Displaying posts labeled "Outdoors"

Neutral doesn’t mean flat and boring. No not at all as this Santa Barbara Spanish Mission style house by Joyce Downing Pickens of JDP Interiors cleverly illustrates. Texture is the hero as is the use of light and shadow. A mix of old and new brings depth and style.

Photography by Michael Clifford

“The brief. Transform a rare freestanding 1890s Italianate style terrace house in Sydney’s Inner West into a three level home combining the delight of a warm, contemporary aesthetic with the flexibility and robustness required for the changing needs of family life. A respect for the heritage of the original features is paramount as is creating a connection between the interior living spaces and the outside terrace and garden.”

A joyous, light-filled house celebrating the home’s history and future. It’s neutral palette and natural materials are the perfect are beautifully matched by the verdant back deck and courtyard garden. Elià House by Studio Prineas.

The garden of this lovely Georgian rectory in Dorset is large but sits at the top of a hill which drops off quite steeply. This topography left us with the challenge of rather a tight and oddly shaped footprint for the formal area by the house. Our response was to create a ‘D’ shaped lawn, framed with curved borders, beyond which everything is about a gentle visual transition back into the woodlands, so that the garden ‘borrows’ the landscape and has the sense of extending further than it actually does. We used very traditional English garden plants; lots of roses and lots of topiary, using clipped copper beech in particular, to bring in an element of the contemporary. The simple, curved grass steps connect the lawn level in a very gentle way to a terrace that’s made of limestone chippings. In this limestone surface, we planted a multitude of traditional ‘English rectory plants’, all of which have period associations. This hazy mass of plants right by the formal front door creates a wonderful sense of softness, which engages you with the garden the moment you step out from the house.

I am in love with this garden, particularly the randomly planted groupings by the front door. The gravel area in my backyard is looking too sparse so this is great inspiration to plant some random mounds here and there to break up the space. They almost look like they’re floating. Love that. Designed by Arne Maynard. (Photos: Britt Willoughby Dyer)

This garden in Ravenscourt Park was neglected and unloved when its owners moved in, consisting of a shabby lawn and a couple of scruffy shrubs but two promising trees – a Magnolia and an Apple tree. The garden has evolved over the years with structural Buxus pyramids later being replaced with Taxus baccata. The introduction of a Wildflower meadow with a winding path was later reconfigured bringing an abundance of wildlife.

The garden of landscape designer Butter Wakefield is simple yet an absolute delight and so pleasing to the eye. Inspiration folder material for sure. (Photography: Clive Nichols / Ellie Walpole / Simon Brown)

Long narrow gardens can be very awkward to plan out but it seems landscape designer Butter Wakefield has an incredible solution for this London townhouse’s space. She incorporated an intricate set of interlinking paving circles, each one different joined together with a ribbon band of cobbles. With the addition of a dining space, massive planters with trees to provide privacy, a row of wall lanterns and a trough-style fountain and you have yourself a garden that will be the envy of all the neighbour’s. (Photography: Ellie Walpole)