Natasha Morgan - The Productive Garden Companion

Join me in conversation with @natasha_morgan_ architect and landscape architect, former lecturer from RMIT and Melbourne Universities and author of The Productive Garden Companion. 

We cover a lot of ground in the conversation including navigating anxiety in motherhood, how Natasha has created her business around her passions, creating gardens for moments of intimacy and connection and diving into her gardening know-how as encapsulated in her wonderful new release, The Productive Garden Companion. 

Links:

• Natasha's website - https://www.natashamorgan.com.au/about
• Natasha Morgan social media - https://www.instagram.com/natasha_morgan_/?hl=en
• The Book, The Productive Garden Companion - https://www.natashamorgan.com.au/the-productive-garden-companion 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

For me, a productive garden is something that gives more than it takes. Whether that is food or flowers or herbs or medicinals or biodiversity or nourishing the soil or community.

SPEAKER_03 0:16

Hi, I'm Sophie. Welcome to Big Things Little Things. A podcast series where I sit down with inspiring change makers to discuss the big things they're doing, the little things that make them who they are. And together we vision pathways towards a better future. I'd like to begin by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which I'm recording, the Gethable people of the Bunjalung Nation, and pay my respects to elders past, present, and emerging. Welcome back to the podcast. My name's Sophie, and I'm your host. Today I'm so excited to share this conversation with Natasha Morgan. So Natasha is officially an architect and landscape architect, and she has previously lectured at RMIT and Melbourne universities. So she broke away from her very successful career in landscape architecture to immerse herself in her passions of growing, gathering, foraging, flowering, making, and preserving. So she moved away from Melbourne to a place called Spargo Creek, to a five-acre property called Oak and Monkey Puzzle, which she transformed into a world-renowned space where she ran collaborations and workshops and uh bespoke events. So more recently, she has decided to apply what she learnt at Oak and Monkey Puzzle to a 515-square meter block in Dalesford, which she calls Little Cottage on the Hill, which is really magnificent. And so today we discuss all of this and more, including Natasha's fabulous new book, The Productive Garden Companion. So this book redefines productivity to me in a way that really just makes a lot of sense, considering where we're at in the world right now. So I hope you enjoy this conversation. And if you do, I would love if you could leave a five-star review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. And even better, tell a friend who you think would like this conversation to tune in. Thanks so much, and I'll see you at the other side.

SPEAKER_00 2:39

Oh, that's so nice to hear.

SPEAKER_03 2:41

Yeah, well, I have a note here. Like there was a particular picture in the book that was of a spring posey of double black Lenten roses. Yeah. And I just put like dash, lush. I'd never seen those kind of roses before. And it's just they're so magical.

SPEAKER_00 2:57

Yeah, so they're the the the winter roses, the lenten roses, so the hellabores, and I do like to grow things that are a little bit different. Like I figure that if you're gonna grow something, why not grow the things that are really extraordinary? And um, I've always grown beautiful things, but now that I'm on a much smaller block, and we can talk about that, you know, that journey, but now that I'm on a much smaller block, which is only 515 square meters, everything has to work hard here. So I don't have any um I don't have any time or space for things that aren't going to give me joy.

SPEAKER_03 3:31

Yeah. Oh, well, this they're so beautiful, and um this is just like a very random comment. But do you know that shop in Dalesford called Manteau Noir? I do. Oh my goodness. So your book is like the garden version of Manteau Noir. It's just so it just almost you can almost smell how beautiful it is, and it has those the real like darkness to how you design things, like your wicking beds, how you've clad them with the black cladding, and they just look so beautiful. And all of these kind of layering effects that you've done, and these repetitions and these swathes, it's just so beautiful.

SPEAKER_00 4:09

Well, I love that you think it's the Montana of, yeah, because um Victoria's always been a huge that's the owner of Montana, she's always been a huge supporter of everything I do, and I have a little um a little side hustle, which is a syrup brand that you know, which is a local organic and forage seasonal brand. And she um was the first store to stock it. And yeah, so um she was actually like, you need to sell this, this is so delicious, you know. And so I feel very chuffed because literally Montenoir is one of my favorite places in the whole world to hang out.

SPEAKER_03 4:44

Oh, it's so good. And I also hear you say that and recognize I actually used to speak French, and I just got the pronunciation very wrong, and just follow Natasha's lead on the pronunciation of words. I've lost all of my French, and anyway. Just to begin with the questions. So um, I had previously listened to you speak on the Future Standing podcast with Jade. Yeah, and I really appreciated one of the um, I guess you were just talking in general about anxiety in motherhood. And so you have a career formerly in architecture and landscape architecture. Yeah. And from my understanding, you were really, really successful. And what you were saying to Jade was that, you know, you you found it very confronting, like with children, um, that you were able to control these huge projects uh in your work, but then you kind of struggle because you can't, you know, get your child to go to bed. And I mean, I'm a mother of three and with a former career in law, and although your comments really, really resonate with me. Obviously, I was nothing like as successful as you are, but um just that feeling of being unable to kind of control things when you become a mother can be extremely overwhelming. And I know now your children are older, and I was just interested to ask how you did navigate anxiety and how you do navigate anxiety, and um yeah, just how that looks for you and how you sort of feel like you overcome those moments as they continually crop up.

SPEAKER_00 6:24

I I think it's kind of important to give a bit of context. So, you know, I was raised by a mum who is an immigrant of former Yugoslavia who came to Australia um as a displaced person as a as a child and you know came from absolute poverty. Um, and I think it would probably be safe to say, like a lot of generational trauma. Um and so um I grew up, I suppose, you know, my mum is incredibly supportive, but I did grow up with the weight of expectations on me. Um and for mum, um, and you know, she she was she's was a lawyer up until a few years ago, she's retired now, um, an incredible lawyer. And um, but she really believed in education and a and a career because obviously that is something that could provide for you and and keep you safe, I suppose. And so I've always been a bit of an overachiever. Um, I spent six years working on the Australian Garden, um managing the design and construction of stage two, which was incredible. And um, I was also teaching in landscape architecture at Melbourne Union, RMIT. Um, I'd come to landscape architecture after, or sort of three-quarters of the way through an architecture degree, um, and had decided to take on landscape as a double degree. I probably would have done landscape from the very beginning had I had a different upbringing, but mum was always like, no, gardening's a hobby. And so I got to, yeah, three quarters of the way through architecture, and I'd been avoiding architecture a lot of the way through that that kind of degree because whilst I loved it, it just didn't felt, I just didn't feel like it quite sat with me. Um, I don't know, maybe it was just the wrong soup for me to be in at that time. Yeah, um, but I don't regret it. I mean, it shaped so much my thinking. Um, but I'd always, I think I'd always been an anxious person, but I had always maintained it by having this extraordinary armature. So I was always incredibly good at making sure that I was overprepared for everything and any possible eventuality. Um that resonates, yes. Uh so you know, you know, the top of my year in landscape architecture, you know, winning all the awards and all of those things and working at an incredibly high level in landscape architecture. And then I had my daughter, my first child in 2010. And I got to, and it was exactly the same thing for both of my kids. I got to 10 weeks when they were both 10 weeks old. And it was right at that time when um a newborn baby just doesn't just go to sleep, you know, like up until that time, you can basically breastfeed them, change their nappy, and they'll sleep, you know. And um, you don't really have to do a lot, like all they do is eat, sleep, and poop, basically. But but then something they get this slightly higher consciousness at 10 weeks old, and you have to actually actively get them to sleep. And I didn't know at the time, obviously, my daughter was very young. I didn't know that she was autistic. And um, a lot of the rules didn't apply to her as a baby, so all those rules like don't put them on their back, uh, don't put them on their tummy, don't put them on the side, you know, all of those things that were saying, you know, like you they just wanted them on their back. She hated.

SPEAKER_03 10:01

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 10:01

Um, and it was then that I realized I was like, okay, um, something is going on here that is more than just a mother's um a first-time mum, sort of, you know, that unfamiliarity or whatever you want to call it. And um I managed that by I don't know, how did I manage that? I managed that with the support of my sister, mostly. Um, and also just being that person that was like, I spent a lot of time in a dark room bouncing on a fitball.

SPEAKER_03 10:35

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:36

So um during the day she was fine. It was just getting her to sleep at night. And so she had this 25 out 25-minute window. If I didn't get her to sleep in that 25 minutes, she'd be awake for another four to five hours. And now I look at her and I'm like, well, she was overstimulated. If she didn't get to sleep in that mo in that window, then she would become overstimulated. And that was what that would be how long it would take to kind of um to you know get to the next phase, I suppose. Um and then the same thing happened with my son. He was born 18 months later, and I was working part-time in between. But yeah, I was really, I was just like, oh my gosh, like I can manage a $17 million project, but I cannot get my child to sleep. Um and that is when I um checked myself in when my son was about 12 weeks old into a mother-baby um unit. And um, and I just had to learn the skills. Like I just had to find skills that resonated for me outside of a professional context because you cannot over-prepare for children.

SPEAKER_03 11:44

No, that's right. You can't because it's so you can read every book, but it may not apply to your child.

SPEAKER_00 11:49

Yeah. And I remember actually being, you know, in the mother baby unit and the side and having a session with the psychiatrist. And I with Saffron, my my daughter, like she was she is very sensory seeking, and I see that. And she's 15 now, and so I even see the evolution of that. But as a little kid, she was hugely sensory seeking, you know, she was that baby that didn't matter how many times that I said, don't play with your food, it would be smeared everywhere. It's a compulsion, you know. And um, but I remember the psycho, and I was so I would have to pat her until she fell asleep, you know, just rhythmical patting. But the psychiatrist said to me with my son, he goes, 'Do you know what's good, what a pat's good for?' And he patted me on the lap and he goes, 'For waking up.' And when I stopped patting my son, he went to sleep. And so I was like, wow, you know, and so you can get so rigid, I think, about um you see something working once, and then you feel like that has to be the way. It's so true. Yeah, that's so true.

SPEAKER_03 12:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:50

Uh, so you know, I think we're all wired for success. And and, you know, even, I mean, I um I met one mum once, and I just remember that she would, I was aghast that she would A, have her child next to her, and I'd be like, that child's gonna get overtired. How are you gonna get to sleep? But then she would just have the child sitting on the seat next to her on a sofa or whatever, and she would put her hand on its face and it would go to sleep. Oh, wow. And I was like, what magic is that? Um witchcraft. Witchcraft. But I think that she I was always that person that was looking for the ways that you could make everything right.

SPEAKER_03 13:30

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 13:31

Um, whereas she was the one that was just watching and just seeing, and then, and I think that's kind of the irony, is that I've spent an entire lifetime in gardens just watching and being curious. But I saw my children as a personal challenge. Yes, yeah, which is a completely different mindset. I think that when we stop and we observe and we're in the moment, um, and we bring a curiosity to things, then we can learn. Um, I feel very grateful that you know, my kids now being at not adults, but they're in their teens. So, you know, I was saying, you know, Saffron's 15 and Oliver's nearly 14. Both my children are autistic, and um I have learned so much about people by being able to remain curious with them. Uh, and I think that's kind of also the gift of um, in many ways, solo parenting, which is a blessing and a curse in many ways. I think solo parenting is the toughest gig in the whole world, but um, I have a very open relationship with my children um where we talk about um everybody has their strengths and challenges. And some of my challenges look like anxiety, and some of their challenges may look like whatever it might be when they were younger, emotional regulation, or whatever. But then we also have our strengths as well. Um, and I think that that has helped me. I mean, I'm still, I would still say I'm an anxious person. I would say that that's my wiring, you know, that I still um I would say that I'm a deep empath, that I see everything deeply, I feel everything deeply, and so everything lands deeply with me. But my kids and I have this very open dialogue about, oh, you know, like um um, you know, a couple of years ago I was diagnosed um with autism at ADHD, which I don't share with many people, but I now recognize my daughter actually teaches me that now because she we would go to IKEA, for example, and I would go there with all the hope and the promise in the world. I'd be like, okay, I'm gonna get these little, you know, compartments that's gonna organize my life. I'm there for 15 minutes, and I'm like, get me out of here. I'm like grumpy and I'm angry, and I'm like, get me out. And Safi will say to me, Mum, I think you're overstimulated. Yes. But I was raised in an environment where there were certain things that were privileged, you know, which was education and getting things done and being industrious and being productive and making a difference and contributing. Um, and so I just got along, I just got on with that. Um and now I'm like going, oh my gosh, that sensation that I've had, I can now identify that as being overstimulated. Uh really fascinating because I've just turned 50 and I feel like I'm at the very beginning of learning about myself.

SPEAKER_03 16:34

Oh, I I agree. And I think that's just a really relevant thing that you said about um, it's interesting how you say you so naturally come into garden with this inquisitive uh mentality where you're really observing what's going on and then kind of responding through that observation lens. But then it's it is interesting how you know you just through your own conditioning, you you approach children in this different way. And and I guess it's a less intuitive way because it's a learned way. But then if we step back and apply the same lens that we do to gardening, things become a lot, a lot easier, probably in the children relational space.

SPEAKER_00 17:11

And I think why it was so easy for me in gardening is because I grew up like the garden was my place. Even when I, you know, like I have memories of just playing in the dirt, like our very first garden, I wouldn't even call a garden. I would say it was leftover space at the back of where my mum had her legal practice because we lived in the shop front, or we lived behind the shopfront, and it was a courtyard with a rubber tree and some dirt. That's as far as I remember. But that probably takes me back to about two years old. Um but I think as children, we bring curiosity. You know, when we have children as adults, we bring a whole set of preconceptions about how things should or shouldn't be done, and we have things modeled to us. But um, you know, I was just doing a little video the other day which talks about um just that that incredible sense of achievement and wonder and joy that, you know, I remember um, you know, like, and you're I'm sure your kids have done this too, is you know, you get the stocking, you get the soil or the sand, and you get the grass seeds.

SPEAKER_03 18:16

Oh, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:17

And they make their grass-haired monster and they put some googly eyes on it and they make a smile, and then all of a sudden they've got this thing, and there's this incredible wonder at seeing those elements turn into something. It just grows and it keeps growing. As long as you water it, it'll keep growing, you know, until a certain point or whatever. And then you give it a haircut, whatever. And I think that's the thing that has never left me. It's just that sense of kind of wonder. And and so the garden is absolutely that place, but I think coming from it from it's been the one constant in my life since I was little. Um, and that's been sort of nurtured by family friends who had gardens, and it's my mum enjoyed gardens too. Um, we always had beautiful books about gardens, but um, yeah, it took me a lot longer to realize that that was something that was going to become the center of my world. And I won't even say a business because it is literally like everything I do revolves around gardens.

SPEAKER_03 19:16

Well, I do so I actually I do have a business-related question, but I just had a quick question that I wanted to ask because I I love gardening and I garden a lot, but I always feel like my knowledge of the plant kingdom is pretty small, really. And I was wondering like, how have you you seem to have an extensive knowledge of plants and you know, just all these different varieties? It's it's amazing, and I really love it. And I was just wondering, like, when did you start start building up that kind of dictionary of plants within your head? Like, did that start when you're a kid, or did it start in landscape architecture, or did you have to just, is it just constant? How did you do that?

SPEAKER_00 19:57

I think it started from the very beginning and just, you know, recognizing certain things and sense and you know, impatience. Like the irony of a landscape architecture degree is when I was studying it, there was very little in it about plants. We had one subject in plant ID um in first year, and then that was basically it, you know. And I probably would have done a degree in horticulture um had I started from scratch, but because I'd come from architecture, um, I hadn't yet finished my architecture degree, and I wanted, I was like, well, I can't do a graduate diploma in in horticulture, so I was like, I'll just go to landscape. And fundamentally, they're design degrees. Um, and obviously, well, not obviously, but landscape architecture is very contextual, um, it's very much about landscape systems, um, it's about, you know, the nuances of a place and how you generate design from that from the ground up, and that can be hydrology or history or topography or you know, whatever, the all of those layers. Um, whereas when I was studying architecture in the early sort of 90s, architecture was far less contextual than it is now, and it was very much about kind of you know, the hero, you know, the architect, you know, the object as hero, or and but that has shifted and involved so much since then. So I love being able to um generate ideas from a context. I'm not very good at generating ideas out of thin air, so I I'm very much about association, about you know, revealing layers and and of the of the ground or of a place or of its climate. And I think that I'm also very much about storytelling and sharing things, you know, stories. And so for me, plants always had some sort of an association. So that's how I learned it was like, you know, walking with my mum and smelling things, you know, Daphne or Gardenas or. Um or magnolias, you know, the grande flora magnolias. You know, my mum has always been a little bit of a um habitual picker on a walk. I'm like, Mom, don't do that. Someone's garden and you're like, oh, it's only one flower, it'll be fine, you know. Um, but I did you you build it, you build the repertoire, and I would say that probably my plant knowledge has grown the most um in the last 10 years. Uh ironically, you know, having worked on botanic gardens and things like that, but they were such big projects that we had, for example, Paul Thompson, he was doing all the planting design for us on the Australian Garden. So he was the one holding all the knowledge, and there was bits of it that I would hold, but because I wasn't actually picking them or smelling them or um or or planting them myself, a lot of that knowledge really didn't stick for me. Yes. And then when I started making my own gardens, so my my prior to that I had the knowledge of my own gardens and the gardens that I inhabited as a child. Um, but the way that I probably learned the most about plants was by pouring through catalogues. Um, and one of them in particular is like Antique Perennials has a whole list, wholesale list there in King in King Lake. And they don't put any um photos with their lists. So I would have to just go and, you know, I'd be there and I'd get it on in my email and I'd be like searching, you know, and I'd be doing all of those sorts of things. I'd be like, oh, um, that's what that looks like. Um, and that's how I would start remembering them. But the more you plant them, the more you and the more you grow them, the more, and then the gardens that I inhabit, you know, I know um, you know, I've got friends that have got beautiful gardens, and I'm very lucky that I get to spend a lot of time in their garden. It's those conversations. It's about like, oh, what does this do? What does that do? Like, and actually getting to know the plant and its characteristics and and just sharing those experiences, like, oh my gosh, mine's in flower. And they're like, oh, mine, mine, mine hasn't even started yet. And yeah, they're only 10 Ks away, but they're four degrees warmer than me, for example, or whatever it might be. Um, but yeah, that that process of like um looking things up, talking to people about plants. Uh, that is probably where I learned the most.

SPEAKER_03 24:27

There's just so many things, the like plants that you mentioned in your book that I started to do, like because you do actually include quite a lot of photos, and then there's some that are more like you know, lists. And I actually was doing that with some of yours to look things up because it was giving me some really great ideas. Um, because I just I I think I've been quite busy lately, and something that looking through your book really did was it re-inspired me about the garden, and I really loved just like the intentionality behind how you create spaces. There's so much thought and it's really beautiful, and I loved it. Um, so the next question that I've been having some friends ask me lately, that they were really interested to hear of people stepping outside of their mainstream career. How do they build their livelihood, especially parents, and especially like you know, as single parents? Um, and I was just wondering if you could give us a snapshot of what does your um what does your livelihood kind of look like? What are the pieces uh that you have that make up, you know, your work? And what does that look like perhaps on a weekly or seasonal basis? I mean, it's probably a big question, maybe like the cliff notes.

SPEAKER_00 25:44

Yes, yes. So um, well, first of all, my business came from a space of having kids and knowing that I loved landscape architecture, but there was other things I wanted to do. I just worked out. I was like, in my brain, I was like, you know what, I've been working in landscape architecture for 15 years, or does, you know, architecture and landscape for 15 years, and I absolutely love it, but I just feel like I'm not a nine to, and sometimes it was like nine till 10, six days a week kind of a pest, like that there's other things, and the teaching would give me something, and I love that. And I love teaching, you know, first years and final year students and you know, master's students, because I could come to them with different ideas, and I think that's what I'm starting to discover about myself is that I love novelty, not in the sense of like shiny things, but being able to bring myself to lots of different things where they cross-pollinate, you know, and this and it's kind of um creates new things. So I had was living in an old scout hall in West Foot Square at the time, and I wrote on the old chalkboards all the things that I loved doing. And it was cooking and preserving and teaching and cross-disciplinary, you know, pollination and and and collaboration, um, all things that I did in my working environment, but in different, varying degrees. You know, preserve, I've always been, you know, I've always been someone that, you know, preserved things or grew things or, you know, I loved that sort of stuff. And I thought that after my my first um, you know, maternity leave, I would have that all worked out. Well, not even close to it, because here I was trying to wrangle being a human, raising another human, and I thought I'd have that done by my second maternity leave, not not even like that. So, and then that's when I had been fine, I'd been looking for places, and it's kind of a roundabout way of coming to where you've asked me the question, but bear with me for a sec. Um, is that I had been placing all the the um I'd researched while I was still working, like all the places within an hour and a half Melbourne with high rainfall, good soils, art and culture. Uh, and then I found Spargo Creek, this property, which was this old beautiful, old, you know, gold rush era property. And that was the first time that all of those things on those chalkboards make sense made sense to me. Um, and they I was like, oh my gosh, this is it. This is how I can make it make sense. I can teach here, I can make a garden, I can um, you know, grow things and sell things and preserve things. And I started this little street side stall, and for a long time I refused to tell anyone because I felt like it was so quaint that I sort of felt like I was a sellout. I was like, oh my gosh, I've got two degrees, and here I am making jam on the side of the road. And it took a long time for me to kind of like, but then I was getting so much joy from it at the same time, like so much joy. I remember the first time I went foraging for mushrooms in the pine forest behind us, and it was like euphoric. You know, I was like starting to get my eyes in and seeing the mounds and knowing that's where, oh gosh, there'll be one under there, and then you start reading it, and you're really like so utterly 150% present in that space. And it's such an incredible experience. Um, that I had this kind of, you know, this tension between the things I was doing that I loved and should I be doing more? Um, and so I just it was such an incredible opportunity for me. And I was very fortunate, you know, at the time that um, you know, I could do that, I could make that choice. Um, my partner was was working, and I had then I decided to start my business, which was running workshops and teaching. Um, and so initially that's how it started, you know, as I was running workshops, um, and then um I went through a really, really challenging separation um and and COVID as well, and I couldn't do a lot of work, but then my syrups really came to the fore. But along the way, I was really learning how to live seasonally, which is just incredible. Like at first, I I really dreaded or I loved winter and the fog and the mist and the like, and then I realized it went for eight months where we were living, and then I was like, oh my god, and then I started dreading it, and then I, you know, and then now my life is so aligned to the seasons, which I think for me feels so natural now, 10 years on, but I know is such a foreign concept for so many people. And so the way I earn my money, the way my business operates is completely seasonal, completely. So um, you know, after COVID or during COVID, I kind of had this epiphany, which was um as long as I have soil, sky, air, and water, I have everything I need. Which led me to downsizing because I was like, well, if they're my currency for living will, and if you add in community and collaboration as well into that equation, then how much do I actually need? And I never intended on looking after a five-acre property in the forest on my own. That was never part of my grand plan. And the kids were at an age where they wanted to be closer to their friends and their community, which was Dalesford. So I thought, well, wouldn't it be an interesting experiment to downsize and see if I can live like I did on Acreage on a residential block, which is the challenge I've set myself for this property here, which was literally to distill the best of nine or ten years on country acreage onto a city block. And so I still run workshops, I still have my little um preserving business. We're actually here inside my studio, and on the other side is my little commercial kitchen, and um I write and not just for the book, but I write for magazines as well. And I've had to make some pretty huge compromises in terms of the financials of my life, um, but at the same time, the value of my time has gone way up, so it's a really interesting kind of position to go, okay, um, I could be earning five times as much working in landscape architecture. And I don't actually design gardens for other people, and maybe I will in the future, but at this point in time, it's just workshops and writing and books, and um, I'm a community manager for Gardenstead, which is an online social media platform just for gardeners, um, which is international. And so I spend nights working on that, uh, two nights a week with the team that's all the on the other side of the world. But I what I get in return is I can grow the things I want to eat. I can um I remember when I was studying architecture, the it was at the end of um the 90s or you know, towards the end of the 90s, and it was just after the recession and all those sorts of things. And the lecturer saying to me in professional practice, only ever rely on 70% of your income from your profession because it's based on boom bust cycles. And I was um looking, I was re listening to a book the other day about um a portfolio life, and I was like, but that's actually what I have is I have a life that somehow accidentally I have created around my interests and my passions, but it's also around seasonality, and so at different times of life and different times of the year, certain parts of my business, I say in inverted comet, come to the fore. The winter is a quiet time for work for workshops, and um uh I'm seeing actually the value in in doing more works over over winter, but I always use that as my planning time, my imagining time, my writing time. The whole book was written over winter. Um and then, you know, so this week, for example, what is I mean, this week's a bit different because you know, I'm sort of in book pre-launch phase, but yesterday was Monday and I ran a workshop at a beautiful pro a beautiful shop, which is an antique shop, and and it was a table styling workshop with nine beautiful women from all across Victoria. And then uh today I'm working on Gardensted and I'm also working on um a an incredible event that will happen in March next year, which is a regional longest lunch.

SPEAKER_03 34:20

Oh, wow.

SPEAKER_00 34:21

Um, at a beautiful property that will showcase, you know, the the best of the region's um chefs producers, winemakers distiller sideries, and um so it's funny, like it's just you know, some some weeks the money comes in, and other weeks the money doesn't come in. And I have to I have to just trust in the process, but I also um know how to live really frugally these days. Yes. I think that something is very freeing when you know that fundamentally, if you can grow something yourself. Like I used to say, you know, my when we when COVID hit, my son was like, you know, he was like, Mom, you know, it was when the also it was just such a strange time in the world, you know, the supermarket shelves were empty and everything, and we were in the garden and Oliver was, I don't know how old he was, but he was like, Mom, we have our own supermarket here. And I'm like, you know what, you're right. I said, we might be eating a lot of bloody silver beet, but we're still gonna be fine. Um, and I do know that, you know, like, you know, when all this craziness happened in the Middle East recently, I was like, well, maybe I'll just plant a few more things. Uh, and so what I see as abundance is not necessarily about, it's about, for me, it's about living well fundamentally. And I think I've got to a stage in my life where really I am living so extraordinarily well. And whether that is whether money is part of that equation, um it's just part of the equation. You know, I love the idea of being able to grow things that I can swap and share and trade.

SPEAKER_03 35:55

And Dalesford has such an incredible network of people who are into that. I went to stay there. I had I gave myself a my own baby moon before I had my son. And I went down and I stayed in Dalesford uh for maybe about a week and saw some friends down there. And oh, they're just so incredible, the connections they have and how they, yeah, they never need to go to the supermarket because they just have this amazing um network of people that they just trade and barter with, and it's just so fun. It's so it makes me excited to be down there and to see what people are doing. And just very quickly, what did you decide to plant more of with all of the conflict recently? What were your kind of go-tos? Did you ask? Zucchinis. You can't, you know, like you know, yeah, zucchinis.

SPEAKER_00 36:44

If you've ever grown zucchinis, you know that um one is always enough. So I just grew extra, you know, I just threw a few extra things in the ground. It was zucchinis. I mean, garlic, I always grow garlic because I just love it and I can't ever live without it. Um to m just, yeah, just whatever, you know, just tuck a few more things in the holes in the gaps in the garden.

SPEAKER_03 37:10

Yeah, yeah. I got I did potatoes because I for some like there's certain things that I I find easier to grow than other things, and and they're not always the things you would think, but potatoes I always find I grow, I just find them easy to grow. Um zucchinis as well. Apparently, I YouTubed a lot of this, and zucchinis are a top survival food because they store very well, especially when you let them get really big. Um I put in what's it arrowroot? Somebody gave me some arrowroot, so I put some of that in. And a lot I really went a bit hard on more protein-y kind of sources. So um just experimenting with different kinds of um beans, like scarlet runner beans, um, and different bush beans, and yeah, things that I could dry, like mung beans that I could cook with as some kind of semi-protein source. Um, yeah, it's I mean, it was it was a good thought experiment anyway, um, as to how to expand and make your food security a bit more solid through your own backyard. I'm still at most.

SPEAKER_00 38:16

And I I really started thinking about saving seeds as part of that, not just growing more, but saving more.

SPEAKER_03 38:22

Yeah, yeah, so true. Yeah, because the seeds, seed, um, when you go online to buy things in when there's some kind of thing in the news that's scary. Everyone buys out the seeds, it's the first thing to go. Um, so getting back to my list of questions. Um, in the book, you did design, you mentioned it earlier, the Australian garden at the Royal Botanic Garden in Cranbourne. And you said you designed it with intricate detail in mind to create intimate moments and small pockets of experience. And I would love to talk more about how this process looks for you in the garden design. And I know it would depend on the garden and the space, it would be very individual. But what how do you sink into that mindset when you come into a space to design a garden that facilitates intimate moments and pockets of experience? Um, what kind of how do you how do you get in that mindset? And what are some maybe examples of things that you've done that help to create that intimacy and experience?

SPEAKER_00 39:24

So maybe I'll talk through this garden because obviously, you know, this garden um is much smaller, and I've had to so one of the things is this is a tiny little property, it's 515 square meters, and the house takes up most of it, and I've got a studio as well. But I was looking for a property where I could do something interesting, and we've got two big wide verges here. The other thing we have here that I didn't have for 10 years is I have a long view to the south, and I was in the forest before, and so that was an experience. You know, the idea of having a long view was something that felt really meaningful to me here. And it's sort of it's probably the southwest actually. Um, and um and so, you know, creating the verge, I always knew I was like looking at the things that felt meaningful. So one of the things is that when I lie down in my bed in this in this house and I look out to the tree line or the or the you know, the skyline, I actually look out to Wombat Hill Botanic Gardens. And that tree line is very similar to the trees I had at Oak and Monkey Puzzle in Spargo Creek. So that for me was a real thing. I was like, okay, like don't ever obscure that view because it's it's a it gives me a sense of connection, you know, and it feels like it's just really beautiful. And then there's a there's a house just down the road, and it's the cutest little cottage, and they always leave a light on. And when it's deep fog in the middle of winter, it just is like this little golden halo, and that's another view that I absolutely love, but it's an evening view. So I kind of there was bits of it which was based about, you know, my garden and the connection that I could have to views and what those views mean to me. And so on the verge, I knew that I needed to create a space where I could take in that afternoon view and I could see extend out to the rolling hills of Dalesford. And so there were bits that I knew were precious for certain reasons, precious because um they captured the sunlight and I wanted to be able to, you know, grow things that were productive. And a lot of those things that need to ripen need, you know, full sun, which is six hours of sunshine a day uninterrupted. Um, so that was it, is actually, you know, for me, it's about the experience, it's about how I want to inhabit the space and making sure that when I design, I'm designing for me to still have those experiences, whether it is taking in the long view. And it just happens that that long view is, you know, beautiful afternoon spot. And I've put, even though it's on the verge, I've put a fire pit there and a space to sit. And the garden wraps around the back of me. It's all perennials, it wraps around the back of me. So I feel held in that space. So it could be about dimensions, it could be about the vista, it could be about the change in materiality. Um, you know, on the verge, I, you know, most of the space is lawn, but then there's this one space around this um birch tree, which is where I've put a seat in a big monolithic slab of um wood, which is actually a piece of cypress that came from a tree that came down at Oak and Monkey Puzzle. And so I actually milled that and brought it from one to the other. So it also has like a history in it, has a one chapter brought into the next chapter. Um, and the other thing also for me is about having a garden that does lots of things. So uh I want a garden, I don't have space for a picking garden, a vegetable garden, a herb garden, a berry garden. My garden has to do all of those things. So the plants have to work hard, but it also has to be a beautiful hybrid of all of those things. So my Western Verge garden is um it's it is um designed so that it is perennials, it's medicinals, um, it's got an understory of bulbs that are coming up right now. All of the perennials are there that are there are things that need to give me all-year interest. So I'm looking out the window while I talk to you. Um, so they have seed heads and grasses, um, you know, there's lots of things in there that are kind of, you know, pet Oodoff esque, you know, the the um the garden, the planting designer. So I love having things that hold a garden across the seasons. I always want seasonal interest. So I've got layers of things, as I was saying, I've got bulbs coming up underneath, and I won't cut that garden back until the very start of spring when I'm almost. Almost like the plants just want to burst into leaf, and then I'll be like, Oh, quick, quick, cut it back, cut it back. Um, but also it's about bits of the garden that hold me, like I was saying, you know, the garden wrapping around the back of me so that when I'm sitting in a, you know, on that on that big log or that big slab of wood, I feel held in that space. Um, it's about where the sun is so that I can feel warmth in that space, or where the shade is so that I can get shade in summer in that space. Um, I often design gardens or you know, my own gardens so that I can move a chair around them. And I had a friend when I was living at Okamonkey Puzzle that every time she would visit, we would sit in a different part of the garden so that we could experience it from a different vantage point. And I used to love it to be like, let's sit at the end of the lawn spine today. Yeah. And so I do very much think about gardens and the experience and how you want to inhabit them. I was working on a garden um for a friend many years ago, and it was a country property, a beautiful big black barn structure, but no landscape whatsoever. And I said to her, um, what do you want the arrival experience to be? And she's like, What do you mean? I said, Well, how do you want to feel when you come off the dirt road and cross the threshold of your boundary line coming towards the house? Do you want to meander through, like through a parkland and then discover your house at the end? Or do you want the house to be the hero and it be very axial and you can see it, you know, it's that straight axis straight from the dirt road to the house and it becomes, you know, the hero in the landscape? And she was like, Oh my gosh, I've never thought about that. And I think that I'm often doing a lot of choreography when I make a garden, I'm imagining what it's like to, you know, approach it. Like even now, like we've been here for uh four or five, four years now. And sometimes I drive up the hill and we come up to the corner, I go, look at that garden. It's so beautiful. And then I pull up in the driveway and I go, Oh, it's ours, you know. But it reveals itself as you come over the hill. And I wanted to also make sure that because I've taken over the verge and I've met the nature strip planning guidelines to do that, I wanted to make sure that my fence line was permeable. So it's these, um, it's uh it's a material called wattle and wire, and it's timber profile that's woven together, but it's very got a wide aperture. And so for me, I can actually see right from here all the way across. And when I'm up on my veranda, because it's sort of permeable and the planting starts behind the fence and then it continues out, it feels like one continuous garden. So for me, it feels expansive, it feels abundant. Um, you can't see the grass footpath in between because when you're at elevated position, the garden sort of hides it. So there's lots of things I do. You know, I'm thinking about, yeah, where the views are and making sure I maintain them or obscuring views as well. Like, you know, what is the experience? I'm thinking about what the sense I want to have is. Do I want to feel like the eye can extend or do I want to feel held in a space? Um, do I want to find the bits where there's warmth on a cold winter's day? And my garden behind our north fence is my wicking bed garden. You know, that's this beautiful happy accident. It's not really an accident because it sits behind a dark coloured fence, but I'm amazed at the microclimate that sits behind that space. And on a cold winter's day, that is the nicest place to be. And the fact that my wicking beds are full height IBCs, which are those water cubes, means that I can be in that garden standing up gardening, which is another really pleasant way of being in a space. But it feels quite sculptural and architectural as well in a long, narrow space that otherwise would feel quite flat and it would be hidden behind a fence. So there's lots of devices I use, um, but they all center around what is the experience that I want to have in that space. And sometimes that experience is the ability to, you know, connect with the neighborhood.

SPEAKER_03 48:15

Yeah, well, um, I know the Wombat, is it Wombat Hill Gardens? Yeah, Wombat Hill Botanic Gardens. Yeah, I know those gardens. We walked around those gardens when we're in Dalesford and they are just beautiful. The trees are amazing, they're enormous. And it's just so cool how it sits atop the town, you know, it's just amazing. Uh, and I think I know roughly where you live because we walked around. Most people do. And I um yeah, I just was really loving looking at the pictures of your current house. And I love the verge gardens. They're so beautiful. What's the the community's interaction been like with those? Have you had do you have a lot of people that stop in there? Do you have people that come there to get their herbs? Or how does that is it a welcoming kind of thing?

SPEAKER_00 49:01

Or you know for the first time in four years, I have someone who's cutting my rhubarb.

SPEAKER_03 49:08

Oh, oh wow. Well, cutting it, you meant to pull it. Exactly. Did you leave a sign being like, dude, pull it? Don't cut it.

SPEAKER_00 49:15

And I'm very mindful that it's a public space. But there's a little bit about me that makes me twitch when they cut it two-thirds the way down with a knife on an angle. I'm like, what are you supposed to do with the rest of it sitting there?

SPEAKER_03 49:28

Like, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 49:29

And um, and so, but look, that's that's my only, you know, that's my only twitchy.

SPEAKER_03 49:36

We all have our pet peeves. That would annoy me too.

SPEAKER_00 49:39

Um, but what I must say is that the response has been extraordinary. So at first people were like, what is she doing? And I'm sure they thought I was mad because I was out there with a big, you know, a big flame gun, you know, weed flame weeder, and they're like, oh my god, she's mad. And then I'm putting, you know, fire pits out on the verge, and they're like, What? Like, what is she doing? But the number of people that stopped when I was making that garden. And I have people that say to me, like, I've had literally had people email me and say, every year we come to Dalesford, and every year we make sure that we come past your house to have a look and see what it looks like now. And I have neighbors that say to me, every time I drive past, something's changed. And that is pretty extraordinary. And I think that's that's from living in this climate for the last 10 years, and the layering is that there's always something on offer, whether it's the new bulbs coming up or the seed heads or the change of colours. And you know, I'm always so reticent to cut the garden back in winter, and because I'm like, oh, it's gonna look bare, but then the bulbs have come up, and then there's just this whole flush of green growth, and then you've got this incredible display of colour, and then we sort of autumn comes and it becomes more muted and antique y tones, and then everything becomes golden. And then you get the first frost, and it all becomes blackened and dark, you know, the stems all change colour, and it's it's it becomes very, you know, textural. Um, but gosh, I have had people leave things on my front doorstep because they're like, oh my gosh, we love your garden so much. A bag of you know, garlic or limes or whatever. And yeah, I've just had so many people stop and chat, and you know, I've had the people that, you know, go, oh my gosh, we found you, you know, we've been driving around Dalesford for half an hour, you know. And I'm like, okay.

SPEAKER_03 51:38

Like a celebrity.

SPEAKER_00 51:41

But uh, it's really lovely, it's amazing what a garden on the verge can actually do in terms of connection and giving back, and not just giving back to me or the community, but the birds and the lorikeetes. You know, I always leave the Echinacea seed heads on now, so the Loro keys have something at this time of year because they'll be eating all those seed heads when there's nothing else before, you know, spring flushes come through. Um, and I think that is, and I'm probably I'm sure I'm jumping a question of yours, but that is fundamentally what a productive garden now means for me. And it has expanded beyond writing the book or through the process of writing the book, too, is that for me, a productive garden is something that gives more than it takes, whether that is food or flowers or herbs or medicinals or um biodiversity or nourishing the soil or community, you know, whether it's it starts conversation. Like I've met the people in my community because they walk their dog past every time. And um there is something about that that makes me feel um more connected and more resilient and more capable than probably I ever have felt in my life.

SPEAKER_03 52:58

Yes, I'm really glad you just touched on that productive, because I was going to ask you, and then I skipped that question because I was just so interested in what you have to say. I forgot my own questions. Um so I did have like two really quick, just super practical questions. The first one was is that how you did? Because I know because you had to follow the council guidelines with the birch gardens, you couldn't have garden edging. And I and you've done like a did you call it like a spade edge edging? It's a tad edge into the lawn. How? Okay, so is it with a flame flame torch?

SPEAKER_00 53:33

No, I lived so when I set up my garden, so the first well, A, I was in a hurry because I'd had a car accident when I was in the handover, so I couldn't do anything in my garden for the first six months, which is you know, I would have been out there straight away, but I was in a neck brace and all sorts of things. But um, the first thing I did is I marked out my garden. Yeah. So um, yes, I had to use the nature planting guidelines, so that meant that I had to have offsets from the road, I had to not obscure any services, I had to leave space for a footpath. Um, I needed to keep the corner sight lines open so that cars turning could still see. I had to meet certain height guidelines. Um, and basically I just did a design of the garden that was sort of used the negative space of this once I'd I'd allowed for all of the requirements, all of the constraints, which I love working with constraints because that's where the fun really kind of happens. I think. Um, and uh so then I yeah, I marked out the spaces that were kind of left over and broke them up into smaller chunks, thinking about what I wanted to grow and how, you know. So one bit which is the northern verge, um, has a long big garden bed, which sort of screens me from the road. It's just a bit of a separation, but it's also on a slope. And so that catches the runoff from the road before it hits my edible garden.

SPEAKER_03 54:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 54:55

So I was just really mindful of road runoff and stuff like that. So I was like, let's capture that. Um, and that's a big perennial garden, and it's you know, it's got um dogwood, which is this vivid red at the moment, and grasses and and all sorts of things. Um, and then smaller garden beds for different harvests and things. And my kids at one point thought they might like a little bed for sunflowers, and one wanted this, so I broke it up into smaller spaces. Um, but yeah, I marked it all out with pegs and string lines and one lot of garden beds. A friend of mine came with his little mini excavator and he just scalped the soil off. Yeah. And then lots of mulch, lots and lots of mushroom compost and building up the soil. But then other parts of the garden, I've literally just done no dig with cardboard, over, and then lots of different layers on top. Um, but yes, I couldn't use any edging, so I couldn't use any um, you know, timber or steel edging for the garden areas. So I just cut the lawn.

SPEAKER_03 55:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 55:52

Um and you have to keep cutting that to keep, but I just have some some clever tools now that I use that make my life really easy.

SPEAKER_02 55:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 56:00

I have a uh a battery-operated edging machine that I use. Um, and every now and then I'll go out there and I'll line up all my string lines again and make sure my edges are all straight because I'm that person. Um well, it looks good.

SPEAKER_03 56:14

Like it's it's worth it. Because like that's I've been to a few, you know, gardening workshops and things, and that's just one of the first things people are always really interested. Like, how do you practically, when there's grass, how do you start a garden bed? And yeah, that is interesting with the excavator, you know, scraping the top. I actually did that with our last uh we sold a house recently, and we did that with the backyard, and then we brought, we brought in because the soil was quite depleted, you know, yeah, my mushroom compost and um yeah, some really wonderful like amendments, and it was very, very successful. And we did heavy um forestry mulch on top of cardboard for the paths. And it was just so successful, like with things just within a year, there would, you know, some of the nurseries that I put I sort of used some syntropic ideas and some of the nurseries were like five meters tall. You know, it was just so awesome. So that that can be if you have the ability to use some of that that equipment, it can be so it can really save you some time.

SPEAKER_00 57:15

But I'm amazed at um at just even the no-dig, like putting like like you were saying, is I was amazed at how successful that was. Now we didn't have too much sort of running grass or kaiku grass, but there were bits that still popped up and I just pull it out as it would go. Yeah. But I did like, I think four layers of cardboard, and then again that bush mulch, that kind of forestry mulch on a lot of areas of it. And I was just amazed at how successful that actually was.

SPEAKER_03 57:41

Yes, yeah. And I've heard you say in the book and now like mushroom compost quite a few times, and I'm also, I really like mushroom compost, and it seems to just really help to reactivate those like fungal networks through the soil when you use it. It's so good. Um, the other thing quickly was just I am really interested in experimenting with ornamental and native grasses. If you were just to like reel off, if you were to start suggestions for somebody who wanted to, I've never planted any. What would you suggest?

SPEAKER_00 58:14

Poars and Ekanops would be a beautiful connect, you know. So we have a Poa Labelladiere, which is a local poa here. Um and that's a just a beautiful sort of tussocked grass. Um, but what I love is it kind of like it it sort of falls, it's not like a caryx in that it really weeps, but I love mixing things of different textures or forms. So something that's weeping with something vertical, something, you know, something that's sort of rounded with something, you know, of a different, and so that you get those different kinds of textural and um those different forms happening. And that's what I love is that layering and that you know, grasses are just magical because they move in the wind, um they um catch the light, uh, they leave seed heads, excuse me, um, they leave seed heads. Um, but I'd love mixing things together. I don't have a very good native plant knowledge, um, but I believe that if you just base every plant on its own merits, it shouldn't matter whether it's native or not. I mean, it of course it depends on what you want your outcome to be. Um, I am a huge believer in making sure that our gardens give back, you know, give back to the local, you know, um, fauna and pollinators and whatever that may be. And um, you know, I've got a friend Lily Langham who has the most incredible garden, and she will point out all the different bees. And, you know, some of them are ground dwellers and some of them are, you know, all the different varieties. And she will tell me, you know, these ones like a flower with a deep throat that they can get the nectar, or these ones like that. And so I'm a much more aware now of thinking about how something flowers so that different pollinators, you know, are served in the garden. Um, I'm still waiting for a blue-banded bee. That's my bucket list item of my garden, is like a blue-banded bee. I was very annoyed to see a friend of mine who has only just put in a garden that their garden was like smothered in blue band bees. So, how is this possible? You know. And they I'm the one saying they're like, What do you think I should put in the garden? I'm like, how have you got this? You know, you tell me, yeah. Um, but they love the lavender, like her lavender, absolutely love it. Um, and I have lavender too, but you know, we'll keep watching and waiting. You know, they're in Hepburn, I'm here in Dalesford. The climate's slightly different, different, you know, aspect and things like that. Think about what your conditions are. Like, obviously, you know, there's going to be certain things that will grow best in, you know, a boggy space than whatever. But just yeah, like I I think mix and match. Like, I don't think you have to just have a native garden. I don't think you have to have just a, you know, an exotic garden. But it's, I think that's the beauty of me having gardened from a very early age is that they I grew up with no rules. Uh, and I still believe in no rules. And I think that there's so much information out there uh that it's very easy, a bit like parenting. You know, you read all the books and then become so rigid and so terrified of the outcome, or you can just have a look and see what is growing in your garden. A really great way is to wander around your neighborhood and see what's growing really well, and then get to know those things. Um and just go from there. But yeah, I think that, you know, just make a garden that makes you happy.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:50

Yes, yes, very good words of advice for me to start with. So I will say just super quick comment. Somebody who I am now, well, I have been every time I used to see him on Instagram, I was just amazed at his gardens. And then you highlighted him in the book is Tim Pilgrim.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:08

My goodness, his gardens are incredible, aren't they? I just something about them is just absolute magic. And um, one of the comments you make in the book, and this we'll just maybe use this to wind up as the question, is just that one of your absolute favorite things to do is to visit other people's gardens and have a poke around. I noticed through the guard through the book you feature so many people, and you must have had so many awesome experiences in writing this book and connecting with other gardeners and seeing amazing gardens. So, which has been your favorite garden to visit in your lifetime and what what about it was amazing? And yeah, just tell us about that.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:43

Well, I have to go back to Lily Langham. I'm really lucky that Lily is a friend of mine, and um, I met her when I moved up to the region, and our friendship has just grown over the last sort of you know, nine, eight or nine years. But um, Lily has a five-acre property in Basalt, and so it's quite a dry um place, although at the moment there's bits which are super boggy because we've just had so much rain here. But she grew up in gardens. Her mum is a beautiful gardener, and she's so incredibly connected to her place and the insects and the cycles and the rhythms. Um, and she will often wander her garden at night so that she can see the moths that are pollinating things. I think we forget that um there's daytime pollinators and nighttime pollinators, and she it's so hard to put Lily into words because I mean she's a garden designer, she's a plants person, she's a sculptor, but her whole life revolves around the land, you know, and the seasons and the changes and the and the and the moments and that um and and she's so free about it as well. You know, there's no I I think that some people who and she's got a design background, don't get me wrong, but I used to love teaching first-year students in landscape architecture because they had no idea what good design looked like. Or like the normative good design. They didn't, they didn't know that you know the patterns or the the outcomes that everyone seems to gravitate to in magazines. Yes, and so they would just come with fresh ideas, and I think that is is that that childlike curiosity is what I love about Lily. I'm also really, really fortunate that Lily is my soft entry back into the world after I've done a workshop because I'm an introvert, and um, but I can be very, you know, I put a lot of energy into my workshops. I love what I do. I I it's really important to me that I'm generous and I share as much as I possibly can, but I also am quite depleted afterwards. Yes. And so um I love it. I'm kind of buzzing and exhausted all at the same time.

unknown 1:04:57

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:58

And so I will go to Lil's garden for a cupper and I'll say, Lil, are you home? And she'll be like, Yeah, come on over, Tash. And we just wander her garden with a cup of tea. And it's kind of like just brings me back. And that's my ritual now. I know that when I am giving a lot and I'm in a space of you know, being around people and I'm very much kind of on show, then I have kind of a transition process for myself that gets me from there, from like so I yeah, I can't be like zero to a hundred or you know, a hundred to zero all in one go. And um, you know, I was just there actually at Lily's Garden on Saturday because I had this workshop yesterday, as I was saying, which was a table styling workshop, and it was all about um winter styling and and and winter being abundant and seed heads and all the moments and you know, all those beautiful little details. And so I asked Lily whether I could cut from her garden because I'm actually got some filming at my garden tomorrow here. So I couldn't cut from my own garden. I still needed it all nice, you know. And what ended up me just Going there with the ambition of cutting some buckets of seed heads. I ended up spending five hours in her garden, cutting her garden back with her. Oh, so nice. And um, it was a beautiful sunny day. And um, it's just those shared experiences. It's like working side by side. There's something, there's nothing better than gardening with someone else that really gets it. Yes. And you feel like you're contributing. I still have that need to feel productive, don't get me wrong. Um, but I value it in different ways. Like productive for me feels very it's it's less about being industrious and more about the quality of the output, if that makes sense, whatever that might be. And what I have learned that even rest is productive. Yes, is that you know, sleep is productive. You know, our bodies do all of our healing, all of our things while we're sleeping. And so to be in someone's garden like Lily's, um, to not just be helping her cut back her garden because it's huge, but to be having those conversations, to be able to share something together that we are both really love, like that for me is productive too. You know, it's about human connection, it's about witnessing the seasons, it's about, you know, having your hands in the soil. And we all know now, well, I think hopefully we all know now, how good soil is for us. You know, there's this direct relationship with hands in the soil and our serotonin and dopamine, you know, it's so um, I think that um it's a funny, you know, it's it's kind of a to make a book which is you know called the Productive Garden Companion and also to be shedding my old definitions of what productivity meant. Yes, and creating my own new ones um is kind of ironic, but also incredibly special. And I'm very, very grateful that I get to do that alongside all of the contributors in the book because they've all helped shape that definition. Um, and to be able to be in gardens, you know, like Lily's, um, has been just such an incredible part of the journey, you know. Who who knew? Who knew that I had a book that I could write that had all of those pages?

SPEAKER_03 1:08:23

Well, I I was very impressed, and I think it's all like I just think I'll keep re referring back to it, you know, as time goes on. And I I, you know, need to to scope out a different part of the garden to work on because there's just so much to to do um and so much inspiration from the book. So I think everything is totally amazing in it.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:42

And I and I'll share one more thing. I mean, I laugh to the I laugh and I say to people, well, at least we'll make a good doorstop pay. Because it's heavy, you know. But um, that doorstop has also got my 15-year-old daughter's drawings right through it. So Saffron worked with me on all the illustrations and um she has been drawing since she was old enough to hold a pencil, which was when she was about eight months old. And um, from the moment she could sit up is when she's been drawing. Um and um yeah, it's pretty incredible. It's pretty incredible. When I actually um got the first copy of the book, I was like, oh my god, Safi, you know you made a book, you're in there, and she just did not give a shit. Whatever. But just a few days ago, so it's been what about five weeks since I've had the book in my hands. The other day she said to me, So where is my name in the book?

SPEAKER_03 1:09:40

Where's my credit? That's right. Oh, well, I didn't realize she did those.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:45

They're they're really beautiful.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:46

I did actually notice those.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:48

Some of them are mine, but most of them are hers. Um, some of them are mine from when I did my first branding for my business. So, you know, because I I wanted the business to reflect me, and so that's why it had my name. So we we wove those in there, but then she did all the ones that spoke to the content in the book. So um, yeah, it feels pretty special that there's new definitions, new ways of being, and and new doors opening, you know, all at the same time. It's it's so beautiful. So when is the official release date? The 15th of September. So that's in Australia. Yeah. And then um the 17th of September in the UK, and then the 22nd of September in the US.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:28

Awesome. And if people listening are interested to do workshops or things with you, where's the best place for them to go to reach you?

SPEAKER_00 1:10:34

Just hit my website, which is um www.natashamorgan.com.au. And that's the beautiful thing about the book is that all of those QR codes go to my website.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:45

So it all leads them there. It was really important to me that the book was um something that had a life beyond its pages, um, and that the stories could travel. So, you know, it's full of video conversations just like this one with all of those contributors and then downloadable resources. And um, yeah, I just hope that it it keeps finding its way like tentacles into the world. I think it definitely will.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:09

Thank you so much, Natasha.