Blog

2012-01-31T02:31:00.000-08:00

New tree planting in Hampshire, to soften boundaries, enhance views and provide replacements for established trees when they eventually fall

2011-12-17T08:17:00.000-08:00

An extraordinary and unique bower made by Martha Freud, Danny Wootton and Sid Dawes from stag-head oak. We can't decide whether it is too beautiful to adorn with climbing plants ....

2011-12-17T08:10:00.000-08:00

Here is a new garden for a new-build house planted Winter/Spring 2010/11. The advantage of planting hedges relatively small is that you can let them grow slowly to a height that suits the site - not too high and not too low - eye heights vary - not all my clients are 6'4'' like me.

2011-12-17T08:03:00.000-08:00

Here is a photo, take in August, of a little orchard of crabapple and hawthorn trees, planted last Winter and now, because of the extraordinary Spring we had this year, struggling with an unusually heavy crop of fruit. The house has been extensively restored and the garden, which was a wilderness a few years ago, entirely recreated and re-imagined.

2011-05-23T00:58:00.000-07:00

My own garden May 2011 (cf. photo below) with Geum Princess Juliana, Geranium macrorrhizum Bevans Variety added for extra colour to contrast with the monkshoods, Phlomis, self-seeded ferns and verbascums

2011-04-14T09:55:00.000-07:00

Spring at last in a new London garden. Clematis macropetala in a white glazed Brooke Barrel - (pity about the rogue tulip)

2010-06-21T04:15:00.000-07:00

This is my own garden in mid-May, a stunning combination of Euphorbia 'Fireglow' and Monkshood, both semi-wild, both thriving in a raised, dryish border

2010-05-19T06:18:00.000-07:00

A prototype modern garden seat for swinging lovers: a wrought iron design combining two hearts. It was difficult to make and, having only three legs, it took some tinkering to make it stable. However, it is surprisingly comfortable and, painted cherry red, adds a bit of zing to a country garden; seen here amidst forget-me-nots

2010-01-27T07:22:00.000-08:00

A sketch design for a little play house on stilts based on a small, traditional granary or apple store - a timber-clad, oak-frame with clay tile roof staddle stones and a detachable ladder - perfect for children of all ages!

2010-01-26T09:08:00.000-08:00

This is a concept sketch for a 'firewall' - a wall with a fire

2009-12-01T01:02:00.000-08:00

This is a new garden for an old house in Norfolk. The basic infrastructure is already there - walls and roads - the new design relies principally on trees and hedges to provide a low-maintenance, relatively low-cost architectural effect

2009-11-30T07:40:00.000-08:00

This is a bird's eye view of the swimming pool garden.

2009-10-21T03:07:00.000-07:00

From this unpromising looking hole in the ground close to Notting Hill Gate, a beautiful garden will, one day, emerge

2009-09-23T01:45:00.000-07:00

This is a sketch design for small pavilion cantilevered out over the canal near Camden lock. For durability it will be made from oak which may or may not be painted but the underside of the roof will be gilded so that reflections from water's surface illuminate the inside

2009-09-09T03:45:00.000-07:00

This is one of the most successful planting schemes I have ever done. Yuccas and daisies mass planted in a series of galvanised troughs on a roof terrace in central London, seen here in September 2009, 3 years later, in full flower. They have survived drought (faulty irrigation system) and howling winds.

2009-07-31T09:46:00.001-07:00

Recently, I have become intrigued by 'open source design' and specifically, its application to landscape design, to my own small practice in particular. So much so, that I am currently rebuilding my website to accommodate it.

Open source design, for those not familiar with it, is more than just being generally open to ideas (which is what I originally thought it meant), it is in fact a good deal more sophisticated. It is a computer term, and involves companies making their designs - the source code – open for all to see in the hope that someone will pick it up, play with it, improve it and return it for evaluation and if good enough, for marketing.

There are obvious downside risks for conventional business models – profit and copy right principally. As a result, it requires something of a paradigm shift that may not suit all but for those companies who have adopted it, the results are apparently compelling.

Famously, Apple have and, more recently, Riversimple the hydrogen car which is in the news now.

Where once it was the norm for businesses to have large, R & D departments operating in rigidly controlled, hermetically sealed environments, they can now, by throwing themselves open to the world, make do with smaller design teams whilst harvesting ideas from much further afield.

There is obviously nothing new about idea sharing but the internet is so fast that the speed of interactivity generates a spark that makes real creativity possible …. at least, that's the promise.

So far as I am concerned, I intend to upload working drawings onto a page alongside my conventional website, inviting comments and suggestions from not only contractor/fabricator/supplier/clients but also anyone else who happened to logon to that page too.

2009-07-30T07:43:00.000-07:00

This slate plaque was installed today. It was inscribed by Tom Perkins; the text chosen by my client. Though small (and nearly 9 months to commission and make) this final element adds an extra dimension to the courtyard garden and was definitely worth the wait.

2009-07-28T10:33:00.000-07:00

This is the design for a very large clay pot we are having made for a private garden in London. The clay is from Yorkshire where it is also being made: