Lay out for a long thin garden?

MrsE_2

RAS wrote: »

So, your garden is bordered by the bridle path? If people are riding, can they see in and do you mind if they can?

Yes boardered by bridal path, yes they do ride past, See-in and mind yes & no, in winter I don't care, in summer the willow blocks their view.

yumyums

In my Alan Titchmarsh book it says you should divide the space up so that you have a series of smaller spaces which are each related and lead on to the next. You should also ensure that at least part of each space is hidden. You shouldn't have a long, straight path to the end as it makes the garden feel like a passageway.

In the example plan shown, the garden is divided up into areas but on the diagonal instead of straight across (hope this makes sense). First area is a patio & pond, second area lawn and borders, third is a meadow area through an archway.

Hope I'm not breaching copyright posting this info!

RAS

Well my thoughts are that you need to start with two places in the garden, both on the tapering, sunny side, where you put patios, seating areas for breakfast (towards the bottom) and evening (at the top).

You need something to draw the eye through the garden without revealing the whole space; Rosemary Verey was excellent at this. Apart from anything else, by hiding the space to either side of the view, you leave the viewer uncertain how wide the garden actually is. Whether you make this a path towards one side or in the middle does not matter, but I would leave enough room on the tapering (north) side to place a seat between the path and the boundary, so that there are stopping off points along the way. And if the final point of the long view is the willow tree, there is nothing to stop you placing the less than beautiful sheds up against the boundaries, screened by a hedge or fence; personally I would use something like cordon fruit trees that can be established and produce quickly. Do however put something, even a bird bath infront of the willow as a focal point.

I suggest you walk along the tapering boundary and look to the south, and then southeast and southwest. Are there any points where there are interesting views beyond the garden? Even trees that can be seen and take the eye beyond the hedge? Ditto the south hedge, incase there is something worth looking at from a shaded seat (a church steeple, a hill the other side of the valley, whatever).

That may suggest whether you go for a diagonal design, making use of borrowed views or whether your "rooms" face more or less straight across the garden. Remembering again to have focal point on the opposite side to the garden to the seat. You could have different surfaces in each space. So maybe patio, grass with path, gravel and then vegetable and fruit beyond?