A CITY GARDEN EMBRACING FORMAL FORM

THE BRIEF

This family garden was designed for a keen gardener who wanted to introduce formal shapes and strong form into her garden. She wanted a stylish, contemporary garden which would hold a strong architectural visual throughout the year, and which would provide a backdrop for her attractive sculptures. She also wanted to encourage the family to use the garden space more, and provide a practical solution to connect the house to the garage at the bottom of the garden without having to walk on muddy grass.

THE DESIGN

The backbone of this design was the gorgeous herringbone-patterned clay paver path. The garden is surrounded by a brick wall so we colour matched the new pavers to the existing wall. I ran this down the length of the garden and wrapped it around to the new terrace. This gave a lovely texture and strong architectural line. To juxtapose the strong rectilinear shape I created, I used rounded forms throughout the beds - these included buxus balls, Hydrangea aborescens ‘Annabelle’, alliums and of course the clients’ own sculptures. The existing terrace was enlarged to provide enough space for a large Neptune dining table and chairs to give the family the space to enjoy the garden. I ran a line of pleached hornbeam across the bottom of the garden to hide the more utilitarian area of the garden from the house - and these helped add to the strong formal shapes we created. As a second phase, we are now developing the area beyond the pleached trees into a softer, less formalised area of the garden with natural meadow grass and soft planting.

THE PLANTING

We used a strict planting palette of white, green and purple in this garden. The strong rounded shapes were provided by Buxus sempervirens, Hydrangrea aborescens ‘Annabelle’ and a mix of alliums. Underneath the pleached trees I used Verbena bonariensis to provide height and a frothy ‘screen’ to hide the garage behind. We also used white Digitalis purpurea and Gaura lindheimeri ‘Whirling Butterflies’. To provide texture in the shaded areas we used a mix of ferns, and we also made sure to include some existing favourites of my client such as Dicentra ‘aurora’ and Polygonatum x hybridus.