Private houses, country properties and the landscapes around them
Open the JournalA garden is never finished. It is a long conversation between a house, the ground it stands on and the weather, carried on over many years by the people who live there.
The first time I walked through the Garden of Cosmic Speculation, what struck me wasn’t the visual drama—though there’s plenty of that—but the quiet confidence of its structure. Here is a landscape that refuses to be merely decorative. Every landform, every terrace, every curve in the path serves an idea. The garden doesn’t try to […]
Why topography matters in a garden
Topography is not just about hills and slopes. It includes every change in level, from a subtle rise in a lawn to a retaining wall, terrace, swale, or sunken seating area. At garden scale, even minor level changes can become a major part of the spatial design, often defining […]
What Makes a Garden a Work of Land Art
I’ve walked through dozens of private gardens that were undeniably beautiful — lush borders, clever planting combinations, immaculate lawns — yet only a handful stopped me in my tracks and made me feel I was standing inside a composed work of art. The difference almost always comes down […]
Walking the ground, reading the soil and the light, and drawing how paths, terraces and planting will meet the house.
Trees and hedges go in while dormant, followed by shrubs and perennials once the soil begins to warm.
Watering, mulching and patient editing, so young plants root deeply and the structure of the garden settles in.
Spring growth, summer fullness, autumn colour and winter outline: the same garden becomes four different places.
