Victorian Eternal Gardens: The Art of miniature gardens

A different post from the others. I’ve done some experiments about the famous gardens in miniature, gardens in jars, closed gardens, self-sufficient gardens, etc. I did some research about how these small worlds works and of course, a bit of the story of those beautiful places in bottles.

Pretty much like all those classic fancy ideas, we must thank England for this. During the Victorian age, precisely, the art of terrariums got started and then some creative minds decided to seal the gardens on glass jars.

So why not try such classical art? besides, this is an amazing idea for recycling bottles and plastic.

My experiments were pretty simple, some botanic research is necessary once the “artificial environment” will probably suffer from the increase of head, due to the paradox of “they need light, but not directly.” the plants must resist such microenvironment, with means that you must try to predict possible complications as heat, drainage needs, for example.

These gardens are all about the creation of a possible system for your garden to survive. Naturally, that aesthetics may be the point for most of the people who want them, but beauty is a goal, and not a crucial factor for your garden reaches a half-century of the lifetime.

My pictures aren’t really good cause this was just an experiment, certainly, I’ll try again to great those gardens on bigger spaces (like crystal jars). So forgive me for these poor pics.
The ”ingredients” were:

• Aquarium small rocks
• Aquarium Sand
• Moss provided by tree bark, collected on nature.
• 3 different species that live well on your geographic location, in my case, tropical climate. They could be seeds or young plants.
• Rocks for decoration, preferentially natural: I used some amethysts.
• Soil with abundant organic matter such as dry leaves, small organisms.
• Pieces of cloth (old one).
• Transparent plastic.
• A bottle or recipient made of glass or crystal (with cap or stopper)

The tools:

• Any kind of stick you have at home, hard enough to give you the possibility of handling inside the bottle or jar.

–  Is potentially important to pay attention to the perfect spot to leave your tiny world: Half-shadow, never directly receiving sunlight during sommer. I also would strongly recommend to don’t touch your garden, not only cause the whole point is about not opening NEVER your small garden, but also cause drastic changes of lightning or position could be potentially harmful to the internal environment which your garden has created.

So my first experiments were made using 3 bottles from different sizes: One, pretty simple, smallest, with only one species and moss.. pretty common on South America.
The second one, more like a hilly landscape, made carefully using 4 species and lots of organic matter to make sure it will grow up strong and with enough nutrients. And the last one, which is my favourite, is a miniature forest with its own lake, even artificially built, is still only made with water and of course, for this one were necessary some sketch considering dimensions and absorption factors, layers around and how to separate it from the soil without any prejudice to the species.

Soon enough I’ll make some ”serious” jar, with a full landscape, which will be probably part of further exhibitions cause, well, gardening may be considered an expression of art in your simplicity of ”material” but the complexity of botanic principles and geographic factors to be built.

See you soon with some pictures of my latest exhibition on ”Espaço Protótipo Tópico – Cabaret Scène Sonore ” in Brazil.