Botanical Garden Design on Isle of Dogs

The Brief

The clients have lived at the property for over 20 years and landscaped the garden many yearsago.Howeverillness prevented regular use and maintenance of the garden and the once beautifulspace has become tired and overgrown. The clients would like to revive their love of gardening bymaking the space more accessible, with plenty of raised beds and the opportunity to stamp theirown mark on the space as the garden grows.

Design Solution

This design focuses on the clients love of gardening. Based on a Victorian plant hunters botanical theme, the planting is all about foliage. To set the plants off to their best the garden boundaries will be clad with a contemporary horizontal softwood timber slats and painted black.

The lower section of the garden adjoining the house will be restructured to create a larger more useable area, with a curved retaining wall across the garden. To the left of this will be a fixed seating area comprising fibreglass planters with a built in timber bench. To the right, will be a Victorian inspired mini greenhouse. New curved steps will be constructed opposite the back door. These steps will be wide and shallow and include architectural salvage Victorian railings and handrail for easy access to the upper garden.

The existing greengage tree will be removed to allow for a backbone of planting including shrubs, some existing plants such as the potted yukka and new architectural specimens.

Paving throughout the space will comprise cream porcelain tiles laid in a diagonal stretcher pattern in a curved spiral motif. A pebble mosaic ‘rug’ will form the centre of the spiral shape.

The planting beds in the upper garden will consist of raised planters constructed from rendered concrete blocks and painted a soft pinky beige. These beds will increase in increments of 20 cm and wrap around the back corner of the garden. The back boundary will be clad with a panel of green Perspex to reflect the Victorian botanical inspired theme of the space and provide a stylish backdrop on which to display the client’s London underground sign and other ephemera. The back fence will also feature a piece of fender timber from the King George the fifth dock as a nod towards the heritage of the area. Space underneath can be set aside the storing wood for the fire pit in this area.

To the right of the space, a tall sentry box style storage unit will provide storage for waterproof cushions and garden tools.