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Robyn Kiltythe cottage and garden owner - Garden lover-
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"I believe, as did Monet, and many other artists, that gardening is an art, as one is continually contemplating colour texture and balance" - Robyn Kilty |
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the cottage
I moved into my cottage in 1993, and it was a wreck - rusty leaking roof, stippled ceilings, and cheap painted hardboard walls. I made a wonderful discovery - these unpromising walls were actually covering up original Kauri panelling. But they, too, had been defaced with many coloured coats of paint. It took 2 years to remove the ghastly hardboard and strip off the many layers of paint. But once uncovered, the honey coloured Kauri, was worth every scratch and scrape during those years, and once finished, all I had to do then was coat the wood with Linseed Oil. Nothing more - it has looked after itself ever since. After replacing the roof, the kitchen/bathroom areas were remodelled and a studio was built at the back of the cottage. |
The Garden
In 1993 when I was restoring the cottage, I was also thinking about the non-existent garden I had inherited. It was all lanky long grass, except for 2 enormous dense Pittosporums in the front blocking light to the interior of the cottage Oh, and a wonky aluminium shed in the middle of the long grass at the back. Worker cottages are traditionally symmetrical with a front door in the centre and 2 windows either side, like a nose and 2 eyes. I thought the garden should reflect this symmetry, so I made a brick path with steps up to the verandah with an intersecting path either side surrounded by matching narrow gardens. This all changed after the earthquakes when I decided I needed more garden and less path, so only the central path remained, slightly swollen in the centre to form a circle filled with mosaic. The side paths disappeared and hey presto - two wide garden beds either side. I filled the beds with flowers and some grasses in the 'prairie style' which has been popular in the northern hemisphere for 20 years a la Piet Oudolf. |
