A week of site visits

6th December 2024

It’s definitely Winter here at Manor Farm Barn this week as we’ve had the first flurry of snow. It looked so pretty but didn’t last long sadly. The Winter sun has taken over showing the Hakonechloa off in it’s Autumn colour against the Cotswold stone… Busy busy with work as always – I have several projects being built at the moment so am spending my time travelling about visiting 3 separate sites & my clients both new & existing. On top of that I’m madly trying to get some drawing done. All good – it’s great to be busy – …

What a range of projects!

11th October 2019

Normally I show you drawings & plans of gardens I’m working on or work in progress or beautiful images of completed gardens. This time I’m showing you the before shots of these projects I currently have on my books. There’s a manor house in Warwickshire, a couple of farms with many acres, a new build Georgian style mansion, a Cotswold cottage, an uber modern glass house near Henley on Thames, our barn & a plot in Bristol where the existing house is to be torn down. Here are some … What is fascinating about my job is the variety …

Contemporary garden thoughts this sunny June

29th June 2018

I’m busy working on several schemes at the moment & am just about to start on quite a large one near Marlborough in Wiltshire. My clients love all things modern & smart & want something elegant & funky too. I’m excited as I love working with clean lines & my clients have given me free reign. They liked several of my schemes including our own small courtyard garden in Henley on Thames which we sold a few years ago. I thought I’d take a look at it again 10 years on… This is what we bought which was pretty dreadful …

A garden designers own project – from the beginning

17th January 2018

I spend my life designing gardens for my clients but always design my own too. It’s something I love to do & learn from as an added bonus. I’ve had quite a selection over the years; a shoebox with my first little house, a large & casual Cotswold garden, a contemporary courtyard in Henley on Thames, a large & very formal garden to suit my fairly large Victorian house in Berkshire that we sold recently & now this. See blog posts regarding both of these last two gardens. Now I have redesigned what was a pretty confused garden that is …

All change!

16th March 2017

This is the lovely purple garden around the Breeze House at my client Jane’s garden. It was one of the first things I designed for her some years ago now & it’s been one of my personal favourite areas. I’d used the purple berberis ‘nana’ successfully before instead of box edging & here I used it to link with the Acers to tie the whole thing together. Indeed it was much admired last year at the open day. The largest Acer is original & we added more to complement it & settle the Breeze House into the area. Rather like …

A new garden for a barn conversion

18th August 2015

I love doing small gardens as they are very satisfying. They are relatively quick to build (I often design very large estates which are implemented over several years in some cases) & the before & after shots are always amazing. With small gardens everything counts & the whole scheme must work throughout the seasons, day & night, back to front & so on. This counts for all gardens of course but more so here as nothing is hidden; I don’t do mini wild flower meadows for example as I don’t believe a small garden can afford such temporary beauty. I …

Busy Day Last Friday

24th January 2014

Last week I was madly busy preparing for a Friday presentation to my client in Oxford. It’s a contemporary scheme with a south facing front garden where she & her family would like to sit & chill out whilst screened from the world. She wanted a Mediterranean feel & a storage space for bikes & bins. I had to disguise the fact that there was a drive. The rear north facing garden had to incorporate another relaxing area, dining area, lawn, office & a play area with a tree house for the children. How lovely! Here are some sketches & …

Chelsea Award Winning Garden Design