Lawns

[poliphilo]

Lawns have their uses. As sorenr points out they're good for picnics and croquet. But the fetishization of the lawn- the belief that every home should have one- and maintain it to high standards- at a huge cost in labour and natural resources- is bonkers. It needs examining.

Lawns are an artefact of country house culture. When a gentleman's home ceased to be a castle- in the 16th century or thereabouts- he started to experiment with gardens. The word lawn- wikipedia tells me- is first recorded in its modern sense in 1540. The earliest lawns were pure one-up-manship. The householder was saying to his guest, " Look, I have so much land I can afford to keep this large expanse of it out of cultivation." In the 18th century, lawns passed into the repertoire of landscape gardeners like Lancelot "Capability" Brown- who was in the business of turning gentlemen's parks into versions of the Roman campagna as painted by Claude Lorrain. A century later as the middle classes and then the working classes became gardeners (on a smaller scale) they took over the country house aesthetic more or less entire- (this is a gross over-simplification)- and that included the lawn- no matter that a grassy sweep of half a mile looks rather more striking than a square of a few yards across.

I wouldn't dispute that lawns- as elements in a larger design- can be beautiful.  Of course they can. But taken on their own they're a bit limited- monochrome and whatever is the opposite of bio-diverse. Here- on our two or three acres in Kent- we have a garden with lawns and a much larger area of former grazing land that has been allowed to develop in its own sweet way. If I'm going for an afternoon walk I pass quickly through the garden and out into the fields- where the grass grows to different lengths- some cropped by rabbits, some untouched by anything- and there are all sorts of wildflowers, weeds, brambles and fungi,  plus the wildlife that goes with them. Compared to fields, lawns are sort of boring.

Comments

[sorenr.livejournal.com]

Ah, but to have both! One day - in the far, far future, I fear - I hope to have a few acres to garden on as well, and then there will be room for 4 gardens: The terraces by the house for barbecues and enclosed "secret" garden rooms, the "formal gardens" with wide herbaceous borders and a cut lawn for games and guests sleeping in tents when we have big parties, a large kitchen garden that will provide at least a degree of self-sufficiency, and finally a "wild" garden with wild-growing grass and meadow flowers, interspersed with fruit trees and berry shrubs and a chicken coop.

It is lovely to dream, isn't it? A garden like my dream would be impossible for me to achieve, but I do love the dream. A mix between Sissinghurst's gardens and my grandmother's garden on the farm... But when I step away from the dream and look at it in reality's stark light I can still see how I can create it in a much more realistic size.

But the dream should come before the reality. When you have the dream, reality can be adjusted to at least live up to parts of the dream. Like our balcony in Houston where I can at least sit and look out on trees and wildlife. It's not the entire dream, but for now it will do. And I have my pots of bougainvillea to give me the feeling that there's at least a small part of the view that is mine to care for. Mine to make inviting to insects and hummingbirds.


Still, I envy you. To be able to walk out into a garden and beyond every day...

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I'm very much in favour of the sort of gardens you describe- just so long as someone else maintains them.

It's been ages since I went to Sissinghurat- and it's only a few miles down the road from here. We frequently drive through the village on our way to someplace else.

[sorenr.livejournal.com]

I'd love to maintain a garden like that, but... You can't do that with a full-time job, so the dream has to be scaled down. But... A dream is good to have!

[cmcmck.livejournal.com]

Mebbe, but they're nicer out back of a terraced house than concrete! :op

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I'll give you that.

They're also much nicer than decking.

[puddleshark.livejournal.com]

A small lawn out the back is a very useful area...

But those people who buy a house with two or three acres and spend their lives riding around on a motor mower, cutting it into chequer-board patterns? When they could have a wild flower meadow full of bees and butterflies and birds instead? *shakes head in amazement*

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I don't believe they can have thought things through. They're just conforming to the wisdom of the age.

[butterscotch711.livejournal.com]

You make really good points, but lawns are almost totally non-existent in Korea and my god I miss them! I miss the crunch of short grass under my feet, I miss sitting or lying on grass to relax, I miss the smell of grass after rain...

I guess the smell could be provided by more natural-style grass-scapes, though. Those are increasing here, luckily, as Korea recovers from its later-20th-century cement explosion and creates some parks and green public spaces.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Lawns are almost always going to be preferable to cement.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

The opposite of "bio-diverse" is "monoculture".

And "boring expanse of undifferentiated monoculture that sucks up WAY too many resources in terms of potable water, fertilizer, and time" is a description of the lawn that many of my friends use.

I can see an argument in favor of having enough lawn for a picnic, croquet, and bocce/pentaque/bowls/whatever you want to call the game. But anything more than that seems like a waste.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

I've been trying to create a home meadow in front of my house, as an alternative to a law.

Oh, wait. No.

I mean "I've been totally ignoring my front lawn for years and seeing what happens." But the result is actually pretty nice.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

It's interesting to see what turns up, innit!

[wyrmwwd.livejournal.com]

They are good when you have children and/or dogs. Kids can run and play and do somersaults on them. I remember doing that as a kid. When dogs pee on them, it just goes into the ground. (of course, it can affect the nitrogen balance, but I'm not fussy about such things). When they poop, it is easy to pick up.

HOWEVER... California is in a MASSIVE and SERIOUS drought. People are beginning to take out their lawns right and left. This is probably good, but I fear that it is going to effect the ambient temperature. It is noticeably cooler in places wear there are lawns, hotter in places where there isn't. That may contribute to something later on.

Although... Southern California used to be a desert. I suppose there is no reason to keep it from reverting to its natural state.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Grass just doesn't belong in Southern California. It's an alien import.

It ought to be possible to create gardens using the local flora. Cactus gardens? Rock gardens?