We loved working on this project and continue to guide the final touches to the shape of the landscape. 

Our clients, who we met through a mutual love of natural building materials - specifically Cob (clay, straw, aggregate and some cow shit) - decided to move to the lovely coastal town of Bideford and purchased 9 Brookfield to demolish the existing cottage, which was very much passed its best. They worked with Paul Bedford of Bedford and Bedford Ltd to design the new house and we added landscape design to the wholesale remodelling of the site. 

Our design had a few strong lines of thought. One was access. The garden was on a fairly precipitous slope leading down to a natural stream and in its old state it would have been very hard to garden. Our clients are super keen gardeners, whose many years of living close to RHS Rosemoor has meant that the plant palette for the project will be diverse and colourful. We wanted to make sure that the garden would see them into their later years so we worked on a terraced system where the land descends to level areas which can be accessed by a side ramp and simple steps between the levels. On one side these terraces flow into each other and on the other, to account for the level changes, they are faced with stunning stone from a local quarry. This reflects the facing stone used for the upper terrace and garden room of the basement. 

The design is still gently emerging from a very very very wet winter (2024) and we are very excited about planting up as soon as we can work the soil again. Stay tuned.