To step into Reverend Florizel Allen’s garden is to enter a refuge designed for reflection and renewal. For the immediate past regional vice-president of the Lay Magistrates’ Association of Jamaica, this verdant sanctuary offers both spiritual and physical comfort. Style Observer Gardening (SOG) journeyed to Green Acres, St Catherine, to explore the unique charm of this captivating oasis.

Reverend Florizel Allen showcases a cucumber freshly plucked from the vine. (Photo: Karl Mclarty)

At the front of the driveway, an inviting welcome awaits with a vibrant mix of palms, bromeliads, crotons and ti plants. Yet, the true magic unfolds in the backyard. Here, an assembly of flora and produce creates a tropical paradise. Roses, ZZ plants, and other species occupy the garden floor, thriving alongside bountiful Scotch bonnet peppers, mangoes, grapes, and naseberries. The balcony embraces a farm-to-table ethos, bursting with spinach, cucumbers, purple cabbage, and pineapple. Adding to the experience is the chatter of parakeets that he lovingly tends to.

He inherited a green thumb from his parents, Reginald and Lurline; it was their shared appreciation for flowers that ultimately shaped his own home gardening philosophy. In fact, his parents planted three different types of trees for each of their four children.

“My parents had a tradition of celebrating the birth of each child by planting three trees: A coconut tree with the child’s navel string buried at the root, a fruit tree which provided food for life and a lumber-producing tree which would later be cut to yield lumber that would be stored under the cellar of the house in preparation to make a casket. This was to signify the cycle of life,” Allen explained to SOG. “My mum had a particular affinity for flowers, especially crotons and coleuses. As an adult, I developed the perspective that a home is not a house with a garden, but rather a garden with a house.”

That philosophy is one he shares with his wife, Marva. Together, they have built an oasis that serves as both a personal sanctuary and a welcoming venue for family and friends.

While Allen cherishes his collection, he harbours a particular soft spot, too, for

crotons and coleuses, which he grows in honour of his mother. He is also deeply captivated by the blooms of roses and orchids.

“Some of my favourite flowers are aglaonema, roses, orchids, and the jade vine. I also have a passion for palms because of their wide variety and tropical elegance,” Allen explained.

Join SOG next week for more from Florizel Allen’s garden.

Photographer: Karl Mclarty

White grapes (Photo: Karl Mclarty)

Tea rose (Photo: Karl Mclarty)

Blue spangle budgerigar (Photo: Karl Mclarty)

Floribunda rose (Photo: Karl Mclarty)

Croton (Photo: Karl Mclarty)