Auberge du Lac,
Brocket Hall
One of the finest restaurants outside London, the ‘roundabout bed’ greets guests as they enter the restaurant. New perennial planting was introduced in March 2006, now a riot of colour providing a warm welcome to guests. Other areas surrounding the restaurant (which has great views of the Hall over the lake) have been re-planted, too.
Cambridge
A newly built three storey townhouse, the compact courtyard garden is surrounded by wooden fencing. The clients wanted a low maintenance garden and a space for entertaining: they also love plants and modern art and had bought a beautiful sculpture to sit in the garden to be enjoyed all the year round. The fence was painted black and two curvaceous borders were cut out of Indian sandstone paving.
The larger border has the sculpture (with a new one added recently to the other border): at the back of the garden, a raised bed, adding extra seating, is planted with standard Photinias to give all year round colour. Perennials and shrubs are used for a succession of colour in the garden. A lovely, colourful relaxing space to enjoy all year round.
Cambridge
The lovely couple at this house have lived there for over forty years and wanted a complete re-design of their garden. The shaded front garden had a tall conifer, which was removed, and the small lawn was turned into a gravel garden with a circular granite sett design. This circular theme carried through into the rear garden where three separate circles were created in the long narrow lawn. Over-grown trees and shrubs were removed and trimmed back to make way for colourful borders bursting with year round interest.
Welwyn, Hertfordshire
A new house built on the site of an older house which needed new planting to soften the exterior and reflect the client's love of exotic and tropical plants. Year round interest from perennials and shrubs were added to bamboos, palms and tree ferns. Now in its second season, the garden is establishing well.
Great Gransden, Cambridgeshire
The planting in the front garden of this recently built house had become overgrown and dated. A new look was required that offered low maintainance, clean lines, year round interest and also to define the boundary.
The lawn and all the shrubs were taken out (some used elsewhere) and standard Photinias planted to break up the large expanse of brick wall at the side of the house. Pebbles, cobbles and granite setts create tactile hard landscaping and the boundary edge is defined with an iron railing fence. Soft herbaceous perennials and grasses underplant the Photinias and a low box hedge encloses the new border at the front of the house.