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This was a brand new house with a steeply sloping garden mainly laid to lawn with bare beds and with protected yew trees heavily shading the back of the garden. A conservatory was added as the owner moved in and the brief for this garden was to create an ornamental patio/seating area around this and some sort of retention to cope with the slope. An additional seating area would be included to catch the afternoon sun. As an arthritis sufferer, the owner requested low maintenance planting and required shallow steps to cope with the slope and raised beds for ease of bending.
The Design
The design incorporated an octagonal patio to surround the conservatory to create two new seating areas, edged with brick walling in keeping with the house and conservatory walls. A raised walled bed surrounded this incorporating spring bulbs, alliums, festuca grasses and herbs, with two sets of shallow steps, flanked by box topiary cones, leading to the rest of the garden. Walls and fences were disguised using a fan trained morello cherry, pyracantha, euonymus and scented honeysuckle.
A half gazebo was situated in the corner of the garden to catch the evening sun and the shaded wooded area was underplanted with tough dry shade tolerant shrubs such as aucuba, viburnum opulus and mahonia to provide some structure and flowering plants such as hellebores, epimediums, cyclamens and tiarella to give colour and interest.
The Feedback
"I commissioned Julia to design a layout for the garden of my new house. The plot is a difficult shape, with a sloping rear garden heavily shaded by trees to the rear boundary. Julia went to tremendous trouble to discuss my requirements with me and assisted in the preparation of the brief.
The final design was imaginative, well thought out and completely took the requirements into consideration. She was very helpful and knowledgeable in advising me on the types of plants and shrubs to be selected, providing ease of maintenance but something to look at all year round.
I am very pleased with the result that totally lives up to my expectations. Through the whole process of planning and construction I was very impressed with Julia's attention to detail and informative and patient advice. She took all of the worry out of the project for me and produced a first class result."
Mrs C, Andover
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