When Kate and Mark Edwards returned from Hong Kong to move into his mother's house in England and modernize its garden, they asked around for a landscape designer. A family friend had a son in the business. Done.
Kate Edwards rang him up, thinking the fellow sounded as if he'd do a fine job in the garden. At the other end of the phone was Tom Stuart-Smith, a giant of British landscape design who after winning three Best in Show medals at the Chelsea Flower Show kindly stopped competing to give others a chance.
Anything for a family friend, Stuart-Smith said, and headed out to Herefordshire (about a two-and-a-half hours' drive to the northwest of London) to take a look at the 2-acre property surrounding the Edwardses' Regency-style house. He offered a few ideas, and the garden turned out more than fine:
Photography via Tom Stuart-Smith.
Above: Landscaped to be seen from above, Stuart-Smith's design created a level playing field for lawn games.
When a delegation from The Hampstead Garden Suburb Horticultural Society came to see the garden recently, Kate Edwards cooked lunch and served the visitors in her 18th-century dining room. Then "we all were invited to view it from the owner's bedroom," Jill Ambrose reported in the society's newsletter. "The lower garden has a large rectangular lawn (for playing cricket) with huge hardy perennial beds on each side and, at the far end are hedges designed like wriggly worms with prairie-style planting in between."
Above: A clipped beech archway connects the lawn to the upper garden.
Above: A Stuart-Smith signature, waves of Miscanthus sinensis 'Malepartus' (maiden grass) create movement and a soft smudge of background color. Throughout the garden, large swaths of grasses lead visitors on a journey from one level to the next with what he calls their "bold rhythm and simplicity."
Above: Large garden beds of herbaceous plantings, anchored by clumps of perennial grasses, surround the stuccoed sandstone house. In the background are seedheads of Echinacea purpurea 'Magnus' (R), Veronicastrum, and blue asters (Center).
Above: After Phlomis russeliana (Jerusalem sage) finishes blooming, its pom-pom seedheads provide winter interest in the garden.
Above: Another favorite Stuart-Smith grass is Calamagrostis brachytricha (Korean feather reed grass).
Above: "The planting design makes for ease of maintenance and gives a dramatic textural effect when viewed from the first floor rooms of the house," says Stuart-Smith.
Above: On the highest level of the garden, hedges of boxwood co-mingle with Hakonechloa macra (Hakone grass) in an undulating vermiculation which Stuart-Smith designed as an homage to the tracery patterns worms leave beyond as they move through soil.
Above: The three-tiered garden includes the lawn for games, a swimming pool, and a tennis court.
For more inspiration from Tom Stuart-Smith, see:
- 9 Garden Ideas to Steal from England's Tom Stuart-Smith.
- Designer Visit: At Home in Jurassic Park, in North London.
- On the Market: £17 Million Cotswolds Estate, Vegetable Garden Included.
More Stories from Gardenista