Eyes On The Future

Never short of ideas or energy, Dee Napier has built a garden designed to flow with the landscape and inspire generations to come.

- Elizabeth Wilson

Dee Napier would rather tune in to her garden than turn on the TV news. Every evening before sunset, while her husband Rob watches the evening bulletin, she spends about an hour outdoors, contemplating the green wonderland she has shaped over the past 37 years. “That’s my time for thinking – about plants, life, everything,” she says. It’s a ritual that says a lot about her love of nature. “When you have a garden,” she explains, “you’re always planning for the future. It gives you the impetus to keep going.”

Dee, Rob and their son Andrew moved to Kyalla Park, near Orange in the Central West region of NSW, back in 1982. It’s a naturally blessed site of about 40ha, with gentle undulations, a creek and rich basalt soils. When they arrived, there was a residence dating back to 1913, a constellation of outbuildings and just the remnants of a garden. “There were some beautiful old trees, but the rest of the garden had been neglected for years and the sheep were almost up to the house,” Dee recalls. The homestead needed refurbishing, but her desire to start a garden took priority. “We could have done with a new kitchen, but I wanted a bulldozer instead, to shape the garden.”