A Victorian garden project

Ty Isaf is a Victorian Villa house located in the Dee Valley near Corwen in North Wales.

We were asked to create a masterplan design for our client’s garden, which sits on the southern side of the valley on a partially wooded slope.

The views out across the Dee and over to an Iron Age hillfort are spectacular, and we have considered these in our design along with the historical features of the site. These include parterres, formal garden laid out on a level area and made up of enclosed beds, separated by gravel, and a 350-year-old oak tree.

We have used permaculture garden techniques that blend the best of wildlife gardening with native-plant cultivation to create a low-maintenance and productive eco-system.

Our ideas include transforming an existing area of rough grassland, using these principles, to form a “forest orchard”. Fruit trees will be planted in combination with smaller shrubs, herbs, some root vegetables and groundcover to supress weeds.

Climbers and fungi add further layers to this approach, creating a highly-productive, all-year-round orchard, that will also support a wide variety of wildlife. It’s a lovely project to work on.