Narrator: Look around. If you’re a gardener, you’ll notice plant types you never thought could thrive together in the same climate and growing conditions: succulents, New Zealand flax, cannas, roses, even Scotch heather. They live under the Stream Garden’s deciduous trees, which drop their leaves in winter. Irwin chose these trees for their sculptural form, but equally likely, for the nuanced plays of light through their leaves and branches.
But for all its horticultural richness, the Central Garden isn’t about plants, per se. It’s as much a show of light, form, texture, color—the elements of art.
As you descend the hill, it’s a subliminal, yet calculated, effect. The stream gets louder, and correspondingly, the plantings get taller, more vividly colored, more varied.
Jim Duggan is the Central Garden’s main gardener, and worked with Irwin over many years.
Jim Duggan: Plants do have structure. And then there’s pattern not only in the stems, but there can be pattern in the leaf. And of course, there’s texture, too.
Narrator: And color. As a painter, Irwin mastered it: paint’s hues, intensity, amounts, juxtapositions.
Charlotte Frieze: Sometimes it’s the branches that are colorful; other times it’s the foliage, or it’s the flowers. He’s creating a space in the shade of the sycamores that’s punctuated with yellows and whites and, and oranges and reds, to attract your eye down along the edges of the stream.
Jim Duggan: "Kicker-colors" are really important to Bob. Colors that activate other colors.
Narrator: At the top of the hill, these kicker-colors are orange and yellow. Farther down, they’re blue-green, then red. And near the bottom of the hill?
Jim Duggan: It’s chartreuse, this really vibrant yellow-green.
Narrator: Colors to brighten the shadows … until you exit the Stream Garden—and find yourself surrounded by light.