A new leaf
Keen to turn her creative skills to something new, Elaine drew up the plans for this garden herself...
One dedicated gardening couple turn their plain space into a cottage-style retreat
he makeover was initially sparked by Elaine’s increasingly bad migraines, which forced her to give up work.
‘I desperately needed a fulfilling project that would also be flexible, so John encouraged me to draw up possible designs for the garden,’ she explains.
‘I wanted beautiful herbaceous planting that
would flower
Taround structural features, focusing attention within the garden, and distracting from the surrounding properties.’
Her final design is a flowing layout based around a series of circular shapes that represent the patio, pond, lawn and wooden pavilion respectively.
‘Circles used within a rectangular plot maximise the planting depth at the corners, making the garden seem more spacious, whereas straight-sided borders make the plot seem smaller,’ she explains. John marked out the outlines on the lawn, using canes, string and hosepipes. ‘Then I tweaked the design until it was exactly right,’ she adds.
Work started seven years ago with the stripping back of the lower half of the lawn. ‘The garden slopes down a metre from front to
back, so the whole design is on a slight diagonal,’ she points out. The soil is a free-draining, sandy loam over shale, so once John had formed the new borders, he dug in loads of horse manure. Then he laid a circle of paving as a base for a wooden pavilion where, if the weather is good, Elaine can sew. ‘The flowers around me provide a never-ending source of inspiration,’ she adds.
Later additions
It was a few more years before the couple renovated the upper section of the garden, a westfacing patio area that catches the last of the sun’s rays. ‘I’d envisaged an intimate, enclosed feel, so that when you come out of the house, you’re instantly in the garden,’ says Elaine. Money was tight, so she tried to reuse the original, rather unappealing paving in the new design. ‘Nothing worked,’ she says.
In the end, they saved up for a circular patio (bradstone.com), making significant savings in the path that links with the pavilion. ‘It’s simply built from paving slabs laid in gravel, but don’t lay the gravel too thickly, or it goes everywhere,’ she warns. Finally, the old timber shed was given a new lease of life with a coat of black paint. ‘Now it “disappears” into the planting,’ she adds. The dull side wall is cheered up with wirework cage shelves displaying pots of succulents.
Outdoor room
For Elaine, the hexagonal pavilion (a sale bargain from Dunster House garden buildings, dunsterhouse. co.uk) is the most important element of the garden because it is the one place that has two chairs ready for use in any weather.
‘So often, people are always “doing” something in the garden, but to us the most important thing is to sit down, take a deep breath, relax and enjoy!
The weeds will still be there tomorrow.’
Beautiful borders
Good teamwork lies behind every stage of this garden’s transformation, but especially when planning the borders. They provide a succession of flowers from May until September. ‘That’s when we want most impact because it’s when we spend most time outside,’ says Elaine. Around 16 David Austin roses are planted throughout the garden, including the scented pink rosettes of ‘Eglantyne’, ‘Wildeve’ and ‘Wisley 2008’.
Round of applause
The lawn is a smallish disk of grass measuring some 4m in diameter, but come a hot summer’s day, the feel of soft grass underfoot is wonderfully cooling.
By undertaking all the work themselves, Elaine and John have channelled the cost savings into buying plants, especially those that encourage bees, butterflies and beneficial insects such as lacewings and hoverflies.
There is also a tame blackbird that follows Elaine round the garden, splashing in a small pool filled with frogs, which hoover up the slugs. ‘Far better that nature does this work, rather than resorting to pesticides,’ the couple agree.
Elaine adds, ‘The garden has transformed my life. Just looking outside, I feel excited at what the day ahead may bring. And there’s always more to look forward to in a garden, another season and new plants to discover.’