Origin

The decline in population caused by the series of medieval plagues in Europe left more open land and put a premium on labor, raising the status of the average serf to that of peasant or even freeholder. The English cottage garden reflected this hard-won independence. The first cottage gardens contained fruits, vegetables, herbs and plants with medicinal value as well as a few sweet-smelling flowers to fight the rancid odors of lanterns, coal fires and lack of sanitary facilities. In short, an English cottage garden packed a large and varied assortment of useful plants into a small yard.

Adaptation

Today’s orderly borders and straight-rowed vegetable gardens bear no resemblance to old cottage gardens, but Wisconsin is dotted with kitchen gardens similar to medieval cottage gardens. They may include some greens and savories. A head of rhubarb (Rheum x hybridum), hardy from U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) plant hardiness zone 3 through 8, may grow next to the "Poorman" cultivar of gooseberries (Ribes "Poorman"), hardy in USDA zones 4 through 6, and French marigolds (Tageta patula), annuals grown from USDA zone 2 through 11. City dwellers plant their kitchen gardens in compact public garden plots. So even for a city-dwelling Wisconsinite, it’s a short step from a kitchen garden to an English cottage garden.

Form

A cottage garden should provide the feeling of an outside room, even during Wisconsin’s snowy winters. Structural hardscaping helps. An arbor makes a charming entrance. Gardeners who live along river valleys or in the Kettle Moraine area might build garden half-walls of stone. A stone or gravel walk, a garden bench and a trellis or garden wall add to the feeling of a room. Trees might include “Honeycrisp” apples (Malus domestica “Honeycrisp”), hardy in USDA zones 3 through 6, or “Montmorency” cherry (Prunus avium “Montmorency”) hardy in USDA zones 4 through 8. Add red osier dogwood (Cornus sericea), hardy in USDA zones 2 through 7, for winter color and a conifer for winter birds.

Flowering Plants

The English cottage garden has evolved into a well-planned, compact collection of traditional flowering plants -- often passed down in families or shared by neighbors -- and a few herbs and heirloom vegetable plants. In Wisconsin, many of these plants grow from USDA zone 3 in the northwest through zone 5 along Lake Michigan in the east. Foxglove (Digitalis pupurea), hardy in USDA zones 4 through 9, and primroses (Primula x polyantha), hardy in zones 3 through 8, are traditional plants. Fill the garden's spaces with native flowering plants or annuals in muted colors to complete the appearance of rampant orderliness, using every inch of space.