Garden Structures – Loggia

As global warming becomes more of a reality, the loggia is starting to appear in southern counties of the UK. Originally an Italian invention, very popular with Romans and found on many excavated Roman villas, it is an open-sided, roofed or vaulted gallery, either free-standing or along the front or side of a building, often at an upper level. What that means, exactly, is that it’s like a veranda but built on foundations and out of the same materials as the house.

Traditionally a loggia had a very luxurious style of planting because the room would be used to hold dinners and parties, and so it showed off the owner’s wealth and style. Because it is normally bordered by stone columns, it is ideal for supporting and shaping a scented plant, such as night-blooming jasmine, which can form a fragrant, leafy wall. Terracotta pots tend to hold other scented flowers, especially night blooming ones, or fruit plants such as bananas and date palms that would be harvested by servants who went round the room actually gathering up fruit to be served at various points in the meal. Hibiscus in a range of colours and rare orchids were commonplace as was the use of tropical birds in cages and a fountain.

For a more modern planting, focus on vertical accents that link the interior of the house and the garden, and keep to one or two colours, such as white and blue or green and red. Tall plants such as white foxgloves and irises give the height element, match them to square white planters running in a line, or two lines, from the loggia out into the garden so that they echo the soft and hard landscaping and have a white seat by an exterior waterfall to allow the final accent of shape and colour that draws the whole space together.

Garden traditional loggia photograph by Xerones, used under a creative commons attribution licence.

 

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