I was approached by the clients initially to redesign their rear garden. The main feature of the existing garden was a large Mulberry tree that is said to be 80 years old and is on the Boroondara significant tree register. Beyond this tree and some woodland planting that surrounded it, the yard was generally unusable. Access from the house, which sat high above the garden, was limited. As the garden was primarily viewed from above, a key feature of the new design was to provide a point of difference in the hard surfacing. Alison was inspired by a recent trip overseas and fell in love with the paving at the Guggenheim. She shared a few images with me and I decided to play around with different materials and angles to create the main hard surface. Limestone paving and handmade Hawthorn bricks were used to create the surface and walling. These were offset from the house at different angles. A small handmade brick wall coupled the paving to the garden and served as seating, while framing entry to the woodland garden beyond. The deck was rebuilt with new stairs to access the rear yard. Cladding by way of radial timber battens covered the underside of the deck and provided a backdrop to the new sitting space.
Further raised angular beds were constructed to grow herbs and vegetables. Access to the front was considered on both sides of the dwelling – one with a set of stairs, the other with a gently sloping granitic sand path. Upright pears created a vertical element along the northern boundary. The beauty of this space and the garden in general is that the house feels as though it’s floating amongst the trees and vegetation. Once “in” the garden the planting is soft and free form, the surface is alluring and adds strength and texture in its materiality and geometry. The client has filled the garden beds over the years with many shade tolerant species and bulbs to provide seasonal interest.
We designed the front some years later. It is challenging in suburban locations to accommodate off street parking and a garden at the front of a property. We saw that it was another opportunity to play around with angles and height to create a parking zone with a garden leading towards the house. The arbor, covered in virginia creeper, serves to delineate the two spaces and provide a doorway to the house and garden beyond. An existing pear at the front of the house helps soften the height of the building, with Chinese pistachios serving to soften the foreground and provide summer shade and seasonal interest. The remainder of the planting is relatively simple, primarily green to provide some strength during the cooler months when the trees are not in leaf. Movement is created by the use of a block of Miscanthus along the front boundary. The rear garden was implemented by myself and my team and the front landscape was implemented by Jesse Moore.