I had the pleasure of visiting Donald and Rachael Tan’s green haven and corridor farm in Punggol recently, and was bowled over by how space-efficient and creatively laid-out it is. Between the couple, Donald maintains the plants, and Rachael harvests produce for the table.
Even though his corridor gets only two hours of sun each day, he has managed to grow a wide variety of plants. Beyond ornamental plants, he grows microgreens, herbs like purple basil, chocolate mint, thyme, dill, pandan, curry, sawtooth coriander etc, he has fruit plants such as gooseberry, grapes, gac fruit, and vegetables like kang kong, amaranth spinach, curly kale. There are so many different plants that I can’t list them all… in fact, I can’t remember them all!
I got to know Donald better when I caught up with the Edible Gardens team one day for a lunch discussion. We bonded over the subject of Daiso and its small but useful gardening section, and how he, as well as my parents enjoy buying supplies from there to supplement our gardening needs. It was after viewing photos of his green corridor from his phone, that I felt like I had to pop by for a look. The plastic baskets sitting on his verandah are all from Daiso, and he has lined them with geotextile, which provides good drainage while keeping all soil in place when watered.
