Banksia Bend features a large established garden of camellias, magnolias and oaks planted by previous owner Margaret Stokes. Today the property has a Camellia Grove, a Seville Walk, an Orchard, a Vegetable Garden and a new Dry Garden by Phillip Johnson. It is all set around a Guildford Bell-designed home (an important award-winning Victorian architect, 1912-1992) and features three sculptures by prominent Australian artists: Pear by George Baldessain, Whale Song by Peter Blizzard and Carbon Trader by Stephen King.
The catalyst for the Dry Garden came from the need to remove telephone and electricity cables from the property’s trees and place them underground. Rosemary Simpson turned a necessity into opportunity; the money to be put into the necessary deep excavation could also go towards landscaping.
Phillip Johnson was commissioned in 2006 to create a rock and water garden for the dry, barren entrance paddock. The brief was to save all the water from the roof of the house, to introduce rocks and a pond and for all the plantings to be drought -proof. The Dry Garden plan included two ponds, a small waterfall and a redirected driveway.
Between 2007-2009 Phillip was engaged to extend the waterfall’s cascade into additional ponds and add a set of Aztec- style steps. Today the cascade runs 600 metres featuring magnificent ponds to the Yarra River.
In 2018 Phillip Johnson designed a mound with the Crucible Rock surrounded by Western Australian wild flowers.