I believe that if someone says your garden is magical, that’s the very best compliment you can receive. Walking through a garden should be a magical experience, and over three decades I have been working towards redefining the British garden, moving away from heavy stamps of design and ego, from rigid hard landscaping and formal hedges, back towards gardens that have a gentler sensitivity about them.
The evolution of British garden design is changing how people think about gardens as we encourage the gentle rebellion of letting nature back in. I want people to feel something when they walk through a garden: I want to create spaces that invite people to explore and to linger. While the rest of the world was paving over planting areas, I have consistently been advocating for a softer approach, supporting wildlife without sacrificing beauty.
The gardens I design capture something essentially British, but with a small difference: that of thinking about the context in which the garden finds itself. The idea of formal structure softened with planting remains, but the geometric layouts are less visible. The ostentatious topiary is placed only if the house and the landscape can cope with it. The space is being filled with an abundance of plants tumbling into each other. Every plant should look like it belongs in its location.
I design gardens with the experience in mind. Nostalgic, peaceful, joyful, contemplative – gardens should be able to embrace all of these and more, drawing you in both physically and emotionally. Paths wind and boundaries are soft. Rather than hard edges and straight lines, I am creating gardens that flow, creating a journey around the garden, rather than it all being visible at once. The intention is to create an experience rather than a showpiece only to be looked at from afar.
