Primaterra

Everything started five years ago, when we left the wonderful but crowded Edimburgh city looking for a quieter place to live.

We finished our trip in Baden, a calm village sited in the Golfe of Morbihan. As a neighbour says, one of the most beautiful places in the world.

The canicule [1] of 2003 was at its strongest. Thus, we installed ourselves between the trees, in the north side of a private field, well protected from the burning sun.

The idea of creating a garden came spontaneously. Wouldn’t it be great to have some vegetables handy? Wouldn’t it be excellent to eat fresh salads, free from pesticides and other chemicals?
Let’s start working!


When we conceived the garden we were not thinking in long term. We chose a tiny piece of soil just in front of the caravan. The exposition was not optimal, neither was the moment right to prepare the soil. As it was going to be a garden only for that summer, we didn’t mind too much about these and other inconvenients.
I gradually relized it was a big mistake. As for me, even though you expect to move, it is better to think the garden will last for a long period. Somebody could keep going your job if you leave or you could stay longer than you expected, as occurred to us.
The reason why I haven’t changed the location of our garden is because it is almost impossible to have the best conditions and it is a good exercice to work in an area exposed to the north and to the winds.

Therefore, location is one of the first things to think about when siting a garden.
The duration of solar exposure determines the vegetative phases: germination, development, blooming, fruiting and ripening.

To be continued...


June 2004

This is an experimental garden where I put in practice what I learn from books and people. It is also the place where I let my own ideas go free.

Quicoharn garden is organic. No pesticides or fertilisers are used. Here, there are no weeds, but only wild plants, some of them being the favorite salads of the family.

We are living in a materialist and competitive world, where we are what we have. University titles, highly qualified jobs, money, houses, cars, are seen as the only important products to get if we wish recognition from the society to which we all belong.

In this civilisation, the spiritual human needs are not taken into account. People who love and need nature are being forgotten and open green spaces are replaced by enormous malls or endless lines of cloned houses.

Writing the memory of the garden in Quicoharn, I pretend to put in evidence another way of seeing and feeling life. Society promotes behaviors of imitation and passive acceptation, but like me, more and more people go out of the social inertia and decide to follow an autonomous and creative way of life, giving the best of themselves, being responsible of their acts and showing solidarity with all the beings that inhabit the planet.

From now on, I will be living in a caravan, which means no access to internet and other commodities of the moderm civilisation. I suppose this article will be quite empty until I decide to get connected.

To be continued...

May 2005

I work alone, which means too much to do. Even though I could design an easier garden I have to confess that I am a strange kind of gardener who loves spending hours thinking where to put this or that rock.

I have studied permaculture and I would like to change towards this philosophy, depending more on perennials but I cannot do it until I have my own property.

Unfortunatly, nowadays I am following a semi-intensive french course and I cannot work as much as I wish in the garden. Thus, everything is half done, I have not finished the job I had planned for the spring and I do not have time to write.

For the moment, I can only include some pictures which can give an idea of where I am now and the different techniques I am practicing. But the best way to know my garden is visiting it...


The old garden.

To be continued...

September 2005

I thought I would never be able to leave Quicoharn. But I am quite happy I will do it. We now have our own field to cultivate! We have found a beautiful forest where to live and start a real permaculture project. The garden of Quicoharn has been the first garden that I have designed and I thanks to this place which has "seeded" me with the need to be and work with nature in a friendly way. From now on I will write from the forest of PrimaTerra. See you soon!
Here are some pictures of the last summer in this garden: