December, 2017 | The Garden Company

Snowy garden scene

The Garden Company team is grateful for another busy year of successful trading and delighted to send a Christmas donation to Perennial, the charity dedicated to people who work/ed in horticulture and are facing tough times. We know that this amazing charity makes a real difference to peoples’ lives.

It has been an exciting year for us at the Garden Company. Highlights include:

being shortlisted for two SGD (Society of Garden Designers) Awards. These are the only awards dedicated solely to landscape and garden design in the UK and are held in high esteem by design professionals throughout the UK and internationally. Being shortlisted for one (or two!) is a huge achievement and we are looking forward to a special night out at the Awards Ceremony in London in February. Having been the SGD Council Member responsible for organising this event for the last few years, I am greatly looking forward to just relaxing and enjoying seeing everyone there!

Family garden in Kings Langley

Contemporary garden in Hampstead Garden Suburb

designing and building a number of interesting and varied landscape projects, including domestic gardens from small courtyards to large family gardens, and also working on public spaces (including our Hare Court project at The Inner Temple in London). Client feedback this year has been really positive and you can read more about how clients have found working with us here

Looking back over 2017, the other big project keeping me occupied has been to design and build a new garden for myself/my family. This has been an interesting and (almost entirely!) enjoyable experience. We moved to a new-build property in a small Bedfordshire village 18 months ago. The garden has a lovely old wall to the rear and a beautiful 80m long mature holly hedge along one boundary. Other than those existing features it was a blank canvas, which was perfect for me. Creating a garden for myself – plus other family members! – has been a great joy and reinforced how incredibly lucky I am to be in an industry where we can provide such enjoyment, and I believe, benefit the wellbeing of our clients. It has also been different to live with the space every day through the changing seasons and see the subtle changes, something I don’t experience in the same way with a ‘normal’ project, where I would perhaps visit a few times in the first year after completion. We started work on it just after Christmas 2016 and – one year on – the garden has been put into constant use over the summer and autumn. I look forward to sharing more images with you in the New Year (the snowy scene at the top of this blog doesn’t really give you much to go on!). I have really enjoyed maintaining and nurturing my garden – it does require attention and care. It’s reinforced my belief that designing and building a garden is just the beginning – the importance of skilled aftercare is paramount to the success of a scheme. As an industry, we need to raise the profile of aftercare and maintenance to make it a valued career choice. As professionals, we need to reinforce the value of paying properly for the skills needed and help clients to see it as more than simply ‘maintenance’.

All that remains is for me to say a huge personal thankyou to our valued Garden Company clients, team members and business partners for your continued support and loyalty throughout 2017. And – of course – we wish everybody reading a magical, merry Christmas and happy, healthy New Year!

The Garden Company office will be closed from December 22^nd and we re-open for business on January 2nd. If you’re thinking about a landscape design or build project for next year, need a maintenance overhaul for your garden/grounds, or you are looking for an opportunity to work in garden construction/maintenance, we’d love to hear from you on 01442-832666.

For more information about the valuable work that Perennial does, please visit http://perennial.org.uk/