart from sweeping leaves and gum nuts, there is very little maintenance involved, although Sean loves playing with it as a form of relaxation.
Featured Plants:
MISTLETOE CACTUS - Rhipsalis campos-portoana
MOTHER-IN-LAW’S TONGUE - Dracaena trifasciata cv. *
CLUMPING BAMBOO - Bambusa textilis ‘Gracilis’
PURPLE-LEAFED PLECTRANTHUS - Plectranthus ciliatus *
STAGHORN - Platycerium superbum
WOLLEMI PINE - Wollemia nobilis
MISTLETOE CACTUS - Rhipsalis sulcata
MONSTROSE CACTUS - Cereus ‘Monstrose’
* Check before planting: this may be an environmental weed in your area
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