University of Sheffield: The Invisible Balance Garden

The garden

This urban gravel garden celebrates the strength and resilience of those living with hidden disabilities and developmental disorders that require balancing day-to-day energy levels.

A wheelchair-accessible seating area is enveloped by structural planting, offering an escape from everyday sensory stressors. As an autistic individual living with a form of dysautonomia called postural hypotension, the designer wants to challenge visitors to think more inclusively and sustainably when creating their own spaces.

A variety of forms, colours, heights and textures reflect how neurodiverse people experience and respond to the natural world. Festuca glauca ‘Elijah Blue’ is fun to interact with, while Thalictrum ‘Black Stockings’ echoes the purple associated with PoTS, the UK’s leading charity supporting individuals with Postural Tachycardia Syndrome.

Although the border primarily focuses on raising awareness of this often misunderstood condition and its co-morbidities, it ultimately champions the richness of human diversity.

Key plants:

• Thalictrum ‘Black stockings’ will act as one of the key structural specimens and bring a pop of the colour purple, echoing that of the PoTS UK charity logo

• Rudbeckia will bring a pop of yellow into the design, lighting up elements within the space, bringing a happy and joyful summer feel

• Festuca glauca ‘Elijah Blue’ is a plant with lots of fun textural qualities to interact with, pairing it with Helictotrichon sempervirens will enhance the layering and three-dimensional quality within the design

• Stachys byzantina has a pleasant and calming textural quality. Purple flowers echo the colour of the PoTS UK charity logo

• Leucanthemum is a bright white plant that highlights specific points within the design, guiding the eye towards different levels and areas within the garden, allowing the neurodivergent eye to detect patterns within the layered planting

Plants supplied by: to be confirmed

The designer – Enya Jacobson

Enya is a landscape architecture student with an interest in naturalistic and climate resilient planting. Her work explores themes denoting to art, culture and sociopolitical discourse that challenges more traditional aspects of the gardening world. Recently diagnosed with autism and a chronic illness, her garden celebrates the strength and resilience in living with hidden disabilities and developmental disorders that require individuals to balance their day-to-day energy levels. It challenges us in how we can create spaces that mutually benefit us, our needs as diverse individuals, and the needs of the biodiverse environment around us 

The garden legacy

To be confirmed.