URBAN FLOW

Chelsea Flower Show 2018

BRIEF

This is a typical-sized urban rear garden designed for clients with children in their mid-teens. The garden is overlooked and requires solutions to provide privacy whilst not blocking light into the garden. The bare lawn needed to be replaced with a permeable surface whilst looking visually attractive and providing a low maintenance surface to accommodate a dining area and outdoor kitchen. The family wanted the opportunity to grow their own salad, fruit, and veg in a compact and low-maintenance format.

a lit up wall with plants and a metal structure
a table set up in a garden

SOLUTION

Viewing the garden from the glass doors at the rear of the property, a water feature, evergreen planting, and seasonal colour provide year-round interest. An oversized steel effect arch provides framed views and divides the space, whilst affording privacy to the open plan kitchen from overlooking loft conversion windows and balconies. Handmade clay bricks provide permeable paving and laser-cut Corten steel has been used to create a cantilever pergola structure, providing further privacy and intricate shadows throughout the dining area. A contemporary concrete kitchen and edible living wall complete the practical outdoor room and allow space to grow your own in a manageable format.

a garden with trees and plants

OUTCOME

The garden design has created an intimate yet light urban living space outdoors, with lounge and dining furniture to provide a place to relax and an area for family and friends to come together, cook and dine outside. Sumptuous deep and velvety planting gives a luxurious finish to the scheme and softens the hard landscape features, with a range of heights using ornate and colourful foliage. The garden is brought alive at night with the use if lighting that casts shadows and adds a warm flow to the detail finishes in the space.

a brick wall with a grate
a table and chairs outside
a plant growing out of a grate
a table set up in a garden

"A garden you want to live in! ” – London Evening Standard"

Gold Medal – Best ‘Space to Grow’ Garden