Emma Sage on Creating an Online Gardening Journal

Tell us about how Sage Journal came to be. Being raised on our family farm in Hawke’s Bay and watching my mum and grandmother create and tend to magnificent gardens all my life, I have an inherent appreciation for growing things and cultivating beauty on the land. My love for nature and gardening wasn’t always so pronounced, though. I pottered around with vegetable gardening as a university student and young adult, but when my husband and I bought our first home – a real doer-upper – it was the landscaping element of the renovation that truly captured my heart.

Naturally, the idea of working in the botanical world began to tug at my thoughts. I dreamt of running an online space for curated inspirational and informative articles that were relevant and aspirational for the New Zealand gardener. And so while my first two children were very young I built and launched Sage Journal – an online magazine for the garden-curious. Sage Journal draws on my pre-kid career in marketing and brand management, my experience as a freelance writer, and a decade of dabbling in lifestyle blogging. And of course, my enthusiasm for plants, gardens and green spaces.

How has the online community that exists around Sage Journal changed your work life? Without social media Sage Journal would not exist. I began the concept of Sage by sharing garden photos and gardening tips on Instagram. Partly for the love of it, and partly to see whether there were other people out there who were interested in what I wanted to share. Having people follow, like, respond and share Sage’s posts and articles with their wider online communities from early on allowed me to dream and encouraged me to build the online magazine. Sage’s growing online community continues to motivate me to do more and share more with those engaging with the editorials, articles – and now the educational Gardening Series. I am so grateful for our online community, and I’m excited to share more with such a brilliant bunch of nature-inspired people.

Can you share a favourite gardening tip for winter? I have quite a lot! Here are just a few.

PLANT – Garlic, strawberries, brassicas and lots of leafy greens. Winter is also the ideal time to be planting fruit trees and roses.

HARVEST – All kinds of citrus, rhubarb and tamarillos. Avocados will become ready to pick, and if you got your seedlings in early enough, you might be harvesting broccoli, cauliflower and other brassicas.

MULCH – During winter, mulch will keep the weeds down and act as a warm blanket for the plants’ roots. Use pea straw, wood chips, newspaper, shredded cardboard, grass clippings, seaweed, wool...

FEED THE BIRDS – Natural food sources become more scarce for the birds during winter, so now’s a good time to make or buy a bird feeder.

Head over to Emma's Sage Journal to learn more. This is the final piece in the Conversations with Friends series, celebrating the launch of our new website. Read our conversations with Philippa Cameron of What's For Smoko and weaver and artist Fiona Collis.