Garden Sculptures

Outdoor sculptures can not be viewed as separate from its surrounding environment.  A garden sculpture is something that promises to enhance your garden all year round, what ever the weather!

I stumbled acrossed one artist, Beatrice Hoffman.  She creates contemporary sculptures specifically with garden surroundings in mind. Her sculptures are very strong forms and create a good impact in the garden.  They stand out when you put the against the solid background of evergreen hedges like Boxus spp. or hide them amongst the fluffy wavy long grass…oh I can go on.  The price is not as expensive as you might fear.  You can be certain that every piece of sculpture has been done by an artist who appreciates the idea of how the sculptures contribute to the surroundings.

She reminds me of Hannah Peschar’s sculpture garden at Black and White Cottage in Ockley, Surrey.  I remember that I went there when I was still an architectural student and was blown away by the way garden and sculptures respond to each other.  The way the garden unfold each sculpture unexpectedly as you walked around.

It was like entering a magical world, I felt like Alice in Wonderland.  Each corner we took we discovered another exciting piece of art.

I would recommend those who have not been to sculpture garden to visit this inspirational garden.  It could expand your view on sculpture in the garden.

Living Wall

Someone raised a question about how sustainable the ‘living wall’ is and what is the benefit of the living wall over the climbers or hanging plants.

For those who don’t know, The vertical garden is a living ecosystem that can be grown in any place where the natural environment has been removed.  Naturally climbing plants may not always be a suitable alternative to a living wall in many circumstances. It would be rather difficult to clad a tall building with climbers and difficult to sustain those. Living walls also are useful where floorspace is a problem or indoors. A living wall does use resources but it also recycles some of them and offers a number of environmental advantages when used appropriately..

Mark Laurence of Biotecture is the director and the co owner of BioTecture, the UK’s first dedicated green wall company.  The company set up by Mark and Richard Sabin in 2007. The company has pioneered new modular hydroponic technology to move the concept of vertical greening from that of rarefied art form into a commercial and most importantly, sustainable systems technology.

They have done quite a few impressive works so far and they are someone that when we have a project which involves a specialist area like this, we would call.

Here are some of their projects which we like..They also do some works on the residential projects too, which is our area of service.

Have yourself a Merry Christmas

I cannot believe Christmas is right around the corner.  We have been having a pretty good winter so far and we have had a few successful projects done which we will talk about them soon enough.  Phew!!

Below are a few images to get you in the spirit, if you aren’t all ready in it!  If you are having a holiday party you may be able to pick-up a few last minute ideas for the decor.

Personally, I love the white and green theme…perhaps with a little surprise red dotting around.  To me, they are my Christmas colours.  But do go on and explore what your Christmas colours are.  My only advice is to keep to 2-3 colours to make it clean.

Aprt from the traditional wreath, you can also cover small containers, such as old jewelry boxes, with weatherproof paper, which will hold up outdoorsand affix a satin bow. like the picture below.  I found this idea from Martha Steward website and you can get the step by step instruction of how to do this present wreath there.

Ther are a few unusual wrethes at Paperchase that you can buy off the shelves.  They do have a whole craft department for you to pick and mix and create yiur own wreth.

For the Christmas tree itself,  The White Company does somestunning collection of decorations that is an eclectic mix, designed to create a look of favourite, vintage pieces collected over time.  You can also use them to add beautiful festive touches throughout your home. All strung with beads and wire, or with white organza ribbon as seen below.

But if you are on a budget, you can also simple make a Christmas vase and spice up the spirit by simply fill the vase with the cheap Christmas decoration that you can buy in bulk cheaply online from places like Ebay and Amazon.

I hope these ideas help you get into the spirit!!

Outdoor Christmas decoration

While you are on a rolwith your Christmas decoration.  I just thought you might want to extend your decoration to the outdoor too.  Now how will we do it without going over the top.

I have a few picture ideas that easy to do…

I really like how the use of simple winter items can be used to create a unique decorating look. Use  items you might not otherwise consider.  Adding an old pair of skates to the sled add a lot of charm, like the picture below.

There is no Christmas display that’s more reflective than your own personal style and taste than Christmas wreath.  Best of all, you don’t have to look any further than in your own back garden to find what you need to make a wreath that’s both natural and rustic, yet elegant.  There are plenty of online ‘How to make a wreath’ websites you can look up on.

Mini plastic pots, planted up and wrapped in hessian squares with an outer layer of cellophane, look fun too. Fat balls for birds, studded with holly berries, are good to string up, and with pastry cutters, you could make stars, moons and other shapes to join them.

The key is to keep it simple, stick with 2-3 main colours to avoid the too busy looks.

The Pampered Chef

I attended an in-home party and demonstration  of high quality kitchen tools by  The Pampered Chef.  The idea was they gave us a cooking lesson whilst demonstrating the cookery products they sell. So it’s like a Tupperware party and cooking class in one.

On the day, the Pampered Chef demonstrator brought a variety of kitchen tools and made a recipe at the party to show how the tools work. Then she let the guests used the tools as well so that we can try them for ourselves. When the recipe was done, the guests snacked, talked, and shoped. The host received free and discounted  products. The parties were very fun and informative…and different from most seminars or products demonstration I attended in the past.

Since our clients normally asked for our recommendation of domestic products.  I would say this is one of the companies we would recommend, since I have personally tried and tested a few products myself.  I can tell good products from thed ones…for the majority of the time.  The pampered Chef  are currently looking for a demonstrator around west London area.  So do get in touch with them if you are interested in their products or to work for them.  http://www.pamperedchef.co.uk

 

 

 

 

The days of boring garage doors are over!

I stumbled acrossed this website for garage door cover by style-your-garage.com by a German firm.  The picture below is a tromp l’oeil garage covering whichmakes the garage door looks like a long road stretches through a snow-covered landscape behind your garage.

The brainchild of Thomas Sassenbach, “Style-Your-Garage.com” has updated its collection of designs for the holiday season. The price is pretty reasonable, around 145Euro.  Not bad!

Outdoor Living Trends

Good news!

Statistics from two of the UK’s leading banks – HSBC and Santander – show that spending on outdoor projects doubled between 2009 and 2010 to £5.2bn.

Here’s the link to the full infographic – http://ow.ly/7swXA

This is a good news especially when I find landscape architects left right and centre are out off job.  Most of the professionals I know are out of work or doing a ‘freelance’ job at the moment.  That’s how scary it is…

My speculation is that typically during a recession people turn in on their homes and fix them up, and hoping for the best when they need to ‘move on’. I’m also of the belief that homeowners are adopting a ‘have a go’ attitude brought on by the insurgence of DIY and home improvement programmes on TV. This on the one hand this may reduce people’s willingness to spend on hiring professionals help, it could also be argued that it’s instilling a sense of pride back into people’s homes, and ultimately, gardens.

After doing a bit of research myself with the estate agents, I have found that the highest demand for properties has been focusing on a large patio, garden lighting almost before what happens on the inside.  It seems like people are more familer with redesign the house themselves and feel more confident about doing so.  So what they are looking for are things that outside their comfort zone, which are outdoor design.

What  I feel all along, even before this economic crisis is that TV program like ‘Ground Force’ did raise people’s expectations that their gardens could be completely dug up and re-built & re-planted in two days on a budget of £500 which makes it difficult for the professionals  to’break the news’ about costings and timescale to their clients, but it also made people realise that garden design was not for the rich or for very big gardens. So it was really swings and roundabouts.

It is all very interesting to see how it will pan out though. What do you think?

Ornamental grasses

I like to use ornamental grasses in my design where possible.  They can be a good architectural features as much as a backdrop for any flowering plants.  They make planting borders look interesting, but not cheesy… if you see what I mean.

I like contrast.

Andrea Cochran, landscape architect, did it well with one of her projects in San Francisco, Pacific Height Residence, as seen on the picture above.

Grasses can add the dimensions of sound and movement to the garden as wind catches and rustles the leaves.   It can be use in the foreground or as feathery hedges just like the above picture (Pennisetum alopecuroides Hamelm).  This garden was designed by the landscape architect Piet Blanckaert for a client in Belgium.

The dried stalks of many grasses remain upright for winter interest.  The wide variety of colors, sizes and growth habits of grasses assures that one will fit almost any garden.

What not to like, really?  So here are a few general tips of how to look after them.

• Use well drained soil when possible but normally they are pretty tough going.

• Use very little fertilizer

• Provide space to grow and reach maximum size.  They can spread out more than you think, so use them wisely, and use them nicely.

• Removal of old growth in early spring.

Hope you like them too..

Brighten up your front door with winter containers.

It’s time to tip out your pots, replace the old compost and refill them with a new set of winter plants to see you through to next spring. Winter-flowering pansies are probably one of the best and also good value as they have the ability to flower in the cold depths of winter when other life is hibernating.  They are extremely tolerant of the cold and wet, and withstand chill winds well.

Apart from that, I prefer using box and also evergreen perennials, grasses and sedges such as heuchera, Stipa tenuissima and carex for structure.

These grasses and box are a little more expensive but then they look great, I love evergreen and structural plants and grasses.  They are very much ‘architectural plants’ with different textures and forms.

Autumn leaves

For our clients’ gardens, leaf collection is as much part of autumn as grass cutting is to the summer months and should be done regularly.  This is when we take on maintenance contract which is rare for the residential clients.  So I will talk about some maintenance tips that can be done at home without having to hire the professionals..

For the residential garden, organic matter such as leaves on the perennial and shrub border is always good for the soil, but the build up of leaves and the time they take to break down looks unsightly.  On the commercial projects,  you can collect the leaves into leaf mould bins on site, but if this can’t be done you can blow the leaves into lines, alongside the borders, and then pass the good old mower over them a few times to mulch them up and then spread them back on the borders. This not only looks a lot better and reduces their volume, and also this method benefits wildlife, and the leaves break down into the soil more rapidly.

The general rule is to remove leaves from lawn and paths as they fall. Leaves under trees and in borders can be left for a while and are only removed where they threaten to overwhelm perennials. This gives the trees a good winter protection.