Are you well-pruned terrace or a messy meadow? How does your garden grow? Anne Byrne looks at why your garden style reveals more about your personality than you think!
The Classic Controller:
Crisply cut topiary, statement sculptures and expensive everything – if it isn’t the best, you don’t want to know. Rose bushes are clipped into submission – as is anyone who dares to walk on the grass. Birds are banned and insects are an insult – but never a problem thanks to the arsenal of chemical weapons in your perfectly painted shed. Your gardening apron, gloves and footwear all match – remember Annette Bening in American Beauty? So does your lipstick, of course, which you wouldn’t venture outside without – it’s the most important of all your weapons. Sorry, tools.
The Eclectic Enthusiast:
You’re a collector, and it shows. Although you like plants, and indeed your garden contains many, of widely differing size, shape and colour – your real love is for things. Water features bubble quietly in several different locations. Pots proliferate. Statuary is scattered around, as are sundials, birdbaths and wind chimes. On first name terms with the owner of the local garden centre, you’re also responsible for most of their profits.
The Plastic-free Purist:
You lie awake at night worrying about ecological armageddon. Everything in your garden is sustainably sourced and traceable; your potting compost has been peat – free since long before that was a thing and every plant is raised laboriously from seed – you couldn’t countenance stamping on your carbon footprint by buying actual plants from an actual garden centre that had been delivered in an actual lorry. Your homemade comfrey fertiliser is so smelly that neighbours have signed a petition begging you to limit its use at evenings and weekends. You respond by leaving bags of rare and unpronounceable vegetables as presents on their doorsteps, to show you can be the bigger person.
The Start-up Success:
Yours is a party garden, designed to impress potential investors. When you’re not networking in the outdoor hot tub, you’re watching football on the weatherproof widescreen TV or comparing cocktails round the gas-powered fire pit with built-in icebox. As night falls, you have a wide array of remote-controlled lighting options at your fingertips to dazzle your guests. Your patio fits twenty people, and in the narrow bed to one side a single forlorn row of thirsty plants is suffering quietly. The actual lawn is okay though – it’s fake grass, naturally.
The Turf Accountant:
If you’re not an actual accountant, chances are you’re an engineer or maths teacher. Every line on your plot is straight, and every inch of your lawn is level. Your family know that holidays must be booked to fit around the annual spring lawn weed and feed, summer watering and autumn scarifying sessions. Grass blade lengths are checked with a ruler in randomly selected areas and averaged out to make sure the median length is within acceptable parameters. You do not recognise the existence of weeds. A daisy appeared once and it took several hours to calm you down. You are best friends with the greenkeeper of the local golf club, as he’s the only person who talks to you in the pub.
With qualifications from the world-renowned Royal Horticultural Society, Anne can advise you on all aspects of your garden design. By combining her skills and experience with imagination and passion, Anne’s garden design will be the perfect finishing touch to your beautiful home.
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