Planting…

Do you love gardening?

It is an obvious statement to say that one of the main components of any garden project is planting. However, many people who would like a nice garden, are not gardeners as such and thus a balance needs to be struck between what looks good and what is easy to maintain.

The goal with a good planting scheme is to get a splash of colour all year round with the highlight in the UK around April, May, June. If you are a keen gardener, then the choice of plants might be a little more adventurous than someone who wants a low-maintenance garden. Nevertheless, both should bring delight all year. We also love to check what plants you already have in your garden. If something is doing well and you love it, then it’s probably (depending on size and location) worth keeping and building into your new garden design. We can save existing plants and keep them alive on site ready to place back in your new layout.

Green fingers:

• A staple of reliable, well-known evergreen flowering shrubs is not a bad place to start and that is the reason why you may see the same shrubs in many London gardens – because they are tried and tested. Some examples would be – Choisya, Vburnum, Skimmia, Hebes, Photenia, Escallonia, Buddlia, Senecio, Euonymus, Pieris, Forsythia, Eleagnus, Fatsia, Camelia, Hosta, Weigelia.
• It is important to identify any completely shady aspects of the garden – generally, flowering shrubs will not do well in these areas. There are some plants that will do well even in the total shade – Fatsia Japonica, Euonymus, Aucubus, Mahonia and Ferns are some examples.
• Walk into any garden centre and there is usually a bewildering array of fertilisers, soil conditioners, plant foods, etc but with regular use of a sea-weed enriched liquid fertiliser during the growing season, you won’t go far wrong and should notice a prolific increase in both flowering density and duration.
• Most of the shrubs mentioned can be trimmed and lopped to keep in scale and shape but avoid doing so when/if they are flowering or if there is any sign of a hard frost that can occur well into springtime.

Garden maintenance…
We can leave you with a list of plants.  Maintenance is much easier when you know what you have got!  If you are really keen, then you can set out a seasonal list of tasks (a bit like they do on BBCs Gardener World), so you don’t even have to think about it, except to check the calendar, e.g. ‘this needs a light trim/shape’ late spring.. kind of thing.  For the most part, your new garden will be quite young, and apart from water and some feeding, won’t need much else.