Designer Ian Barker in his garden called 'Left Overs'.

Designer Ian Barker relaxes in his 'Left-overs' garden. Photo: Justin McManus



There's a touch of the guerilla gardener about designer Ian Barker. But while guerilla gardeners usually operate under cover of darkness in their quest to beautify neglected spaces, Barker is quite open about his horticultural modus operandi.


The results are the same though. A discarded pocket of land transformed into a floral and foliar oasis, not overnight like guerilla gardeners, but in this case over 10 days to create an award-winning show garden for this year's Melbourne International Flower and Garden Show.


''Left-overs'' pays homage to the intermingled perennial meadow garden - the signature of horticultural darling, Dutch landscape architect Piet Oudolf, whose work Barker describes as ''mind boggling'' - in other words a cornucopia of flowers, trees and shrubs that look as if they've grown at random from seed, recreating nature on a smaller scale.


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Awarded a silver-gilt for this show garden, Barker also erected on site a pop-up cafe with decorator accoutrements made from a converted shipping container following the theme of neglected spaces being transformed into places of beauty.