Letter from Julia
Dear garden friend,
Unearthed. was launched as a subscription-based online magazine in 2023, about 4 months before my husband and I drastically decided to upend our lives, buy a little butchery (with no previous experience) in a gorgeous village on Banks Peninsula- our favourite place in the world.
This new adventure required my full input and involvement so I made the difficult decision to refund subs and open up Unearthed. where it could remain as a sporadically updated garden-based blog and archive for all interested gardeners until I once again return to my passion!
Telling the stories of others is ingrained in me as a blogger of 16 years, columnist and author of 3.5 gardening books! So I WILL be back, and with the purchase of a lovely little valley home and a new garden to inch toward my new vision, there will updates here again soon.
In the meantime, please explore and enjoy the shared knowledge here, roaming gardens from both down under and the northern lands!
Nothing changes if nothing changes.
Julia xoxoxoxoxo
Latest Features
THE BEACH BARN
Explore this urban, seaside property where an interior designer and landscape designer found mutual ground.
The garden (still in its infancy) is a collision of styles that reflect the owner Alex Fulton’s aesthetic. Coastal with desert vibes, urban with a borrowed landscape of sea and rural hillsides, design-led but distinctly functional
THE 72 MICRO SEASONS
Explore the intriguing Japanese concept of the 72 micro seasons - a subtle and poetic dialling in on natures movement beyond the very broad four seasons.
PAPER NATURE
Colleen Southwell’s delicate paper creations mirror this concept and more. As a horticulturalist, garden designer and rural woman, her gardened spaces and wider environment have infiltrated her need to create and the results are truly original and achingly beautiful.
Her concentration on form beyond colour zooms us into the fascinating architecture of nature’s specimens, offered to us as if a frozen moment in time.
THE GARDEN CURATOR
Explore the beautiful Australian garden of artist and garden designer Colleen Southwell, where tough plants are used for whimsical structure and soul feeding seasonal shifts.
A GARDEN IN PROGRESS - Part four
The slide through autumn and the first frosty mornings of winter have been a very new experience for me and my garden.
The beds closest to the house which were extended into the lawn and planted in early autumn 2022 have revealed their softening decline for the first time and it has been both rewarding and left me with a few question marks.
LUCY FROM THE FOREST
It’s one thing to find escapism and inspiration in a gardener’s Instagram account (one of my favourite things), but reading the back story behind the feed puts an entirely different lens on what you see, understand and ultimately learn.
That’s how I felt after pulling together this feature on Lucy Szloser’s rambling Polish garden and storybook cottage. While she had captured my full attention through her beautiful emotive photography and sharing on Instagram, I felt her garden gate creak open as I read her words.
FUN BUT STICKY
JUNE 2023 - Jenny Cooper’s Column
The flamboyance, generosity and subtlety of autumn colour almost calls for reverence. Every day the viburnum leaves stop me in my tracks, with their smokey purple tones. The ornamental grapes are a riot of colour.
It seems rude to interrupt it all with my spade and secateurs.
THE GARDEN OF ANN-MAREE WINTER
Explore the highly textured and vibrant seasonal planting by Ann-Maree Winter in her Mornington Peninsula garden. Through her in-depth sharing, discover the gentle changing display as the seasons progress along with the challenges she found in creating shelter and drought-tolerant beds on the top of an exposed, clay-ridden slope.
PERSICARIA
Tough, hardy and bringing blooms to autumn, persicaria is an interesting genus to explore! Even if it’s reputation is for it being a little ‘keen’ at times.
A SEASONAL SHIFT
Planting for the seasons is one of the greatest creative joys offered to gardeners!
A beautiful example of how a garden’s essence can change throughout the year is offered here by comparing the spring and summer planting at Flaxmere garden in North Canterbury, New Zealand.
NATURE INSPIRED JEWELLERY BY SOPHIE DIVETT
Sophie Divett had been on my radar for a few years before I eagerly walked through the doors of her Christchurch studio. My heartstrings pinged as I connected with her obvious subject matter but also the imperfect, hand-formed aesthetic that runs through all of her beautiful products.
INTERESTING PLANTS ON MY WISHLIST
Have a browse through this list of extraordinary, architectural plants that are firmly on my wishlist.
PENSTEMONS
Penstemons are hardy, long-lasting and long-flowering perennials that will help you dictate the vibe and colour in your planting.
A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO BOTANICAL PLANT NAMES
Before I started gardening, one of the biggest hurdles in my head, was how could I possibly remember any plant names. For me it was right up there with understanding business accounting. Practically impossible.
But like everything unexpected about this whole gardening ride, the common names of plants I collected stuck in my mind like drops of sap, underlining the fact that we can learn anything if we have an interest for it! However, the botanical names were another level of mystery that I initially, and naively, shoved aside as unnecessary…. boy was that an oversight!
SEEDHEADS AND HOW THEY DISPERSE
I’m pretty enamoured by the forms that seedheads take, and took a dive into discovering why their architecture is all designed for their preferred methods of seed dispersal.
This will have you taking a closer look at the seedheads in your own garden!
NZ GARDENS TRUST CONFERENCE 2023
In my second year attending the New Zealand Gardens Trust Conference I uncovered fresh perspectives that invigorated the way I will plan my next stage of gardening.
Explore some key Wellington gardens that made be think again about resilient planting and the creative use of NZ natives.
OHINETAHI
Join me to explore the far-reaching corners of Ōhinetahi garden in Governor’s Bay, Banks Peninsula, New Zealand. Created by a family of art and plant loving architects, it is now a treasured jewel of significant gardens in Aotearoa. There is great inspiration to see in exotic vs. native planting and traditional structure vs. wildness.
A GARDEN IN PROGRESS - Part three
The third instalment of my series tracking the ups and downs/successes and challenges of my new naturalistic style planting. Here you get a great recap of the ride through the first 12 months and a closer look at the fullness of the summer show.
SANGUISORBA
Being great picking as well as offering an eye-catching form in any garden bed, sanguisorba only tops off its good looks with its very easy-going needs once established. Seek some out!
PLANNING FOR AND WATERING IN THE DRY
Summer is the prime time we worry about the survival of our plant children - but periods of dry can strike in any season and will constantly surprise us with it’s unpredictable rainfall.
Read on for my tips on creating and preparing a garden to cope with the dry as well as advice on getting the most out of your watering when it’s needed.
