Life, with the garden
Location: Visby, Gotland, Sweden • • • Visit: September 2018
Perched between the low medieval buildings of old Visby and the steel-grey Baltic lies a tiny botanic garden. For being so small, though, it manages to accommodate a great number of different plants. Cared for by the association DBW (De Badande Wännerna = the bathing friends), it has been situated here since 1855. Already at the entrance, I am greeted by two massive plane trees. A bit further in, an ancient apple tree is leaning leisurely on the ground (again with these old old trees…) – and already here, it is easy to forget the dense town of timber walls and cobble-stone streets outside the garden walls. The greenery being so lush and protective.
I am visiting the Visby botanic garden at the peak flowering of autumn dahlias, green apples on the grass glistening with droplets of the rain that just fell. The rose garden is planted in a symmetric amphitheater, so delicious for the eyes. It might not be the most scientific botanical display among my collection of botanic gardens, but every single patch of this place speaks of having been meticulously tended to by generations of plant-lovers. It oozes joy of gardening.
And there are plenty of benches to sit and read on. For a brief moment, the sun breaks through the clouds and I spend some minutes reading the so incredibly impressive “The Unwomanly Face of War: An Oral History of Women in World War II” by Svetlana Alexievich, but then I have to leave. Colleagues await at the ferry terminal, on our way to the yearly Stora Karlsö office retreat. But I know, had I spent more time in Visby, this garden would have been my favorite reading spot.
And just outside the garden walls, the Baltic is slowly breathing, biding its time for the autumn storms.
Katja Malmborg 