Garden for a friend ...

When our dear friend Helen died last September, life changed for all the people who knew and loved her. Our way of coping with her loss was to do something, to design and plant a garden where we could go, and sit, and remember her. She was a passionate gardener and keen plantswoman and we wanted to try to recreate her sort of garden, using some of her favourite plants.

We used a part of the garden that had been the site of a polytunnel, which fell victim to the weight of  snow one bad winter, and basically imploded!

After the collapse of said Polytunnel two years ago, we retained its footprint, using the beds for outdoor tomatoes and courgettes (with spectacular lack of success I have to say !)

In September, we cleared and dug over the area and then discussed and drew out the design for the new garden. We then started to work on it almost immediately and I found it very therapeutic to get out there and expend some energy in digging.

This is how it looked two months ago in March - bleak and uninviting ! In the foreground you may just be able to spot the newly planted bareroot Rose hedge of the old Gallica rose 'Charles de Mills'. It has a single flush of fully double, flat-faced blooms in colours described as 'variable' from crimson, to magenta pink. All plants have taken successfully and were a fantastically cheap way to grow this curving, informal hedge, to mark the boundary of 'Helen's Garden'. 

The following photos were all taken today, and show, hopefully, how a pile of gravel can help to transform an area and give it definition. This is before we started, we knew where the paths would be, so I planted geraniums as edging back in October. You can already see them marking the edges of the new paths.

So, our task today was to clear any weeds, then lay a weed-proof membrane and barrow this into position ...

I can say with authority, that this pile looks deceptively teeny, and that it contains a lot more sweaty barrow-loads than you would imagine !

This is the start of the gravel-shifting ...

And on it goes ...

And on ...

Here it is, all finished, with a bench to sit on, plus a small table and chairs as well. I think we need a few pots on the gravel, with something like Dryopteris ferns in (clue is in the name !) as these would not need constant watering.

It is still a work in progress with lots still to do... there are big gaps with bare earth, and the plants need to fill out in places. The edges of the paths need softening further with more geraniums, and we also need 'something' on that central spot in the gravel ... maybe some sculpture, or a statue, or a bird table, or some driftwood ... I don't know what it will be, but I think we will know it when we see it. And we will enjoy looking ...