Naming Your Garden: Our Cwtch
Dear Reader,
My garden is a part of my cwtch. A cwtch (pronounced like butch) is a Welsh word and way of life. Imagine the emotion and safe feeling when someone you love gathers you close. That is cwtch. A small, safe place. A comforting hug. Your garden.
Our Cwtch is also the name of my garden. There are many great gardens that have names and yours should too. After all, people name their boats, and many like to name their castles and cottages too! Like these, creating a garden is a cause for celebration.
A name is highly personal and meaningful; and garden names can be whimsical or romantic. But naming your garden, or areas in your garden, is useful as well. I have six little nooks in my cwtch that are being developed and have a name: The Arbor, Wagon Wheel (herbs), Pretty in Pink (perennials), Green Man’s Lane, The Veggie Patch and Pot Land. No, I’m not growing marijuana. This area is landscaped with rocks and I’m filling it with planters. So name your garden(s) to create an organizational theme, or simply to tell your family, “I’m going to be working on the Wagon Wheel for the next hour.”
A few people think naming a garden is silly or pretentious. Those people usually don’t have a garden or understand how much hard effort, thought, and personal character goes into the process. In a garden group I recently asked what people have named their gardens and there were so many wonderful names like Persephone’s Seascape, Dove’s Rest, Salad Bar, Gardening Under God, and Trillium Trail to name a few. My favorite garden name that someone mentioned was Huna. This is a Hawaiian word from ancient days. Huna was originally Ho’omana. Ho’o means to make and mana means life force. So huna means to make a life force. What an absolutely perfect name for a garden!
If your garden is yet to be named, I hope you do decide to name it. Choose a name that amuses, inspires, or connects with you. I recently read in an interview with Joni Mitchell that she calls her patio garden Tuscany. I imagine she has a fond memory of that part of the world. I’d love to hear your garden’s name. Please share it with me.
P.S. If you like my garden sign please check out PaintedgardenArt on Etsy for beautiful slate designs and unique stands.
What a wonderful thought - to name your garden(s). We haven't named our gardens but do refer to our home as Bluebird Hill. We mostly refer to the garden spaces by location, but I like that idea of giving them a name. Thanks for sharing.
Bluebird Hill is beautiful. I imagine you must have lots of bluebirds. In the UK many people name their homes and I love that idea. As you might guess our home has a name too! My son named it when he was in little. He used to look out the front window and count the trees out front. So our home's name is Seven Trees.
I recently started reading all your newsletters (life and spam got in the way) and noticed the last one is in October. I hope all is well with you and yours. I also home you come back with more content. Thank you for these beautiful articles!
Thanks so much for reaching out! That makes me so happy to hear. I've got a next article mapped out ready to go soon. We've had a busy time the last couple of months between multiple family birthdays and holidays. And we all got Covid in December! Planning to post next weekend.