Irish Heritage Garden shows off plantings between hardscapes

It's called an Irish Heritage Garden, and it features Midwest versions of plants that impart that region's famous beauty — mosses, ajuga, roses, ferns, ivy, river birch, daffodils, vinca minor, pachysandra, tulips, boxwood, Hicksi yews, phlox and green ground covers.

But Padraig Conway's inspirations come from all over the world.

“The roses today are sustainable in the Midwest. We never saw such roses 30 years ago when we came to America. Daffodils are my favorites. In the United Kingdom you mow them. They grow in your grasses. You can grow a beautiful garden here with just simple plants. It doesn't have to be ornate,” said Conway.

Born in Ireland, raised in Ghana, Africa, educated in Ireland and England, Conway operates Cottswold Gardens Inc. in the Chicago suburbs.

And the man travels. He and his wife, Michaela, visit her native England frequently, and walked across Scotland recently.

“The heather and the lilies coming up in the forest, and the lakes! You couldn't pay somebody to recreate what God put there,” he said in a recent interview.

But he has re-created English brooks in the suburbs, including one where a client can sit in the stream while enjoying a fireplace.

“We followed the advancement of the Roman Empire through England,” the contractor said of one trip. “Sculpted hedges, upright evergreens. Julius Caesar planted trees in a line so his soldiers could walk in the shade when they were coming home.”

But Conway is also likely to sing the praises of gardens and materials in Italy or even Asia.

And how do suburban homeowners bring a touch of Ireland or the British isles to their backyards?

Well, these islands offer a great variety of styles and materials, including plants and stones of many colors. You might even want the black stone that Kilkenny in southeast Ireland is known for. Conway insists you can get the same look from Unilock's Black River. The company's products look like real stone but are engineered for easy installation, he said.

“There's a wall called Rivercrest that looks just like the black stones near my hometown Kilkenny.”

And the hardscape comes first, especially in Ireland — patio, walkways, steps, walls and even water features — before the green plants that evoke Gaelic regions. England is known more for flowers and roses, he said.

Michaela Conway is his secret design weapon.

“My wife has a real talent for ‘move this, add that, take that.' If you stay on a job from 9-5 you don't really capture the job. You have to keep going away and drive around the block again and say ‘wow.' ”

Conway is based in Palos Hills and works throughout the Chicago area.

“I lecture across the country to other contractors. I convey the pride and heritage of our industry. It's a fairly new industry in America. We need to pay our respects to the craftsmen that got us here — European and global efforts.”

Landscape contractors should go through training and continuing education, said Conway. The things that get them in trouble are poor materials, poor design and lack of communication.

He has studied the sinking of Venice, an international tragedy, and says this taught him how important it is to use materials like permeable pavers in the Chicago area. Chicago is notoriously flat, which also means it needs more than the average base under stonework to soak up rainwater and runoff. In fact, he wants you to put 12-18 inches of base under your structures, while a brochure that covers the whole country will recommend 4 inches.

“It is very important to have a contractor interested enough to hear of a problem and willing to go back to resolve it,” he said. “It's not always the contractor's fault. Maybe you put in a swimming pool or have rodent damage or put up an addition.”

Experienced in construction, urban planning and gardening, Padraig and Michaela Conway moved their young family to Chicago 30 years ago at the invitation of his brother, Kiernan. Both brothers had played rugby, and Kiernan came to the suburbs for a career in singing. Now he owns a coffee shop in Three Oaks, Michigan.

“Kiernan said he's not coming back, so we came over to visit and realized maybe we should try an adventure. We had three babies, including a 2-week old and $60 in our pocket. Thirty years later, we have almost the same employees from day one.”

And around the world one feature continues to be important in a garden — water.

“Water is life. Energy, peace. I use as much water as I can. Even if it's patio with just a splash of water in it for an oasis.”