In February I attended a talk on Millboard decking www.millboard.co.uk at my Surrey Garden Design group www.sgdg.org.uk Here’s my resume: In February Russell Porter from Millboard Decking came along to introduce us to his company’s decking and porcelain products. It is a family owned British company, and their composite decking in particular is becoming quite …
Cloudpruning
I spotted this ‘Cloud Pruned’ Viburnum tinus in a front garden in Barnes yesterday. What a great idea to prune it in this way, the original bush must have looked quite untidy. It is now an elegant feature. The gardener of the house was there, and he told me that it had a taken a …
Visit to Silverland Stone
I am looking forward to visiting Silverland Stone, landscape suppliers, www.silverlandstone.co.uk in a couple of weeks. I am going as a member of the Surrey Garden design Group www.sgdg.org.uk. I joined last year and it has been a great way to top up my knowledge and meet and make friends with fellow designers/gardeners. We meet …
Horsham Stone front garden
This front garden in Caterham was designed to comfortably accommodate an extra car space. Like so many areas, pressure on parking is increasing. The brief was to make the garden look good when no cars are on the drive, as nobody really wants their front garden to look like a car park. This is the …
Cool Contemporary garden chairs
I absolutely love these bright orange lounging chairs, made of hard-wearing rattan, but can I find them to buy? They are/were available in the U.S , but apparently not here – shame. I find the range of outdoors table and chairs available here rather limited. Anyone looking to set up a business, here’s a gap …
Yellow roses
I am really enjoying these yellow roses in my own garden this year (unknown variety). Yellow is sometimes an unpopular colour in gardening, perhaps due to some brash yellows found in the plant world, like Lysimachia, and Forsythia, but this yellow is so fresh and clear, against all the green in my garden, it is …
Outdoor pizza oven
Following on from the previous post, here is the gorgeous pizza oven that Cathy Miller designed with her builder. Old stock bricks combined with the fossil stone create such a charming addition to the garden. The integrated bar with stools and the stainless steel barbecue tuck in perfectly to this underused part of the garden. …
Chipstead garden on a steep slope
I re-visited a garden today that was built and planted up last year. It was a joy to see it being looked after so beautifully, Cathy, the owner told me she loves spending time in the garden now that it has been landscaped, and she waters every evening. As the soil is dry and on …
Surrey Garden Design Group
Last week I joined this group, which is open to anyone interested in garden design and professional garden designers alike. It was such a friendly group and everyone that I talked to made me feel very welcome. I really enjoyed their first talk, about Arts and Crafts gardens, and I am looking forward to the …
Contemporary garden in Bookham
This garden was completed earlier this year. The brief was to create a Contemporary style garden with a sawn (smooth) paving slab, with steps, raised beds and a sunken trampoline. The before shot is at the bottom of this post. The steps lead off from wide bi-fold doors to a level lawn. The paving slab …