‘Putting the garden to work has doubled our living space’
Caroline and Tim Norris traded some lawn and shrubbery for seating, a kitchen, a summerhouse and even a hot tub!
After extending and renovating their home, which took around nine months, Caroline and Tim Norris decided to take a break for a couple of years before turning their attention to the garden. ‘We are both complete garden novices, so we really needed to think about what we wanted and do lots of research,’ says Caroline.
The garden was a good size, stocked with mature shrubs and trees, but the couple rarely ventured past the patio seating area, which meant all that space was going to waste. ‘We went to the Hampton Court Palace Flower Show as a starting point,’ says Caroline, ‘then we used Pinterest to find images to illustrate a wish list of what we had in mind for the garden.
‘Luckily, we knew a landscape gardener, Simon Fraser, and trusted him to do a good job. Initially, we paid him a £500 design fee to plot out everything on our wish list. We tried not to be too prescriptive, so he had the freedom to come up with creative solutions and ideas that we hadn’t thought of.’
Once the plans were agreed, the garden was cleared and the summerhouse was built, taking five days including one to lay the foundations. Simon did the rest, including the raised beds, outdoor kitchen, shed, wood store and planting. ‘We wanted low-maintenance plants, especially various grasses, to create the Mediterranean look I had in mind,’ says Caroline.