“Our garden of grasses looks good all year”
Bleached blonde grasses create structure in Gloucestershire
This dramatic garden in a quiet corner of the Wye Valley has plenty of winter interest, but rather than rely on glossy evergreens, most of the colour and structure comes from deciduous grasses. “The front garden looks especially stunning in winter,” says owner Kate Patel, who lives here with her husband Hitesh. “The winter palette always reminds me of a hairdresser’s colour chart, with its blend of pale through to rich browns and buffs. The spent plumes either blaze in winter sunshine, drip with jewels on rainy days, or look ethereal in ghostly mists. Of course, they’re always moving too, so the scene is forever shifting and rustling.” Kate used trial and error to learn which plants would shine in winter. “I’ve contrasted the bleached-blonde grasses with charcoal-dark seedheads, or colourful bark and woody stems,” she says. “It’s even more effective than I’d hoped. But a successful winter garden is not just about which plants colour bands (clockwise from above) The terraced front garden partners calamagrostis ‘Karl Foerster’ and shorter ‘Overdam’ with rudbeckia and silvery-grey nepeta; Crocus tommasinianus; Rudbeckia deamii; Phlomis fruticosa; Chionochloa rubra circles the birdbath; Prunus serrula with grasses and photinia ‘Red Robin’; cornus ‘Midwinter Fire’ and betula ‘Jermyns’
you use, but also how many. A single plant isn’t as effective as a group of them.” Kate and Hitesh have lived here since 2006. “We moved in with a van full of plants and a dream to create a garden of grasses that would look good all year round,” says Kate. “Our budget was limited though, so we planned to do as much of the work ourselves, raising hundreds of plants from seed.” The house was formerly a row of workers’ cottages, standing at the bottom of a rough grassy slope. “Our garden once supplied a local cider-maker with apples,” says Kate. “It’s an awkward triangular plot, stretching across an acre and it slopes in all directions. When we arrived it was the usual story, a
“The palette reminds me of a hairdresser’s colour chart”
much-loved country garden had been neglected for several years. Many of the trees needed urgent attention and the borders, such as they were, were infested with bindweed, ground elder and brambles.” The couple also discovered that much of the garden is on a shelf of undiggable bedrock. “We’re gardening on Offa’s Dyke!” says Kate. “And, in winter the heavy clay becomes cold and saturated, sometimes lasting until late spring. The solution in the veg patch was to build raised sleeper beds.” Kate and Hitesh tackled the back garden first, revamping a vast, sun-baked terrace of 1980s’ pink-and-orange concrete pavers. “Its only feature was a large, weed-infested, kidney-shaped border that had once been a trout pond-cum-swimming pool,” says Kate. “This was the main view from the house; even in midsummer it wasn’t a pretty sight!” Today there’s a greenhouse and a new, circular border filled with grasses and dazzling perennials in summertime. “We’ve created a shaded seating area under a new pergola draped with vines and Actinidia kolomikta for a touch of mystery and drama,” says Kate. “It draws attention away from the dated pavers – they cover about 2000 square feet so replacing them was out of the question. Instead we’ve allowed them to weather with algae and lichen and I’ve lifted the odd slab to plant in between them.” The front garden, meanwhile, comprised half an acre of rough field grass planted with trees and was bisected by the drive. “We wanted to shield the open view across the drive to the lane,” says Kate, “so we planted a 70m-long hedge of Miscanthus sinensis ‘Malepartus’ (a tall cultivar with a strong upright habit) in staggered rows around the perimeter – the same way you’d use traditional hedging plants, only the grasses are much more dynamic. A friend of mine says my grasses are the glue in the garden, and it’s true. They stick the design together pretty much all year long.” Miscanthus are Kate’s favourites for winter. “They have the fluffiest seed heads, held on almost glassy dried stems that clatter in the breeze,” she says. “I also like Calamagrostis acutiflora ‘Karl Foerster’ – another tall grass, which we use here as an elevated screen. It’s the grass of choice for strong vertical effects, and in winter it has a shimmering sheen that’s mesmerising. “We also use the lower-growing, variegated calamagrostis ‘Overdam’ at metre intervals alongside the sloping path that links our Grasses Terrace to the grassy orchard view (clockwise from above) Ancient ‘Bramley’ trees frame daffodils below, with cardoons left; golden bamboo Phyllostachys spectabilis; Prunus serrula with upright miscanthus ‘Morning Light’, pennisetum ‘Black Beauty’ and hakonechloa ‘Aureola’; algae and lichens have subdued the 1980s’ patio, with potted miscanthus ‘Adagio’; pots of rusty Persicaria vacciniifolia
“My grasses are the glue in the garden... they stick the design together all year long”
planting above. It’s a bold combination that looks especially dramatic in winter.” Kate certainly knows the plants that work best at this time of year. “My favourite perennials for winter are rudbeckia seed heads, nepeta and sedums,” she says. “I think of them as the final flourishes, using the grasses as a foil. The birds love Rudbeckia deamii and ‘Goldsturm’ – last year a flock of bullfinches cleared hundreds of plants in just one week! Nepeta ‘Six Hills Giant’ is another good choice; in summer I’ll cut them back for a second flush of flowers that dries to a smoky grey smudge in winter. On a frosty day it sparkles with silver... “The important thing is to keep things simple,” she says. “That means resisting the temptation to use more than a limited number of key plants. Where I’ve restrained the planting in this way the effects are so much more pleasing and restful.”