Garden of the Week
By segregating a vast lawned area into different sections, this couple have created a garden with surprises around each corner
Once part of the 17th century mill next door, the half-acre garden at Mill Bank in Oxfordshire had been divided off into a large lawned area surrounded by high hedges, creating a sheltered microclimate, with the mill stream running along the southern border.
“It may have been bland, but it was a delightfully unusual shape and I could see it had such potential,” says Pat Hougham. Over the past 10 years, she and husband Mike have gradually transformed the blank canvas into a colourful cottage garden with segregated areas of interest, featuring 13 different sunny and shady beds.
The couple were both still working, so the landscaping happened gradually. They started by adding a large chaletstyle shed, two greenhouses and a summer house. Then in went cobbled and brick paths, seating areas and three archways (“so the garden could be viewed from different angles”) together with a pergola walkway covered by a grapevine, roses and clematis.
They inherited a low semicircular wall, which simply divided the lawned area into two. Pat created flower beds on both sides to soften its appearance and as the planting evolved, so the wall became incorporated into the scheme. “Now that everything’s growing away, it provides a really attractive division,” she says.
Vegetable growing is Mike’s domain, and as well as a nearby allotment, he created a small veg garden at home “to grow the staples”. The area was segregated by a perimeter of 25 fruit trees – cordon apples, greengages, pears and plums, as well as figs, quince, apricots and peaches, a mulberry tree and medlar.
Also stationed here are their chickens, which form part of the composting cycle. They’re allowed to roam freely in the garden during autumn and winter and seem to see off all the beasties, as they have very few problems with slugs and snails. The soil’s a rich, alluvial loam, thanks to deposits from the flooded stream over the years, and it’s supplemented
with manure from the chickens.
On one side of the garden, dominated by an ancient ash tree, Pat has created a border of shade-tolerant hostas, heucheras, ferns and perennial geraniums. These take up the baton from the spring bulbs that provide a riot of colour before the ash tree unfurls its leaves in May.
Because the garden is open from May to September, Pat carefully plans her displays to ensure there’s something of interest for visitors right through the summer months.
“I don’t really have a colour scheme as such, but just pack plants together,” she says. “Once the early perennial delphiniums, lupins and alstroemeria are past their best, we’ve pots of lilies, dahlias and begonias ready to fill any gaps in the borders, together with potted heucheras, aeoniums and grasses to give some contrast.”
With 13 flower beds to fill, Pat grows a lot of annuals from seed, and cosmos, nicotiana, zinnias and cleomes start blooming in mid-July, augmented by old favourites including sweet Williams, stocks and pinks. For late colour, spray chrysanthemums, helenium and Michaelmas daisies take the garden through to the first frosts. She’s always sowing new plants from seed and dividing existing stocks to sell on her charity open days and to give to friends.
“My favourite flowers are roses and these appear throughout the garden on archways, scrambling up columns, along fences and on the house wall,” says Pat. “Most of these are repeatflowering and if we keep up feeding and deadheading after the first flush, they reward us with blooms all summer long.”
To add height in the flower beds Pat grows climbers up columns, including sweet peas for early summer flowers, followed by the purple bells of rhodochiton and cobaea, fiery Mina lobata and many different clematis.
Their garden is constantly evolving. This year they added a rockery and in 2018 they’re planning to replant some hedges with yew and holly and remove the ivy from the house walls.
“Sometimes plants don’t look right or try to take over. Those get dug up and if I can’t bear to part with them I pop them in alongside the path by the stream, which is now home to an eclectic mix of wild flowers, iris and my garden cast-offs!”