BALI National Landscape Awards 2016

Winner of Domestic Garden Construction - over £250k 2016

This large country house is nestled in the beautiful East Sussex hills surrounded by fields and woods filled with Bluebells in spring. The clients were undertaking a major renovation and modernisation of the property and additionally adding a large barn style extension, renovating the outside swimming pool and building a new pool house to match the new extension in style. The gardens around the house were tired and with little variety or interest through the seasons and they needed redesigning to link the house fully with its new additions. The front garden was full of large ugly shrubs and the driveway was in a poor state of repair with poor visibility to access the road outside.

Before

Design Solutions

At the rear of the house the paths were completely redesigned and relaid in riven natural stone slabs chosen to blend with the colours of the house. They were formalised and link two large hexagonal sun patios at both ends of the house, one of which serves as an outside space for entertainment and relaxation in front of the new extension. This patio area contains a spherical stone water feature by sculptor Tristan Cockerill, as well as space for a dinning table and chairs. The beds close to the house were enlarged as part of this process and the patio for the extension was boundaried by new beds with cottage type planting retained within the formality of a low Buxus hedge. The hard landscaping around the pool was similarly completely redesigned to deliver areas of wide new paving for furniture and entertaining; and new planting beds that soften the feel of the pool garden and enhance privacy. Close to the pool garden the property is boundaried by a meadow and so this edge of the garden was turfed with wildflower turf so that the garden seamlessly blends into its landscape.

At the front of the house the tangle of ugly shrubs was removed and replaced with a sweeping circular driveway and a centerpiece large circular pool and fountain. The fountain has softening low shrub planting around it and the drive is ringed by flowering cherries. New gates for the drive were added and provide the house not only with fitting entrances, but with improved visibility for cars arriving and leaving the property. The circular driveway, new retained gravel surface and ample parking deliver easy vehicular access for all the family.

After

Construction by Living Landscapes   http://livinglandscapesuk.com/
Photographs courtesy of Living Landscapes