The Property Magazine - New Homes - Summer 2018

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GARDENING The Garden Shed gives way to The Garden Office Perhaps the last bastion of male dominance in the garden is the shed. Traditionally the male preserve where men can retreat from ‘her indoors,’ batten down the hatches and indulge in all sorts of disgusting, anti-social behavior. Not for much longer. A 2015 study by the TUC to mark National Work From Home Day revealed that nearly a quarter of a million more people worked from home than the decade before. And the biggest growth in the trend has been among women with 35% more working from home in 2015 than in 2005. As this trend seems set to continue, many ladies are eyeing up the garden shed as a possible extra working space. Some garden offices come complete with a sedum roof in which alpine plants flower in spring and summer making a pleasant outlook for neighbours and the top floor of the house. Your garden should be a reflection of your own personality, just like your clothes, it should fit naturally with you. You may dislike the apparent randomness of the classic garden, choosing a more contemporary, clean cut garden building with sliding glass doors and minimalist decking surround, in which case the surrounding planting palette should be kept to a minimum to give maximum impact. It’s becoming increasingly popular to introduce a smart, efficient workspace to our gardens and several companies now specialise in contemporary home offices (or posh sheds) to meet this growth in demand. Visit any garden show and you will find on display fantastically chic buildings designed for all year use. It seems that many of us now see the garden as an extra room and the daily commute to the office, a simple stroll to a space into which we can disappear undisturbed. An office in the garden can completely dominate, especially if space is at a premium, but with crafty design it can blend into the surrounding area and style of the garden. Before deciding about what garden building to buy, consider your taste. The look of a classic English cottage garden, for example, appeals to many of us, in which case, the building can be ‘softened’ with hanging baskets, terracotta pots and window boxes crammed with colourful annual planting, thus making the building a feature. Making the office or shed the focal point of a garden is fine providing it’s an attractive building. The alternative is to screen it from the main house and create different areas of interest within the garden. This can be done by planting a hedge, although it will take a while to establish. A speedier alternative is to erect a trellis, as a support for climbers, which are usually much quicker to grow. Trees can be used with great effect,if there is enough space. Pleached trees ( like a hedge on a stick) have become popular in recent years to provide an instant, living screen. Hornbeam is often used for pleaching, or,for evergreen screening, Quercus Ilex, the Holme Oak, is an excellent choice. Unless you particularly wish to don wellies on a wet winter morning’s commute to work, a path from the back door to the office entrance is essential. This should suit your garden in a similar way the flooring inside suits the various rooms. If your style and taste is less formal, a winding gravel path, with local shingle using an edging to contain, is a practical, cost effective choice. Adding a planting border to each side, gives extra definition to the pathway. 6
In a sunny garden, a Lavender pathway is the perfect choice for scent, colour and attracting bees. For a lovely ‘cottagey’ look, allow for pockets of low growing herbs among the gravel, so they can release delicious scents when stepped upon. The disadvantage of gravel as a pathway is it can be difficult to wheel things over and if you have trees in or around your garden, the gravel can quickly become a mushy mess in the autumn. If you have a larger budget, a stone or brick pathway is ideal. Giving the pathway a curve, as opposed to going straight from A to B will make a garden look larger and invite exploration. Lighting the pathway is essential for those long winter evenings helping to define the edges and illuminate any flowers that are planted next to them. As with anything else in your garden, the choice will depend on the overall style and should fit your own lifestyle and personality. Sheena Marsh is owner and designer at Oxford Garden Design. See oxfordgardendesign.co.uk or email sheena@oxfordgardendesign.co.uk 7
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The Property Magazine - New Homes - Summer 2018

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