The Water Conscious Garden is a contemplative space to focus on the beauty of rain. The garden is designed to collect, slow down and soak up rainwater for the benefit of wildlife, our rivers and ourselves.
Our changing climate exposes us to ever-increasing periods of drought, followed by unpredictable deluges of rain. Drought and rising temperatures bake the soil into a hard crust, which is impervious to rainwater. The tendency to cover and seal the ground with hard materials, such as concrete, tarmac and paving, only exacerbates the problem. When rain eventually arrives, it rapidly travels across these nonporous surfaces straight into the nearest drain, overwhelming the system, which causes wider environmental issues.
One way to help alleviate this problem is to use plants to slow down and soak up the rainwater, effectively replicating what would happen in a natural landscape. Plants and trees create shade that prevents the soil from baking in the sun, and when rain arrives, water percolates through the healthy soil, some of which is soaked up by the plants.
This space is designed to emulate a garden with heavy clay soil that causes poor drainage and waterlogging, a common problem in urban environments like London. Soil is excavated into a meandering swale, the spoil of which is combined with crushed recycled concrete to create free-draining mounds on either side. More recycled crushed concrete is used as mulch, with larger pieces creating stepping stones and a place to sit.
A canopy of trees provides light shade throughout the garden, helping to reduce the ground temperature during the hottest months. The planting is naturalistic with a light cloud-like texture to absorb external sound and create an immersive wild space. The species are selected for their tolerance to extended periods of drought, as although this is a rain garden, they will only be exposed to wet conditions periodically. This design approach not only slows down rainwater but also creates broad habitats for urban biodiversity, absorbs air pollution, reduces land surface temperatures and helps capture contaminated water and microplastics.
At one end of the garden stands the Petrichor Pavilion, a lightweight timber structure designed to create an immersive rain experience. The roof of the pavilion is constructed from galvanised steel to capture and amplify the sound of falling rain. The open sides allow air to circulate from the garden, welcoming petrichor, the scent of rain on dry earth. The term Petrichor is derived from the ancient greek petra, ‘stone’ and ichor, which, in Greek mythology, is the ethereal blood of the gods. Petrichor is created by a combination of geosmin, a compound secreted by microbes called Streptomyces found in healthy soil, and ozone, which is created by lightning and carried to the ground by raindrops. As rain falls on the parched earth, these compounds are stirred into the air, which creates a unique earthy scent.
During long periods of heat and drought, we crave the relief that rain brings. Rain falling from the sky fulfils our purest primaeval desire for fresh water. Our sense of smell is incredibly sensitive to the smell of geosmin in the air, which can be detected by the human nose at less than five parts per trillion. But our modern lives have detached us from the outdoors. We stay in our dry heated homes when it rains, wishing for days without a cloud in the sky. But we clearly miss the connection – there are countless hours of rain sound recordings listened to by millions on YouTube, Spotify, podcasts and even dedicated apps. The sound of rain is a nostalgic trigger and a natural source of white noise, making it the perfect background for deep focus, sleep or meditation. Celebrating the arrival of rain brings us more in tune with the rhythm of the natural world around us. So next time it rains, take a step outside, soak it in and really experience it.
During heavy periods of rain when a large amount of rainwater is sent directly into the drains, it can overwhelm the UK's inferior water treatment network, which permits water companies to dump stormwater and raw sewage into our rivers and seas. But changing how we design our gardens does not change the systematic problem with the UK's water companies.
According to data from The Environment Agency, sewage was dumped into the ocean and rivers around the UK more than 370,000 times over the course of 2021, including periods when there was no rain at all. The water companies responsible are all privately owned – England is the only country in the world with a completely privatised water industry. Despite nearly every water company recording a loss for the year ending March 2022, the majority of them still paid out dividends to shareholders totalling £965 million, of which most are based overseas and include banks, foreign governments, and hedge funds in tax havens. And the government has gutted regulator funding, reducing it from £120 million to £50 million over the last decade. They have stripped the red tape, allowing water companies to self-report their pollution. All of these factors allow UK water companies to underinvest in infrastructure, dump untreated sewage into our precious rivers and reap the profit.
Drastic action needs to be taken to change legislation, de-privatise the water industry, and increase funding for river monitoring, management and restoration. Failure to address this problem will cause irreversible ecological collapses which could destroy the UK's most beautiful waterways.
FURTHER READING
Surfers Against Sewage
Guardian podcast – What’s gone wrong with England’s water?
The Rivers Trust
Greenpeace – How sewage got into UK rivers and seas
Number of hours water companies discharged raw sewage into rivers and seas in England in 2021
The Water Conscious Garden was originally designed as a conceptual show garden, but unfortunately, the garden never materialised.
The Water Conscious Garden was researched, designed and created by SEMPER.
SEMPER is a creative studio in London that operates between art and design to create installations, objects, interiors and gardens.
The garden is well suited for most residential settings, with the roof of the house acting as a water collection source for the swale. The ever-changing, immersive environment is surely an improvement to the usual patio, lawn and borders.
To find out more about our work, reach us at info@semper.garden