Wimbledon Residential Garden
Design
Front and Rear Garden Designs
Felicity O’Rourke developed a creative garden design for her recent Wimbledon clients who set her the complex challenge of extending and then partitioning their gardens for their Edwardian semi-detached property and their newly acquired property next door. The above images were taken five months after planting.
When the opportunity arose for her clients to buy the neighbouring downstairs flat and the upstairs duplex flat, Felicity was tasked with the redesign of the front and rear gardens.
The upstairs flat was to be rented out and have a small, private, terraced garden space, leaving the ground floor flat to be incorporated into the main family home via a glass corridor across the intersecting side access alley between the two properties.
Felicity’s unique design combined the front two gardens to maximise the planting area and created a functional storage solution for bicycles, whilst keeping the two property entrances partitioned sufficiently enough to give them each their own sense of entrance.
Sustainability and Practicality
The rear gardens were combined and then cleared of overgrown trees, shrubs and unused outbuildings.
The garden design focused on sustainability as much as possible, incorporating edibles in to the scheme; year-round plants for pollination; retaining the wood from the chopped trees on site to create a naturalised log pile for local critters; reusing railway sleepers for the raised kitchen planting bed; and using permeable gravel as a medium throughout the front garden and rear garden for sustainable drainage. Waste from the cast concrete demolition was used to fill in the hole from the previously sunken trampoline area and to raise this up to form a raised terrace feature within the space.
The gardens were partitioned into a main garden, a garden for the tenants in the neighbouring top floor flat and a small courtyard which linked to the downstairs flat will be linked to the original house.
The main focus was to ensure that the garden design was future-proofed in the eventuality of the clients down-sizing their property and selling both the neighbouring flats. The resulting garden design allows the easy partitioning of the garden should future segregation be required, with very minimal adjustments required.
The above images were taken three months after planting. The below images show the garden newly planted.
Design Features
There are various features within this garden design:
The Main Family Garden:
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A bespoke pergola: Felicity designed a powder coated steel pergola and employed the expertise of Surrey Ironcraft to fabricate this feature for the project. It has the strength and ability to attach a shade sail for inclement weather or when shade is required on hot summer days.
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A paved and secluded area for a fire pit
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A green house
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Edible planting in a kitchen garden planting area
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A newly installed greenhouse for Felicity’s client who is a keen gardener
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A water bowl feature
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A feature rockery with giant boulders to sit and pause in the evening sun.
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A hidden storage area to allow easy access to the portable outdoor table tennis table and a lawn large enough to allow room for play.
A contemporary Courtyard:
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Screening Holly trees for privacy
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Contemporary porcelain tiles from Mandarin Stone
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Storage shed
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Planting beds and evergreen interest for year-round green interest and structure.
Terraced Garden for Upstairs Flat:
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Storage Shed
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Sunny terrace for BBQ
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Tiered planting beds
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Lower-level gravel terrace with dining space and wooden pergola feature to create dappled shaded seclusion.
Front Gardens:
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A combined space linked by narrow gravel paths.
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The main entrance to the family house indicated by a contemporary version of a formal Victorian pattern. This same pattern was used to define the entrance step to the front door of the neighbouring flats to provide continuity in the design.
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Generous Planting beds were created in bold shapes inspired by the architectural features of the main house the its stained-glass front door.
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Bespoke bin and bike sheds were created with green roofs, planted with shade-loving perennials and ferns for the northerly aspect.
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Gravel was used where possible to alleviate surface water.
Contact Felicity
To discuss your garden design aspirations, please call Felicity on
07961 148012
or email: felicity@felicityorourkegardendesign.com