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Costa visits horticulturist Eric Chang at his home in Sydney to check out his spectacular tropical-inspired garden.

The stand-out feature of the garden is an incredible green wall – around 20 metres from end to end and two metres high.

The former engineer says each square metre requires about 30 plants – more than 1000 plants for the whole wall. There’s not much sun in this garden, so Eric has chosen shade tolerant plants such as anthuriums, staghorns, gingers and echeverias.

“You’ve got to select what’s really hardy – because that’s the key to your green wall,” he says. He’s placed succulents in a section of the wall which only has four hours of sun per day.

Eric also has some “mini” green walls in the garden. He says the smaller walls work well with just a few plant species. Each pot hooks onto mesh and has two holes to drip water down. Eric says Rhipsalis and Peperomia are “good friends” for a green wall.

Eric’s masterpiece can go two weeks between watering. He combines semi-automatic irrigation with some hand watering. He also sprays with a fertiliser high in nitrogen.

Eric is truly making the best of a small space, by building up – in a spectacular fashion! He has transported his love for the tropics to his little piece of Sydney.

“Never in my dreams did I think I would do something like this – achieve a really nice green space that’s a happy place for me.”

Filmed on Bidjigal Country | Hurstville, NSW

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