Alpine Troughs, Miniature Gardens

One of the places we always check out whenever we visit the RHS Wisley garden is the Alpine area. In there you can find the alpine display house, crevice garden, raised gravel beds, and several small troughs with alpine plants thriving in them. I do like this section of the garden, so many miniature plant gems and most of them are hardy too, given that their other growing conditions are met of course and the most common denominator of which is sharp drainage.

The Centenary Crevice Garden at the Alpine Area of RHS Wisley

One of several raised beds outside the Alpine Display House. This usually has a roof on it during winter to keep the bed on the dry side (as winter in the UK is usually wet, too wet for some alpine plants).

Some nice little gems inside the Alpine Display House...

Dianthus erinaceous and Cryptomeria japonica 'Tenzan-sugi'

Love the foliage of cyclamens! Not too fussed about the flowers though. Cyclamen graecum subsp. mindleri

I wonder how many look down and admire the paving like we do....

And even more nice little gems growing outside too!

I love this one - Tanacetum argenteum subsp. canum

Close up of the same plant, nice!

Crevice Garden

The troughs are a particular favourite of mine within this section. It always makes me smile seeing these troughs, each of them having different arrangements and individual designs. Like there was a competition among different gardeners making them whilst the area was being conceptualised years ago. And each trough looks like it's mimicking a garden or natural landscape, but this time only in miniature. Each trough effectively complements the appearance of these alpine plants and at the same time sympathetic to its growing requirements.

A miniature rockery garden in every individual trough! And just like big gardens, some are better than others...

This one is my favourite. I almost felt like wanting to go to the rockery centre instantly and buy oddly shaped slabs of slate to recreate this trough. One for the idea bank!

Whilst this one is Gaz's favourite of the lot. The slabs used were smaller and more irregular, and the trough itself is twice the size. I can imagine repeating rows of troughs similar to this would look great in a larger patio or balcony.

Needs 'freshening up' of the plants/planting, otherwise it's a nice, simple, yet effective arrangement.

Not bad! The labels are very distracting but this RHS Wisley so that's fine. Go easy on the plant labels though if one intends on using it in a private garden.

Simple but nice, if a tad sparse on plants. This trough reminds me of a miniature Japanese rock garden.

Do you have any leftover tiles after re-tiling your bathroom? Then use in a trough...

Now this is better! Looks modern and contemporary and wouldn't mind recreating something similar to this myself.

Hmmmm...a goldfish graveyard perhaps?

One of the better ones with a more classic arrangement of stones over gravel.

This one isn't too bad, although some of the plants could do with being replaced to 'freshen' it up.

Another one that I really, really like! And made me think 'big' too, envisaging a bigger version of this arrangement. Instead of a trough, imagine a large gravel bed as the base and on it are arrangement of several reclaimed chimney pots, on different levels and sizes, teeming with sempervivums, agaves, aloes,....you get the picture? If only we had the space and aspect for such a bed. Maybe in the future...

These troughs are a great idea especially if space is an issue, looking great in a sunny courtyard or a balcony. Or even if space is not an issue, as accent pieces in a seating. Only one's creativity and imagination is the only limit.

Mark :-)

Posted in: garden design , Garden visit , RHS , rocks , Wisley