In this year’s Melbourne International Flower and Garden Show, Lincoln Flynn, of Lincoln Flynn Landscape Garden and Graphic Design put our Premier Hydropavers™ permeable pavers to good use to clean up the awards!
In the 21st anniversary of the show, Flynn managed to take home two awards for his garden titled ‘Refuge’ after judges voted him in for best Avenue of Achievable Gardens design. The general public concurred with vigour, with Flynn also awarded the People’s Choice Award by those visiting the show.
Every year the Royal Exhibition Building, along with the Carlton Gardens puts on a display for green thumbs that showcases the best of the newest trends and old favourites in plants, gardens, flowers and landscaping. This year, between the 16th and 20th of March, the last remnants of summer were celebrated with a show that ranks in the top five of garden show events around the world.
The Achievable Garden Criteria
Flynn’s garden, as every garden had to be, was 5 metres wide and 3 metres deep. The idea being to simulate the type of space you would encounter on a balcony or courtyard. The ‘achievability’ criteria dictates that within a budgetof $8,000, the average Australian would be capable of copying the design from head to toe, including plants, materials and design.
What Made the Garden Special?
Lincoln’s garden creation was a bridge between manufactured or treated materials such as steel, timber, pavers and stone and the surrounding natural foliage and water.
The garden more than achieved its goals of creating a tranquil retreat from days of urban hustle and bustle. Flynn used circular designs to attain a composition that would mesh with rising and hanging plantation and foliage. Colours were kept understated to mesh with the natural feel and timber features.
With the competition requirement of having at least 75% of the garden being soft landscaping, having a paver compilation that complimented the natural surroundings was integral to the design feature. To maintain an earthy feel, Flynn used light coloured greys permeable Hydropavers™, giving the sense of an aquatic base for the flourishing flora and fauna. But the true benefits of permeable pavers go beyond aesthetics and into a practical and environmentally conducive material. So here is a little more about what you couldn’t see in the garden, but could enjoy!
Permeable Premier Hydropavers™ Functionality
Permeable Premier Hydropavers™ do much more than just provide an award winning aesthetic quality. They function to provide a solid surface that is responsive to harsh weather conditions.
Moisture Control: Permeable pavers have natural draining qualities, which enable them to withstand the heaviest rainfall Australia can dish out, and more. Not only do the pavers withstand heavy downpours and flooding, they pro-actively drain the surface area they inhabit and redirect the water to where it’s needed. So if your garden area accumulates puddles in awkward areas, or the plants and soil around often look a bit thirsty, using permeable pavers can be a real problem solver.
Heat Control: The material is highly environmentally friendly and manages not only to control water retention and direction, but also to regulate surface temperature in the summer months to stop tight, paved areas from over-heating. Essentially, permeable pavers have the dual effect of regulating the extremes of both the winter and summer months to ensure you can create an area that is enjoyable for 365 days of the year.
Other Attractions at The Show
The show isn’t just world renowned for its beautiful gardens, it offers a range of attractions that create a festival atmosphere so people can enjoy the gardens as well as admire them. Some of the notable attractions include:
- Gardens by Twilight: Eat, drink and be merry when the Friday night drinks and snack trucks flock to the Carlton Gardens.
- Disney Fairy Garden: The Disney Fairy Garden features some of the favourite characters from fairy-tales to make sure the kids are entertained.
- Flowerhouse Floral Workshop: If strictly observing isn’t your thing, then you can become part of the show and gain some experience in the My Flowerhouse floral design workshop.
For the 21st time, the Melbourne International Flower and Garden Show didn’t disappoint. As usual, tourists and locals joined forces to get a glimpse of the abstract plants, gardens and arrangements, taking home a wealth of ideas and photos.
