About This Project

This garden was designed by Tapestry Design Studios and since its first inception has seen several new features added.  It’s luxurious and decadent but at the same time, welcoming and relaxing. It’s a great place to be and we’re proud to have been a part of its development.

The Brief

The garden was originally no more exciting than an empty horse paddock.  Post and rail fencing marked the boundary and the whole space was surfaced with a tussocky, meadow-like grass ley – not unlike a farmer’s field.

Working from a design by Tapestry Design Studios, our brief was to create an outdoor entertaining garden with a state of the art outdoor kitchen, two patios, each of which was to be big enough to host a party and lots and lots of gorgeous planting.

Building An Outdoor Entertaining Garden

This is one garden that could never be built in a hurry. It has lots of features in the hard landscaping that needed close attention to detail.  For example, an outdoor kitchen unit with the strength to support both a barbecue and a pizza oven.  And that pizza oven was really heavy!

The geometrically planting beds were clearly defined using precision made metal edging. And the soil itself needed a lot of improvement.  Essex clay has some wonderful properties but it does tend to be arid in summer and soggy in winter.  Part of our work was to incorporate lots of good quality topsoil and install an irrigation system to support the plants while they established.

Central to the outdoor dining area is a lovely contemporary pergola with a louvred roof and removable sides.  It’s a smashing garden feature.

Of course every outdoor entertaining garden needs a utility area – somewhere to keep the bins and store garden tools.  In this case it’s created by a cedar wood screen conveniently placed just inside the entrance to the garden.  A similar area exists on the other side of the house where there is a large shed and double gates to allow access for a ride on mower. 

Elsewhere in the garden is an intimate allotment garden with raised beds and a comfortable bench.  Our client is not keen on formal hedges and so we used ornamental grasses to shelter this garden room from cold winds.

To finish the garden, we created a large, hardwearing lawn from locally grown turf. Doug, our plantsman, then took the lead in setting out and planting trees, shrubs and over 1,000 herbaceous perennials according to the planting plan from Tapestry Design Studios.

The best bit of this garden is having a strong relationship with the client which means we can visit from time to time to watch the space developing. This is potentially another award winning garden for the Holland Landscapes Team……watch this space.

Planning Your Own Outdoor Entertaining Garden?

What garden features would you need in your garden to be able to entertain family and friends in style? Not every outdoor space needs to be lavish, a very simple design can bring a lot of pleasure.  

Visit some of our other portfolio pieces to inspire your own garden makeover.  

Call us if you need help to design and build your dream garden.