Our gardens have changed – and we’ve lost something

There are many ways modern prosperity has created a better quality of life. But there are some things – like a kid-friendly, far-from-perfect garden – that we seem to be leaving behind. Picture: istock

Australian prosperity over the past three decades has been channelled into our quality of life, including, for example, housing, travel, technology (phone plans), eating out and possibly superannuation (which is an investment in our future quality of life). And nowhere is this transformed way of living better evidenced than in the family home.

Have you ever thought that there must be a point in time when the average Aussie family home gained a second bathroom? I place that timing at around the middle of the 1990s. The ensuite arrived possibly in the same renovation that delivered the kitchen-family room along with a north-facing outside-living barbie-enabled deck. Which now goes by the name “alfresco space”.

I wonder if marketers of smart new homes are ever inclined to pursue a bold retro theme by referring to the alfresco space as the back veranda, or back porch? Possibly not.

But the transformation of the family home doesn’t stop with the addition of an ensuite loo, the kitchen-family room or the north-facing alfresco space. It extends to the gardens that surround the home, too. Although with block sizes shrinking from a quarter-acre (1000sqm) to, let’s be generous, 500sqm, the scope for garden space is limited.

The so-called blind side of the house is now a place for foldaway clotheslines and water tanks installed during the millennium drought 15 years ago. In due course it may hold solar power battery storage for electric vehicles.

If ever there was a prosperity-driven transformation, it is in the reimagining of the back yard. The incinerator was cancelled 40 years ago. For those unfamiliar with the concept of a backyard incinerator, it was an apparatus deliberately designed to burn stuff: paper, plastic, rubber, whatever.

The back garden is no longer a place for cricket matches, for learning how to ride a bike, or to kick a football. Those activities have been outsourced to dedicated off-site learning spaces. The back yard is now a place that is curated, and exists to be admired; there are special cushions placed on Lutyens benches whenever visitors are about to arrive.

Gone is the pragmatic veggie patch. Have you ever pulled up carrots, wiped off the dirt, and munched away? Have you ever lain on the ground between ripening tomato plants and looked up at the sky? I am sure next-gen kids will have their own stories to tell about secret spots in their home and garden in years to come, but my stories relate to an ever wondrous home-made garden.

The front garden, too, has been transformed. It has lost ground in a battle royale with an ever-expanding garage due to the frequency of the comings and goings of a two-car household. Not that prosperous households park their cars in their garage – it’s filled with too much stuff. What is left of the front garden is a huddled, curated, irrigated, rarely-admired collection of plants lining a pathway to the front door. It is a shadow of the former glory of a much-loved front garden.

There are many ways modern prosperity hascreated a better quality of life. But there are some things – like a kid-friendly, far-from-perfect garden – that we seem to be leaving behind.