Cottage Garden

Client Brief

A patio area was required to sit out on and an area to go to enjoy the summer / evening sun. Apart from this it was basically a blank cancas to create an outdoor room that was appealing and very useable.

image of unique circle creared from sleepers design by Pairi-dae-za designs.

The sundiest part of the garden,catching mid to late afternoon sun and right up to nine o'clock at night.We had at our disposal a multitude of old reclaimed materials.Granite setts,an old hardwood gate, sinks and pieces of sandstone. We were to incorporate all of these into creating a cottage garden with beautiful herbaceous planted beds,a lovely sitting area with pergola,and make it feel like it had been there for years.

When we first arrived on site we were faced with a blank canvas, although not a big area it had been left a bit of a building site due to the works on a new house extension.We created small retaining walls using sleepers to allow us to then level the site and once we achieved our levels,we created a circular main sitting area using sandstone paving,laid, on a base of 150mm of type one aggregate and a 50mm mortar screed.Now we had to link this sitting area to the side gate.A series of granite sett paths (which would also creat the framework for our main planted borders) and sandstone paving would create this effect.

image of grey Indian sandstone with sleepers.

We wanted to give the sitting area a back drop that also gave height and enclosed the area, and, we did this with the building of a pergola which would have Wisteria Sinensis climbing over it.Sandstone paving stepping stones and low planting led you to the raised beds of planting, and funnelled you slowly through gorgeous planting to the side gate which is stunningly restored to all its past glory.