Years ago nurseries only sold plants, and on the whole they were pretty boring places. Modern garden centres are much more interesting, particularly ones in the Melbourne area where you’ll find some of the best garden artworks available in Australia today.
A good example is Bulleen Art & Garden Centre near Heidelberg, a well established nursery which has recently opened an art gallery, constructed a mural and sculptured fence and introduced garden art into nursery displays.
Art Gallery
Around 100 local artists and craftspeople are represented at the centre andapproximately fifty works of art are displayed in the gallery. Many of the items have a very Australian feel and an informal sense of fun to them, for example the Cathedral of Bones and various creatures made of metal, including dragonflies and yabbies.
Plants
As well as having a fabulous collection of modern garden art, Bulleen Art & Garden Centre also has cutting edge plants. Very much in fashion at the moment are grasses like Carex buchananii, and grassy sorts of plants like some of the new varieties of flax or agapanthus which add a lovely textural quality to the garden.
Further information:
Prices for items featured in our segment are as follows:
Albert’s Chest – $1800
Frog Bowl – $125
Terracotta animals – from $10 to $300
Metal Dragonfly and Yabby – $160 each
Bone sculpture – $3000
Flacco bird bath – $300
Good Golly Miss Molly – $750 Bulleen Art & Garden Centre is at 6 Manningham Road West, Bulleen,VIC, 3105.
Phone: (03) 9850 5155. It is open from 8.30-5.30pm daily.