Planning a garden

Sensory gardens are not just some trendy garden design concept dreamt up by fancy landscape designers with too much time on their hands. Sensory gardens are fundamentally about creating outdoor spaces that actively invite you to experience nature up close through touch, smell, hearing, taste, and sight. To enrich and awaken your senses, whether thats […]

Staring down that narrow strip of garden stretching away from your house, you might be feeling like you’ve drawn the short straw in the garden lottery. Long thin gardens are probably the most common awkward shape in British suburbia, particularly in Victorian terraces, post-war developments, and those estate properties where developers sliced up former agricultural […]

I’m Lee Burkhill, the Garden Ninja, and if there’s one colour that absolutely transforms UK gardens throughout the seasons, it’s purple. From the palest lavender to the deepest aubergine, purple flowers bring sophistication, drama, and an air of mystery that no other colour quite achieves. After designing hundreds of gardens across the North West and […]

There’s something utterly transformative about a garden at dusk. As the day’s heat subsides and shadows lengthen across borders and pathways, an entirely different sensory experience emerges in our gardens. In my years designing gardens across Britain and consulting internationally, I’ve witnessed countless clients discover the magic of evening fragrance for the first time, and […]

When it comes to garden design for children, you may have seen gardens turned into playgrounds with wood chips everywhere or worse, fake grass and the obligatory swing set. However, there are many better ways to subtly design a garden that makes it exciting for children without completely removing the attraction for grown-ups! Usually, people […]

If you’ve got a bare fence line or row of fence panels in your garden, you will know just how depressing and frustrating the view can be. Let’s discuss one of the most overlooked opportunities in garden design: the humble fence line. I see it time and time again in my design consultations, gardeners treating […]

Gothic gardens aren’t about creating something frightening or forbidding. Rather, they’re about embracing the romance of shadows, the elegance of deep colours, and the theatrical beauty that comes from bold contrasts with your plant choices and landscaping design choices. These spaces evoke an atmosphere of sophisticated drama, that Gothic mystery which many of us love. […]

Prairie planting has absolutely taken the UK gardening world by storm, and for excellent reasons! Although many prairie plants are not native to northern Europe, many have been part of our garden history for almost 200 years, and, with a few exceptions, they have behaved well. What started as an American phenomenon has evolved into […]

If you’ve ever stood in your garden watching your beloved pooch systematically destroy your prize Dahlias whilst simultaneously wondering if those mysterious holes appearing overnight are the work of garden goblins or your ‘innocent’ terrier, then you’re in exactly the right place. I’ve seen it all in my years designing gardens for dog owners and […]

Dream of creating a stunning coastal garden but worried about battling relentless winds, salt spray, and sandy soils? Perhaps you’ve moved to a beautiful seaside location only to discover that your favourite garden plants simply won’t survive the harsh coastal conditions. Maybe you’re standing in your windswept garden, wondering if you’ll ever achieve that picture-perfect […]