Brentford Garden

A garden for entertaining with a sunken area

Design and build constraints:

Garden microclimate
Low levels of light
Sunken area
Access to garden through shared alleyway

My clients had lived at this Brentford address for three years and had recently completed an extension to the terraced property. The open plan kitchen at the back of the house led directly onto the garden via bifold doors. The current garden was mature but suffered from reduced light levels and lots of bare space at ground level. As a consequence, my clients were struggling to find the right planting to fill the void below. The brief entailed creating a garden to look attractive all year round alongside housing a pottery studio complete with water, electrics and kiln.

The solution was to try and open up the garden whilst still retaining privacy. Permission was sought to reduce the size of the silver Birch in the garden along with removing overhanging branches from the neighbouring conifer. The garden was divided into three areas.

A patio off the back of the house for dining with rectangular paving spanning the width of the garden to give the illusion of more space; a central sunken garden with integrated seating and a bridge walkway with more open planting; this led to two Corten steel raised beds housing tranquil planting with the pottery studio behind. An Amelanchier and Acer were selected to act as specimen focal plants.

Lighting was specified to create an ambient mood in the garden for entertaining. Existing architectural specimen plants were lit creating dramatic shadows against the backdrop behind. LED strips were chosen to sit underneath the inbuilt seating in the sunken area casting a glow underneath the walkway to aid visibility.

The central sunken garden had integrated seating and a bridge walkway