Estate Living Magazine The Slow Movement - Issue 39 March 2019 | Page 43

C O M M U N I T Y
L I V I N G
support plants that provide shade. In early European gardens – in
France in the 1400s, for example, or during the Italian Renaissance
of the 17 th century – pergolas usually consisted of two parallel lines
of solid, classical stone columns that supported a latticework of
wooden beams that, in turn, supported fruiting vines or decorative
creepers. A green tunnel, in other words, often covering a pathway
that led, perhaps, to a folly, or a classical pavilion or some other focal
feature.
More recently, though, they’ve become far more varied and
interesting. Now they cover our pathways as well as our patios,
our Jacuzzis, our parking areas, our outdoor lounges and dining
areas, and almost any ‘garden room’ that comes to mind. And it’s
this combination of being welcoming while at the same time being
adaptable to almost any situation in even the smallest patch of sun
that makes the idea of the pergola so essentially South African.
(But please, South Africans, it’s a pergola, and not a pagoda, which,
beautiful as it is, is really a tiered tower like you might see in parts of
Asia. And it’s not a Pongola either, okay?)
Multiple materials
Today’s amazing selection of building materials – steel, stainless
steel, aluminium, wood, brick, stone, even plastics or composites
– makes building a pergola a pleasure. You can design, literally,
whatever you like.
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