Garden Advice

As a garden designer, who specialises in awkward and overlooked gardens, I use pleached trees a lot in my designs. This is not because I’m lazy with my tree choice, but because they really do offer a host of benefits to a small garden. Whether it’s politely blocking out nosey neighbours, adding some contemporary drama […]

Henchman tripod ladders have been designed typically for pruning trees, topiary and hedges they allow you to work at heights without wobbling about. Designed for when you need to be at height for a while without needing to hold on for dear life.  I find that standard ladders have a habit of wobbling about and […]

The fruit tree grafting course was run at Ordsall Hall in Salford, a Tudor hall and knot garden here in Manchester. Peter Nicols from the Northern Fruit Group led the grafting workshop in showing us how to successfully graft some apple trees. The session was aimed at getting us from grafting zero to heroes! We […]

Green roofs are incredibly versatile and beneficial to any garden. This guide on how to fit a green roof will show you how easy it is to green up your back garden shed. What has caused the increasing popularity of green roofs though? Green roofs can slow down the flow of torrential downpours, enabling sewers […]

This Orchid care guide will provide you with all the detail you need to keep your orchids flowering for months at a time and stop the unsightly yellow or black leaf problems. Orchids are now propagated on an industrial level in factories around the world and have been bred to be super resilient but whilst […]

The Hayter Osprey 46 is a rotary lawn mower designed for residential use. Hayter has been hand making mowers for the last 70 years and are renowned for their craftsmanship when making lawn mowers. They have a Royal Warrant which kind of says it all. They recently got in touch to see if I wanted to […]

This guide will show you how to make a compost bin from Pallets. This is by far the easiest method I have used over the years. Even with a small garden, if you have enough space for a palette it’s worthwhile creating a compost bin. You not only save on those dreadful green bin charges […]

How to mulch a garden Mulching is relatively easy to do and has loads of benefits for your garden and plants. By mulching your plants yoy can save time during the summer with watering and feeding. The aim is to either cover around the base of a plant with mulch or the entire bed. I […]

Councils have faced significant budget cuts in the last few years, mainly as a knock-on effect of quantitative after the recession brought on by the banking and financial sector crisis. I’m not going to voice my opinions on that sorry state of affairs, on whether it’s true that the establishment has always propped itself up […]

We have all been there as new gardeners, watching your plants grow and get bigger each year, caring for their every need to be rewarded with flowers or gorgeous foliage. Then there is that moment, you don’t know when it happened but you look at the plant no longer looks full of the joys of […]

I don’t know of any gardener than likes cleaning up leaves, but come the Autumn months it is something that most gardeners need to tolerate. Leaf mould compost is an excellent way to rid yourself of wet slimy leaves and enrich your garden with a nutrient-rich compost. It costs virtually nothing and, if you don’t mind […]

However, there is another thought with front garden design. Why not turn this around and actually make it a space that greets you warmly as you come home, offers refuge, excitement, calm or invitation to your visitors? This guide will show you that you can have a functional, beautiful and environmentally sound space and it […]

Garden lawns are probably one of the most widely recognised garden design components. Turf has a huge variety of uses if you want to lounge on a deck chair on it, manicure it to perfection, get your mates round to have a BBQ on it or even football pitch for your children. Garden lawns and […]

Why do we need to repot plants? Root bound plants stagnate – After a few seasons or years, any container plant will eventually become root bound or root balled. This is where the roots of the plants reach the edges of the pots and carry on searching for water and nutrients by then growing back around […]

The soil type that you have in your garden can make or break your plans for a successful garden design.  Your plants will only be as successful as the preparation and planning that you, the gardener puts in! Rather than thinking of soil as dirt you need to start treating it as the life force of your […]