Central Scotland Garden

Arts and Crafts house and garden

I love designing gardens around Arts and Crafts houses.  Introducing beautiful, sometimes quirky features and placing the emphasis on highly skilled craftsmanship is what this design movement was all about.  The owners of this amazing house in Central Scotland fully embraced this in their approach to the work they were undertaking both inside and out.  They had invested heavily in restoring the windows and stonework of the house and were keen to get my help in transforming the gardens into beautiful spaces to entice them outdoors.

Garden design on steep hills

I always take a deep breath when confronted with gardens on seriously steep hills.  I’ve designed a few of these over the years and they are not for the faint hearted (or the unfit).  Thankfully, a good deal of the hard work and terracing around this beautiful Arts and Crafts house had already been done when the house was built.  However, the areas immediately around the house did not present the new owners with any proper outdoor family space.  With its tarmac driveway and lack of planted borders around the front door, there was the slight suspicion that you’d arrived at a commercial property rather than a family home.

Family patio

The first problem was addressed by designing a large entertaining space to the west of the house.  To begin with I encouraged the clients to open up a wall in an extension to the rear of this area and install French doors to give the family better access to the garden from the living and kitchen areas of the house. A small patio was designed outside these doors with an Urbis water feature.  In front of this, I created an area of Dutch pavers laid out in a herringbone pattern on which sits a grand, twelve seater Oxleys Artemis table and chairs.  The pavers are surrounded by free-draining gravel making it appear as if the table and chairs sit on a paver rug.  The London Stone pavers were chosen carefully to match the red roof tiles on the house.

Outdoor kitchen

The use of traditional materials in the hard landscaping of this garden was complemented by the addition of a contemporary outdoor kitchen by Grillo.  The kitchen units are predominantly black with a timber trim which blends in well with colours of window frames on the house.  I positioned the kitchen against a stone retaining wall.  The effect is discrete as well as elegant.  A pizza oven, barbecue and Big Green Egg barbecue as well as an outdoor fridge mean all levels of entertaining for family and friends are covered.

Perennial Turf

The steep slopes which fall away from the new family patio and down the driveway all present difficult ground to maintain.  I turned to Pictorial Meadows’ range of perennial turf as a solution.   Turf is sown with perennials for a long season of flowers creating excellent habitat for insects and other wildlife whilst improving the biodiversity of the garden in leaps and bounds.  The turf acts as an initial weed suppressant which is particularly helpful in difficult to reach locations and over larger areas.  Periodic weeding is still needed to prevent windblown weed seed germinating and a twice yearly cut is all that is required to keep these areas flowering well year after year.  The effect of whole embankments in full bloom from spring through until autumn is a sight to behold.

Garden Lighting

Soft lighting of plants around the house and patio extends enjoyment of the garden.  A combination of uplighting foliage and the warm sandstone walls of the house and terracing creates beautiful effects and adds warmth after dark.  A smart system makes the lighting highly controllable and means lights can be programmed to come on only when needed.

Plants

I opted for an exuberant planting scheme all the way round the house with blousy Hydrangeas, peonies and roses intermingled with ornamental grasses to add a touch of modernity.  Around the house I created generous borders and raised beds filled to the brim with plants to soften the austerity of the building.  In the south-facing borders, I planted a rolling season of flowering bulbs and perennials as well as ornamental grasses. Bright Geums and Salvias, Geraniums and Erigeron enjoy the south-facing aspect and give a nod to Gertrude Jekyll (the queen of Arts and Crafts planting designs).  In the north-facing borders, Astrantia, Sesleria, Hellebores, Carex elata aurea, Japanese Acers and Fatsia Japonica create contrasting textures and colours at different times of the year with their foliage and flowers.  A bank of Hydrangea Limelight and Persicaria amplexicaulis Fat Domino sits behind the outdoor kitchen putting on a stunning display for months starting in summer and lasting well into autumn.  Roses such as Rosa Desdemona and Rosa New Dawn lend elegance and fragrance to the scheme.  From my perspective, the clients’ commitment to the use of plants to soften the architecture of the house as well as to improve biodiversity around the garden made this a particularly enjoyable planting design and project.