A core part of the Garden City model is to create a street wide, tree-lined feel by requiring houses to be set well back from the street, visually co-opting residents’ front yards as public spaces. In Canberra the result was the famous ‘no front fence’ policy, where low, trimmed hedges were permitted, but not solid fences.

However, it’s not been uncommon for Canberrans to sneakily reclaim their front gardens by putting in plants that eventually provide a sense of separation from the street. They can do this because plants are different from bricks, growing and changing over time, and, under the stewardship of gardening, small shrubs and saplings become tall, substantial hedges.

Crawling through hedges and scrambling down slopes around the world, Julian discussed how gardeners and designers have used gardening as a creative practice and propose that private gardening might be the greatest public good we can provide in our cities to combat climate change.

This event was held in association with the Australian Garden History Society.