The Gardener’s Notebook
When a family found sunshine lacking in their garden, clever design offered a ray of hope, as George Hudson discovers
If you are Australian, there is a good chance two things are important to you: sunshine and barbecues. This was certainly true for garden designer Harry Holding’s Earl’s Court client, Tara, and her family. After moving to the UK they found themselves with a garden that didn’t really cut it.
“When we moved in, the garden had two very traditional flower beds running along either side of the garden with a shed at the back. The only part of the garden that got any direct sun was where the shed was,” Tara explained.
“The combination of children with a football and owning a dog meant we also had a dustbowl of a lawn between the two beds. Several people came to look at the space before we found Harry, all suggesting plastic grass, which we really didn’t want.”
This was a challenging project for a number of reasons, Holding explained. “Logistically it was one of the most complex gardens to make. Parking was very difficult outside the house, so everything had to be carried to site by hand from a couple of streets away.”
The garden already contained some wonderful mature trees and climbers, such as the heavily scented, evergreen star jasmine, which he really didn’t want to lose. Holding also took advantage of a maple and cherry tree that leaned into the space. His design retains the existing ground levels in the garden: “We used steel edging to create a journey through the spaces, making the journey to the end of the garden slightly more intriguing.”
A series of contemporary stepping stones snakes its way to the back of the garden, the gravel between each stone giving space to pack in extra planting.
At the rear, Holding removed the shed and created a decking area, blending it in using dark painted wood. This area is now the sunniest part of the garden and gives Tara and her family the space they need to entertain in.
Tara’s brief was also to reduce the feeling of being overlooked. Holding used a tropical planting palette, with tree ferns and banana plants providing the bones of the space, filtering the view to the flats above in summer.
The garden was recently awarded the Big Ideas, Small Budget award at the 2023 Society of Garden Design Awards.