before

PENRHYN'S MASTER PLAN

penrhyn

The owners of this 1930's family house had just finished extensive internal building work and now needed the front garden to be improved.

They wanted a contemporary look in keeping with their internal style, with a parking space and a better outlook from inside the house.

The challenge

The garden was sloping, North facing, open and soulless.  It contained very little other than concrete paving, a large holly bush and litter that blew in from the street. The existing steps up to the front door were cheaply constructed, small and unsafe. The view out from inside the house revealed the back of a shopping parade and a busy London trunk road. 

Solutions

I explored the possibility of opening up side access to the parking area and closing off the existing front entrance to reduce the litter blowing in and give the garden a better sense of space and privacy. However this would have involved costly planning applications and compromised the natural line of the front path from gate to door.

So …

I designed a brick wall to replace the fence along the pavement boundary with pillars to mark the path and parking entrances. Iron railings and a gate run between the pillars.

Along the inside of the wall raised beds were built and planted with Box hedge. Bay standards and lavender were planted in the larger square beds either side of the pedestrian gate. A further box hedge was planted to hide the neighbours’ garden wall, with Sarcococca confusa (sweet box) in the dry, shady bed under the bay window.

A raised bed was created as a centre piece using oak sleepers and planted with a Magnolia soulangeana which provided an attractive view from of the sitting room window.

The gradient was made as gentle as possible and a wide black limestone path was laid with wide steps up to the door to reflect the shape of the bay window.

Cotswold chip aggregate filled the area around the central Magnolia bed and parking space, where stabilizing grids were laid to help prevent the stones travelling or being pushed by the car wheels. Black granite setts divided paving from aggregate. The face of each step riser and the concrete band around the base of the house was painted black to create a smart look that worked with the rest of the colour scheme.