Creating an outdoor room in north London

 

When we first saw this small and rather hemmed-in courtyard in north London, it was immediately apparent that the space would be best served by using just a few well-chosen materials.  The client was overseeing major interior decoration as well and wanted style of the new garden to flow effortlessly from the house.

The client wanted a garden to sit and relax in but also for socialising. Plenty of seating space despite the size was a priority. A small recessed area to the right of the courtyard will be used to house a barbecue and outdoor kitchen units. The client also wanted to be able to grow herbs for the kitchen, and we installed the green wall, using vertical garden pods from Green4Air, and with a solar-powered irrigation system supplied by Irrigatia.

The patterned tiles were chosen from the Sorrento range supplied by Fired Earth. The intricate detailing might have been overwhelming in a larger patio but in this compact space they brought light and texture.

The cedar bench was designed by The Urban Hedgerow built from scratch onsite by Graham Thompson of Creative Landscapes London, creating enough room to seat 8-10 people comfortably - or for fewer people to stretch out on cushions. The fence to the right was also built on site using materials from Jacksons Fencing and the corten steel screen, covering an unsightly gap in the rear wall was supplied by Stark and Greensmith.

The handsome bamboo plant was already in the raised bed to the rear, which was giving new edging and coping to match the cedar bench and the soil reconditioned. The bamboo was thinned and trimmed to let in the light and give it a boost, then underplanted with Choisya ternata 'Aztec Gold', an evergreen shrub with fine dissected leaves to throw interesting shadows against the fence and screen and with long-lasting white flowers in spring and summer.

We installed uplights in the raised bed to highlight shapes of the bamboo and other plants after dark.

The dark blue colour of the fence echoes the colour scheme inside the house. Exterior wood paint from Little Greene. 

The individual living wall pods are fixed to a framework on either side of the doors to the garden. The 1ltr pods each hold culinary herb and salad plants, including rosemary, thyme, oregano and rocket. In summer the pods will also hold a number of colourful edible flowers.

Plenty of seating with the bespoke cedar bench and the bistro table

Left: the old softwood deck was replaced by the patterned tiles, right. The built-in deck provides plenty of seating without clutter, and uses the existing wall of the raised bed as a backrest.

Ideas for planting containers

Your outdoor space, whether it's a balcony, courtyard, or garden, is precious. It could become a lifeline and a haven in the next few weeks and months for anyone who is self-isolating, whether as a precaution or in quarantine.

Simply brightening up your space with a plant in a pot, or growing some herbs, or combining a few different plants in a container or border, will give you pleasure and something to nurture.

Plants in containers can be a mix of foliage and blooms, or a pot filled with one glorious blossoming plant.

Grow herbs, such as this mix of basils, indoors on a sunny windowsill.

Left: Tillandsia, or airplants, survive without soil and just the occasional mist of water. Right: a simple arrangemnt of plant pockets on a wall can house a mini-herb garden.

Various succulents can live happily in a shallow bowl.

Try repurposing mugs, cups, bowls or tins as miniature plant pots - just remember to drill a hole in the bottom for drainage.

Breathing fresh air, hearing birdsong, seeing spring flowers in bloom and new leaves unfurl, is life-affirming and raises the spirits.

No space? Try a quick pallet garden

This vertical garden has given me so much pleasure over the summer months and it took all of 15 minutes to put together.

It requires a pallet in good condition, some woven plastic membrane and a staple gun. After that, just add soil and plants.

This pallet was donated to the allotment site by the builders next door. And it’s an ideal shape and size: 1) it will stand up on its own, 2) the horizontal struts at the base make good plant containers with minimal reconstruction, 3) it’s aesthetically pleasing: rustic without looking too decrepit. If you are going to re-purpose pallets, it really does pay to be very fussy. After all, they’re free.

I cut some strips of membrane to fit, and stapled pieces to the underside of each strut, as shown. This made the planting pockets. Next, I filled the pockets with multi-purpose compost and found a good place to site it. Finally I planted up the seedlings and watered them in. Without irrigation, it’s important to put the plants that are most drought resistant at the top and those that need most water at the bottom: plants on the top tier of a vertical garden are very exposed and will lose water very quickly. At the bottom, however, all the water gathers and the plants here are also often in a certain amount of shade.

I had calendula, cornflowers and eschscholzia Jelly Beans in the top two rows, and nasturtiums along the bottom as well as tumbling over the upper tiers.

This kind of shallow-pocketed, non-irrigated vertical garden works best for a single season. After that you can decide whether to redo the planting for another year or to re-purpose the pallet again. As I said, they’re free.