A garden alpine paradise right on our doorstep

Gardens can have many shapes, and while we often associate them with grand, old estates and wide landscapes, there’s just as much pleasure to be found in detailed and small arrangements.

Size does not necessarily restrict the variety of plants if it goes hand in hand with design.

A place that shows this very well is Coolwater Garden in Fedamore, Cloghadoolarty, not too far north of the Cork border with Limerick.

The garden lies 20 minutes south of Limerick city, with Rockstown Castle to the north-east and Skule Hill to the south-east.

Half an acre in size, the garden slopes down to the west. That defines its general climate, as the wind blows nearly all the time, making it a slightly colder and more uncomfortable place for its inhabitants than the general area.

The two gardeners here are Kevin Begley and his wife. He started gardening out of a dislike for grass cutting - luckily for all the visitors and garden lovers now.

After some big transformations, the place is now divided into the back and the front garden. Most of the back garden takes the shape of a pond, done in November, 2009, with the other parts added in 2010 (I will get to them later).

The front garden is a superb collection of specimen shrubs, trees, alpines and some herbaceous plants, combined with fitting architecture as well as hard landscaping, and was done in 2011/2012.

It is clear from the first step one takes in this garden that a big focus lies on alpines and succulents. Planters with miniature mountain arrangements are tucked in or presented everywhere, and it is not an exaggeration to say that even the two-hour guided tour is not enough time to admire all the plantings.

Before one gets to the alpines in detail, there’s much to discover. Daphne bholua ‘Jaqueline Postil’, for example, a wonderful semi-evergreen shrub with beautifully scented flowers from midwinter to spring. Kevin regularly gets comments on it from walkers down the road, so take note for your own garden.

One comes across a pagoda, Passiflora and Clematis ranking up the structure and showing off their flowers. It was the first sloped and curved pagoda the builder did - and Kevin said he told him it would be his last!

There’s a wedding cake tree, Cornus controversa ‘Variegata’, Eucalyptus specimen and a blue Atlas cedar to admire.

In one of the many planters sits neatly the smallest elm of the world, Ulmus parviflora ‘Hokkaido’, which grows up to three inches in 30 years.

When one walks out of the terraces and patios and borders that make the front garden, one encounters a multitude of troughs leading around the house towards the back garden.

Kevin has 70 troughs planted up and three more in planning. This is where it gets enticing for the alpine and succulent fan. There’s Saxifrages, Sedums, and Sempervivums, in more varieties than one can count.

In fact, they grow so well that Kevin changed the layout of some troughs, with a cast iron plate at the back and some stones put vertically against it. This way, the plants can’t overgrow the stones, and the picture of a mini-mountain habitat stays unspoiled.

Rarer plants can be found as well, for example Aquilegia einseleana, native to the eastern Alps, with strikingly blue flowers in June and July.

When one manages to get the eyes away from the troughs to cast a view over the back garden, we’re rewarded with a beautiful pond. Waterlilies flower abundantly in it, and a floating pavilion can be spotted. It is floating because there was nowhere in the garden to put it (as all the space is needed for the alpine collection), so it was installed on the pond.

The vegetation that surrounds the water is mostly native wildflowers, meadowsweet and purple loosestrife for example. They are cleverly planted in vegetable crates, which sounded like a good plan for maintenance, but now all the roots are intertwined, and they are better left in place.

The back end of the garden, that is, the eastern one, offers a view to Skule Hill from a veranda, one of two so-called borrowed views. The concept of a borrowed view, or a borrowed scenery stems from east-Asian garden culture. In this case, it means incorporating Skule Hill into the garden by making it accessible to see and fit with the surroundings.

The same goes for Rockstown Castle, which can be admired from the pavillion, and indeed, by sitting down and looking at it, it feels part of the garden scenery.

The treasure of the whole place though must be the more recently added green house. Built three years ago, it now contains a mesmerising collection of rare alpines and succulents. The south-facing side is made with limestone, the north-facing with slate, and the east-facing at the end is home to succulents. Limestone keeps the pH slightly alkaline, slate on the other hand acidic.

With the right foundations laid out this way, plants can thrive even if they are not in the mountainous habitats of their home.

This special collection has to be seen in person, but is impressive in another point. Throughout the whole garden, the plants are meticulously labelled, but in the greenhouse even their origin is included on the label. It is a true feast for the plantsperson.

A last but important thing to mention, the garden can be visited by appointment only. The webpage can be found online by typing in Coolwater garden, opening days in general being Wednesday to Saturday.