I’ve designed my own gardens since I can remember. The first surrounded an old chicken coop at the bottom of a childhood garden. I remember creating fences with whatever junk I could find so that I had the power to invite people in or, on occasion, keep them out. I remember the delight of parking a bike or tying up an imaginary horse at the boundary, and looking back through the trees at the larger garden beyond.
As I reached adulthood my interests became more focussed on designing spaces where plants would thrive, and I enjoyed sourcing and salvaging materials from places further afield than the back of a garden shed. But without the careless freedom of childhood it took me weeks or months to work out a new design and even then I was often left wondering if I could have done something better.
Taking time to learn the principles of garden design was my game changer. It allowed me to look at outdoor spaces in more imaginative ways. None of what I learnt was rocket science but rather an invitation to play again – in ways that my rational adult brain had got out of the habit of doing. It also gave me the ability to read and unpick the design principles of other gardens so that I could replicate elements of them in my own.
Nowadays I love designing gardens for people, but my own experience makes me especially excited about helping people to use simple principles to design them for themselves. If that appeals to you please get in touch to find out when the next one-day ‘DIY Garden Design’ course is running.
