Notes from the making

Why succulents are different

Most people who bring a succulent home don't think about where it came from. They think about the pot, the placement, the way it looks on the shelf. But the species is the first decision — and it determines almost everything that follows.

Succulents are not all the same. An echeveria from Mexico and a haworthia from South Africa have different needs, different tolerances, different ideas about what a good life looks like. Getting to know the species — really know it — changes how you grow it.

A selection of succulents before potting — the first act of choosing.

Finding the right species for a space takes time. We keep notes — light levels, watering frequency, how the plant responds to seasonal change — but the real test is always the garden. Does it settle in? Does it hold its shape through summer? Does it feel like it belongs?

The answer to that last question sounds unscientific. It isn't. A plant has a memory. It remembers how it was grown, how quickly it was moved, what conditions it came from. A succulent that struggles in its first season will often struggle in its second. One that settles in tends to keep settling.

Learning to read your soil

Reading soil is the part of gardening that takes the longest to learn and the longest to forget. You can know intellectually what good drainage looks like — water moving through freely, no pooling, roots that breathe — and still spend years before you can feel it by hand.

"A plant has a memory. It remembers how it was grown, how quickly it was moved, what conditions it came from."

— Rooted in Harmony, garden notes

What we've noticed over the years is that soil reading is less about testing and more about listening. The garden tells you what it needs — there's a stillness in a plant that's settled, a particular quality to leaves that are neither thirsty nor waterlogged. You stop intervening and the plant grows. That moment is the beginning of a real garden.

We work with a simple soil test before every planting plan. Not a laboratory test — just a handful of soil, a glass of water, and time. The way the soil settles tells you more than most reports. Sandy soil settles fast and clear. Clay soil stays murky for hours. Most garden soil is somewhere between, and that somewhere is what you're designing for.

Most forms are thrown in a single session. Larger vessels — anything over 30cm — are built in two stages, with a drying period between. The base is thrown first and left to firm up overnight. The next morning I add the upper section, joining the two with slip and compressing the seam from inside. Done well, the join disappears. Done badly, it cracks in the kiln.

Glaze as a second skin

All our planting plans are built from first principles. Site assessment, soil type, aspect, water availability, existing plants — a handful of variables that interact in ways no formula can fully predict. No template plans. This is partly principle — we want to know exactly what's in every garden — and partly necessity. A plan that ignores the site will fail, and most template plans ignore the site.

A completed planting plan — the site assessment shapes every decision that follows.

Designing with drought in mind

Drought-tolerant design is the part of garden design I think about most. I've been refining our approach over six years — working with succulents, Mediterranean plants, and native species — and every garden is different. The same species, the same soil amendment, the same planting density will produce different results depending on the microclimate, the season, and what the garden decides to do with the conditions it's given.

Establishing a drought-tolerant garden takes two full seasons. The first is slow — plants settling in, roots finding their depth, the garden adjusting to its new conditions. The second is the test: the first dry summer, the first cold snap, the first moment the garden has to look after itself. The third season is usually when it starts to look like it was always there.

"The most resilient garden is the one that works with its environment — not the one that fights it."

— Rooted in Harmony, garden notes

When the second summer ends and the garden is still standing — still growing, still looking right — there's a particular satisfaction in it. Not all the plants make it. Some choices turn out to be wrong. The ones that do survive carry something a watered, coddled garden can't give them: a resilience, a sense of having earned their place. That's what we're designing for.