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Published on August 17, 2007

When preparing to create a garden around your home, you must first learn where the sun rises and sets, so that you can select the kind of plants that suit your house and garden concept, according to an expert.

Prasert Tulapol, owner of Suan Prasert on Ram-Indra Road, says that his first step when designing a tropical garden is to investigate the direction that the house faces. If the front of house faces east, northeast or southeast, the gardener has to select plants for this area that need sunlight up to 60 per cent of each day.

If, on the other hand, the front of the house faces west, northwest or southwest, the gardener has to provide plants that need sunlight less than 60 per cent of the time.

When the gardener selects plants that are suited to the quantity of sunlight in any part of the garden, they will be healthy and easy to care for in the long term. If the plants are not chosen for exposure to sunlight, the garden may look beautiful for a short while, but the plants may soon whither or die.

An example of Prasert's work is a tropical garden around a house at Perfect Masterpiece in Soi Ekamai, Ram-Indra Road. He designed the garden last year, but it remains as beautiful as the day it was completed.

Prasert says the home-owners wanted a colourful, lively garden surrounding their home, to enjoy in the hours they spent at home.

Prasert studied the house site and the path of the sun from sunrise to sunset, to help him to select plants suited to the location, so he could create a tropical garden with easy maintenance.

The house faces southeast, so Prasert selected plants that need plenty of sunlight and also create pools of shade in front of the house soon after sunrise. He mixed and matched between perennials and smaller plants by creating curves and contrasts between dark green, bright green and colourful plants.

He also set up a fern corner, with orchids and a small fountain near a pavilion in the garden.

"Home-owners and visitors will be able to relax in the pavilion. It creates a kind of resort feeling," he says.

Prasert selected stones and pebbles to form a path linking the front garden with a small garden behind the house. Grass cannot grow in this area because there is insufficient sunlight, so stones and pebbles have been laid down to create a stone garden, and the plants are of a kind that need direct sunlight for less than 30 per cent of the day.

The tropical garden surrounding the Bt25-million detached house cost Bt380,000 to create, and ease of maintenance was built into the design.

However, Prasert's design does not lose its beauty when the sun goes down. He set up lighting around the garden to make it a magic place at dusk.

He says the lighting creates a different feeling for the home-owners because their garden is seen in different colours, when the plants are lit by artificial light.

"We learn the activities of the home-owners and try to create a garden in which they can relax. Owners who spend all of each day at work also need to enjoy their gardens in the cool of the evening, after a hard day's work. The garden must create a different feeling at night," Prasert says.

The tropical garden at the house in Perfect Masterpiece is an example for those who want to feel like they can relax any time in their own resort, at home.

"A great garden is an important part of creating your own haven at home. Make it match your lifestyle," Prasert says.

Somluck Srimalee

The Nation