Garden design in is the detail - how to transform a boring backyard to a lush green oasis...

What makes a town garden a magical oasis? The answer, surprisingly, can be that it's in the details. I've been talking to two top London garden designers about how the materials that you choose, your paths, your terraces, your arbors, can make all the difference and show off your planting. It's Alexandra here from the Middlesized Garden YouTube channel and blog and I've been talking to top garden designers Tomoko Kawauchi and Charlotte Rowe of Charlotte Rowe Garden Design. They're showing us around a town garden that they've designed. It has lush contemporary planting and is in a series of three gardens. There's a front garden, a side garden and a steeply sloping back garden. There's no lawn at all. It's a series of private seating areas linked by garden paths that create a journey through the garden and it's the details that make it special. Note how the bricks and the pavers and the stackers all work together. They're interwoven and they're repeated throughout the garden to give it a sense of harmony and calm and it's also a garden built to evolve. That trampoline will turn into a fire pit when the children have decided that they're no longer interested in the trampoline. So it's a sign of how thoughtful garden design can really adapt to family life. So Charlotte and Tomoko, tell me what you think about when you first come to a garden. What the most important principles are Charlotte? Well in general obviously the functionality and how the family will use the garden is really important but also the shape, space, location, borrowed landscape, those things are really important as well. But when I first came here this was a completely different garden. It had been used as a family garden, it had a trampoline, it had you know sort of climbing frame type thing, it had barriers you couldn't see the end of the garden, it had a really large part of it was lawn and they just weren't using the garden, they weren't coming up into the garden. So as soon as I saw it I knew we had to open the garden up and make it enticing. So one of the things we always think about is a journey within the garden. Do you agree with that? Yes, that's one thing we are known to input is a circulation we call it and more access to one destination is better. It enhances your experience in the garden. So can you tell me how you do that with paths and the patios and terraces? So once you have one patio location decided you need to decide which way you want to access and allow few routes to it and then you select the what is the most interesting journey we can create. This is not a small garden it's a medium size London garden. It's no by no means is it small it's a very wide garden that was the other thing it's not a long garden so you have to when you're doing that the same time you have to think about how you make the garden look as big as it can look. It's very important and we're really good at breaking spaces up making them look bigger. So functionality, journey, destination, access, circulation, location and size. So how do you deal with the different levels to make a different level? So you need to decide the functionality comes first and then what level you want to for example you want to use this dining space at what level sitting at what level because it depends on the level you get the sound level light level changes so you need to be aware of surroundings and where would you feel most comfortable. So before you change any levels or do anything with levels you have to decide where the patio where the terrace where is that part location is so important that we rarely make the garden without deciding the purpose of the space sometimes we do get a brief that they want to be flexible dining and sitting area but we normally decide at the very early on stage this is where you sit this is where you eat depending on things like light location where how it fits with the kitchen. So for example at the moment we're sitting in the arbor which there the old arbor used to be the other side of the garden but we felt this was the right place to be plus we were putting a fireplace in here and going back to the levels a decision was also made that although this garden did cost quite a lot of money one way you can save is by not changing the levels too much you need to try and keep what you've got on site because as soon as you in London particularly as soon as you start removing stuff you're paying for waste there's a waste management issue the cost involved so the decision was made to keep the levels not exactly as they were before but sort of more or less and working with those levels because if you a lot of people when they go into gardens both clients and designers say oh right we're going to kind of completely hollow this out you know and create all one level no that's going to not work. We encourage people not to change levels that's it yeah we are quite strong about that because a client could waste so much money just making the ground and you'd get very boring space I think it's nice to have a level. We had one client years ago who didn't really understand gardens you remember who he is in North London and a lot of gardens in North London are really steeply sloping because it's high in Hampstead and Finchley etc Goldis Green so usually often the garden goes up away from the house and this particular client just wanted to take the whole level down and we're talking about a three to four meter change in levels it's a lot it would have ended up being like a volleyball or a squash court with no light because of course as soon as you take yourself down in a garden you're losing light particularly in an enclosed London or town space so we fought that very strongly in the end and we finally decided to compromise on about a third of the garden being pushed back. A lot of architects just have a patio come out of the house particularly in regency houses where they're again quite narrow and long go up have a patio then have this massive staircase up to the next level with no planting so the garden is moving further and further away from the house whereas here as you'll see when you walk around this has been done in a completely different way with ramping. Do you want to talk about those a bit? So there's a ramping in the middle area we have a large plant in there the idea was this group of plants flow into the terrace space so almost invading into the storm area so more harder surface so the softness comes on like flat almost. This is very important a lot of people just think that landscape or garden designers just do planting well there are a few television programs showing people who do that. Tomoko is a former architect and I come from the architectural side as well and that's not to say the plant is not important it is but the structure the bone structure of the garden is the key thing is what we're probably well known for. If all this planting died it'd be awful shame but you could then replant it and you still got a really good space. You cannot make a space out of planting it's just not possible particularly in a town garden you can more in a country garden of course but here you have to have some structure to create that feel so as I say when you walk in here you go wow at the planting and it is amazing it's quite it's almost invasive it's fantastic but the planting wouldn't be this planting at all without having the areas of gravel these little patches of gravel within the paving that the fireplace the arbor the beautiful benches wouldn't be the same without those. And how do you decide what materials to use for paving and terracing? Yeah so that's a very good question this garden originally had a very dark stone one might say but it's porcelain yeah very different feel to it yes porcelain it's not even a stone so first thing is you need to understand what is the client looking for what mood and this client was looking for a big change from quite masculine garden to softer and more feminine I suppose so we chose for much brighter lighter buff colour stone and from porcelain into stone so more natural material. A lot of town gardens go straight off a kitchen or a family room so we have to make it work with that and so we do use grey stone actually if there's a clear grey spectrum going on in the palette of colours inside but the beige is a softer look it's more natural and this is an English limestone from Wiltshire which is really local which is nice. And is there any particular material that's best for all materials that are best for paths patios and terraces? We like to use natural stone and gravel we use a lot of gravel some plants don't like it because it doesn't do their stilettos much good. Or barefoot. Or barefoot that's the other thing so we tend to slip paving into the gravel if we can but some people just won't have gravel but we like it because it's eco it's less expensive it's readily available and it's really beautiful but we don't use porcelain we can help it and we do a bit of decking sometimes but not much. And what about choosing gravel what do we need to know if we're choosing gravel? I think you need to choose a stone first whatever the majority of the floor surface is going to be then match the gravel after yeah this one I think is is it Cotswold Buff this one yeah yeah I think so and we put the stone in first and then we match the gravel to it. We choose similar tone very neutral colours gravel we don't really make contrasts between stone and gravel. We used to when we started out actually. Yeah I think if the similar colour works the better we want to still keep the one length of the terrace for example this terrace got few gravel pockets we don't want to make it too much of a contrast and when it comes to steps what are the important things to remember about steps? Riser and going throughout steps because outside area you need a deeper and more gentle step up while architects tend to do inside the house it's fine you need a higher or shorter but in external area you really need to be generous. This is for safety reasons because of falling over so our steps are much less shallow that I mean won't mean much to you but anyone watching this who understands what we're talking about the deepest height the highest height we would do is 170 180 at a pinch but we prefer to do 130 to 150 and we're all taught that I mean every landscape designer is taught that. Architects don't sympathize with that and sometimes they've designed the steps out from a house it's a nightmare do you remember the one in Putney we did it was literally like that it's just so dangerous and it was in porcelain and the other thing that's really important I know it sounds so basic but you'd be surprised how many people don't do it they must be identical heights and treads any flight of steps has to be it's so important but you'd be amazed what builders come in oh yeah I'll do your garden for you and stick you know stick some steps in and ones you know that high the edge of that one that's so dangerous really dangerous and anything else we need to know about steps like what the best material to use is at all well stone stone you can do decking or metal metal grills are quite nice because it lets the light through it also you can see the plant underneath but these ones are gravel with a metal edging done with a steel so that's just we wanted it we didn't want it too hard it's a wider space a wider step that also acts as a planting shelves yeah so as you there was planting in the stairs which is again something we do quite a lot and speaking of the planting how have you done that I think because it's a wide big planting space it's very important to give a structure but also difference in height and contrasting texture in that way you don't create a big blob of green you need some punctuation and the movement and colour you need some seam colour going through for example this garden's got a deeper purple way through and the punctuation of the colours and some actually some yellows of the baskin were out earlier they're not out now the grass is coming out in amber just so you know this garden that had this these trees around the outside the bleach trees they were here already we left them because they were so established so was the liquid amber that was here and actually the amelancus so we only put in a couple of trees here which is unusual for us because we normally put quite a lot of trees in we're very pro multi-stem focus feature trees in London gardens because they really give interest and when it comes to the furniture there's some lovely furniture in this garden what would you advise people to think about when they're choosing garden furniture well don't buy cheap furniture because it'll fall to bits it's the first thing I'm afraid outdoor furniture is quite expensive people's views have changed on furniture when we started the business people were still buying just cheap table and you know nice chairs and it was quite difficult to persuade people to buy continental mainland european furniture but they are now but when it comes to colours and texture we always recommend client go for something neutral because these things that if you go too much of a striking colour it might go out of fashion or might not like it a few years later this kind of furniture is quite very comfortable and you can take all the cushions inside although they could stay outside as well I think it's the volume of the furniture against volume of the space so yeah so do you think that the problem is that sometimes people choose furniture that's too small for the space oh yes completely and pots it's a real problem and so we always recommend really large particularly in small spaces you've got to have large things which people don't really understand and what about arbors well one of the problems we have is sometimes people want it completely covered that then starts being more than an arbor starts becoming a building and then you've got to start thinking about how the water is going to run off and what it's going to look like from upstairs you wouldn't sit out here in a storm but you would sit out here in a drizzle it wouldn't be a problem it certainly gives you shade cover you could put glass on it but it's not really advised and we have specified a few off-the-shelf ones haven't we but we tend to design all these and this is a lovely western red cedar beautiful arbor and it casts lovely shadows it looks natural and so do you think that a garden should have an arbor or there's some gardens no no no we don't you can create enough interesting height by trees yeah yeah yeah that's obvious most gardens we do don't have arbors we try and push people away from them actually it's quite a lot of money this one this garden can cope with it with plus with the fireplace so it actually makes a destination and the the owners of this garden their first winter they had their christmas outside here in front of the fire which is lovely in the middle of the winter but if you put an arbor too close to the windows the bad news it's a shame it works for here it sort of creates a spot for you it's like on its own temple and it frames the view if you every view is a frame and what about front gardens because this is a beautiful front garden what do people have to bear in mind when they're thinking about front garden in our front garden it's slightly different game because you have to think with a front of the house as a background so it needs to go with the style of the house we tend to go less modern more traditional to go with a period of the house was built and also there's a thing called the suds rules about drainage which in london is crucial because of all the flooding issues that have been over the last few years and so in other words it depends from borough to borough but you have to make a large portion of a front garden permeable and free draining and it's really important we do obey that because we believe it's true and it's it's important and that's one of the problems that you know that the stones that are the stone pavings that are free draining and permeable are not very nice so here we were very lucky because actually the garden is large and it's not the driveway so it's more challenging when you've got a garden in london with a two-way driveway because you've got to combine it and make it look beautiful but accommodate cars but of course this one has got its own separate garage because there's an this garden this house is unusual it's in its own sight it's a detached house which in central london is unusual so we've actually got here the main garden we've got side passage which has also got planting in it we've got what we call the side garden next to the garage which was never used before it's just a plain bit of grass and then lovely front garden and we replanted and repaved that we didn't do that from scratch so loved it and is there any other advice about design detail that you would give to people when they're thinking about designing their garden keep it simple yeah i agree keep it simple don't do a twirly whirly decorative details because a design design detail should speak to the design concept itself if your garden is contemporary design style should detail should follow that style and we tend to do rectilinear designs in rectilinear spaces i mean not always we have introduced curves occasionally but generally speaking we reserve curves and flowing lines in the hard landscaping to country gardens because it's it really really tests the space if you have curves and circles and ovals which we do occasionally in a rectangular space which is a limited space so we tend to design in a rectilinear manner which flutterably likes that but we've introduced the softness with the planting because we don't do hard planting we do quite soft planting if that makes sense it does it does if you are interested in transforming your garden then don't miss charlotte and tomoko's five top garden design tips and two mistakes to avoid coming up next and thank you for watching goodbye