URBAN REFUGE
This inspiring garden cracks open a number of points that often stand in the way of homeowners creating outside spaces that can bring a tidal wave of joy.
Size is no barrier. Years of experience is not required. Fully-planted spaces that move with the seasons can not help but be a magnet for wildlife. Trees and large plants create dimension. Gardens don’t need to be stagnant but can morph as your needs change. And great change can happen in just a year or two.
Libby Webb and her family transformed their small central Edinburgh yard into an urban Narnia, connecting them deeply to their starkly seasonal climate by creating a private, rich refuge to support their busy lives.
Enjoy this wonderful, inspiring story as told by Libby Webb.
Julia xo
Garden profile
GARDENER: Libby Webb
LOCATION: Edinburgh, Scotland.
City centre garden.
SIZE: 7 x 14 m in a regular rectangular shape.
ENVIRONMENT: Acidic soil, humus rich and good for ericaceous-loving (acid-loving) plants. The back of the house is west facing so enjoys lots of sun.
The long walls are north and south facing. The garden is entirely walled with beautiful sandstone built around 120 years ago. The walls stand approx. 7 feet high and cast a great deal of solid shade.
The area is situated in a quadrangle of three and four-storey buildings which prevent sunlight reaching the ground for 3 months of the year in winter.
@docleaves
THE TRANSFORMATION
I moved here 16 years ago when my eldest son was just one. The houses are 120 years old but the gardens that went with them were originally made as drying greens and a place to bring in coal, not ornamental spaces, so there was little heritage within the planting. When we moved here it was very much the stereotypical Edinburgh city garden – mainly laid to lawn with slim, straight borders running round the edges filled with shrubs. There was the ubiquitous garden shed at the bottom.
Going back to when we purchased the property, the garden was not a significant consideration when buying the house. My husband and I both had busy jobs working in healthcare and the decision to be in the city centre was to avoid lengthy commutes to work after long days on the job. Our only considerations at this point were to have access to an outside space for the growing family, and a west-facing house to enjoy the sun. We knew we were likely to make alterations to the house and didn’t spend time establishing the garden when we knew it would be damaged by future building work.
The first summer we moved in I cleared all the shrubs which were adding very little aesthetically, and actually widened the lawn to create a bigger space for the children to play on. It stayed this way for years as the children grew and became home to climbing frames, slides and projectiles of every kind, which usually ended up in neighbour’s gardens.
I was always interested in planting beautiful plants in the sunny (south-facing) border but the failures were many, almost spectacular in their number. I used to plant delphiniums, lupins, scabious and non-hardy lavenders… they would maybe show for one season but rarely ever returned. I had much to learn about slugs, many of the perennials would be eaten off at the base in spring as they tried to return. I didn’t grow anything from seed as I do now, but would visit garden centres and be seduced by the beauty of gorgeous plants in full bloom which I would invariably buy a smorgasbord of and pop randomly in the border. It never looked cohesive or well-appointed, and I was unable to understand why. I would occasionally buy packets of seeds that I would scatter romantically around the border - I don’t think I ever successfully grew a single plant from direct sowing. I had much to learn about germinating seeds indoors, potting on, hardening off and buying bare-root plants and seedlings.
I got a couple of things right in the early years. I planted a Eucryphia nymansensis ‘Nymansay’ tree to add some evergreen architecture and stunning blooms, an Hydrangea petiolaris (climbing hydrangea) on my shady wall as I knew it would take years to establish (about 15 if I’m honest), a couple of lace cap hydrangeas, some Persicaria bistorta and a Euphorbia characias subsp. wulfenii .
“I’d love to pretend that I sat down and drew the hard landscaping and planting that would evolve but I didn’t. It was piecemeal and organic, and pretty spontaneous in its evolution. What I did know was that I wanted height and curves to challenge the straight lines that existed. I knew that introducing large forms into a small space would make it seem bigger, and that blurring the boundary walls would have a similar effect.
We set to work.”
MAKING THE GARDEN
Just before covid hit in 2020 it became apparent that the children had outgrown the climbing frame and it was sent to a new home. My teenagers would now head to the park with their friends and the lawn wasn’t big enough to be useful for a game of anything. I could see that the outside space was underutilised and I started looking at it more critically - I realised that the garden had much more to offer and set about redesigning it.
I came to the conclusion that any design had to consider four factors: function, aesthetics, wildlife and cost.
I needed to incorporate the ugly storage shed and retractable washing line for function (my husband’s red lines), whilst finding ways to break up the rectangular area for a better aesthetic.
I wanted to introduce trees for the birds and plants for pollinators, ponds for frogs and bug hotels to increase biodiversity. I had nothing against the lawn but the more I thought about it the more I could see that it served no purpose. I knew no garden without a lawn, it was just the done thing in the UK to have one, but I realised it didn’t have to be that way. We weren’t using the space and I knew I could create a wildlife haven for animals that would.
We knew that to keep our costs down we would have to do all the work ourselves, use materials that we could afford and handle, and find products that were within our expertise (novices). It was going to take a great deal of time and would have to fit in around our work and family commitments. It would also have to be done in stages.
I’d love to pretend that I sat down and drew the hard landscaping and planting that would evolve but I didn’t. It was piecemeal and organic, and pretty spontaneous in its evolution. What I did know was that I wanted height and curves to challenge the straight lines that existed. I knew that introducing large forms into a small space would make it seem bigger, and that blurring the boundary walls would have a similar effect.
We set to work.
We started in 2021 by laying a fairly contrived and tightly curved cobbled path down the length of the garden which was incredibly successful at tricking the eye away from the rectangular walls. I bought three winter flowering cherry trees, Prunus x subhirtella ‘Autumnalis Rosea’ (Higan Cherry), and offset them down the garden at different depths but so that all three could be seen at the same time from the house. The euphorbia that I had put in years before had been busy self seeding and was actually quite spectacular in spring. The Persicaria bistorta that I had purchased at some stage was inviting itself to all areas of the garden and putting on an amazing show with alliums that I never gave up on. I remember taking a photo of the path and border at this stage and thinking it looked pretty good. The eyes, following the curve of the stones, no longer noticed the rectangular walls, and they came to rest on the cherry trees. Not the ugly shed.
The following year in March 2022, during a family episode of covid illness, I designed a further two bisecting paths of grass and my husband lifted all the remaining turf in the garden out with those paths. Once the turf was skimmed I laid recycled stones as edges to the new borders and we dug in an impressive amount of well-rotted manure.
I knew that I wanted height and I bought three cheap garden arches to sit over a section of the original path creating a curved tunnel. I planted a Solanum crispum ‘Glasnevin’ (potato vine) to grow over it (quickly) to create shade and interest and installed festoon lights within the tunnel itself which created a magical space at night. I sowed a lot of seeds - inside on warm windowsills where it was actually successful: Verbena bonariensis, Briza media (quaking grass), cosmos, Oenothera lindheimeri ‘The Bride’ (gaura), Salvia patens, Echinacea pallida, Ammi majus (false Queen Anne’s lace), Ammi visnaga, ‘Sutton’s Apricot’ foxgloves and Thalictrum delavayi.
I ordered some plants online as seedlings: Astrantia major ‘Sparkling Stars Pink’, Astrantia ‘Shaggy’, Angelica, Erigeron karvinskianus* (Mexican daisy) and Alchemilla mollis. I bought some mature plants online too: Trachelospermum jasminoides (star jasmine) for the arches and ferns for my fernery: Polystichum setiferum, Polystichum polyblepharum, Blechnum spicant and some baby Dicksonia antarcticas.
* (as a weed this is not able to be purchased in NZ)
I started relocating and dividing other plants in established borders: buxus, aster, Persicaria bistorta, nepeta, euphorbia, peonies, hardy geraniums including ‘Rozanne’, Sedum ‘Autumn Joy’, hydrangeas (I split one monster into five with success) and I replanted four runners that had come off my lilac tree.
I rescued dying and discounted plants from garden stores: Fatsia japonica and the variegated spider’s web variety, Cordyline australis (cabbage tree), hydrangeas, Erysimum ‘Bowles’s Mauve’ (wallflower) and lifted sumac tree runners from my neighbour’s garden that she didn’t want. I was constantly surprised by the amount of work required to plant up even this relatively small space and at times felt a bit overwhelmed. What I was amazed at was how little I actually needed to spend overall, it has been only a few hundred pounds at this point.
Summer arrived in earnest and the garden was transformed. I was struck by the obvious improvement in the space’s biodiversity. I watched the birds and pollinators moving in swiftly. The noise of the wildlife and the presence of the butterflies was a dramatic transformation from the lawn that lay there in quiet before. I was impressed at the impact that one small urban garden could have on its immediate environment. I had put a beautiful (plastic) water bowl in the shaded fernery to bounce the light some months earlier, but I realised I still needed a pond for the wildlife too. I dug out part of a sunny border and installed a preformed pond with additional pond plants.
That first summer without a lawn was a revelation. The introduction of the trees into the centre of the garden, adorned with bird feeders, meant the focus was all on the birds. The surrounding planting with the height of the arches and establishing tree canopies gave the immersive woodland feel I was looking for. The boundaries disappeared beneath the planting, the garden merged with the borrowed landscape, and gradually the 7 x 14m uninspiring rectangle was replaced with a seemingly much larger treescape woven with paths and flowers.
My friends would occasionally visit to look at it. ‘It’s not like a normal garden is it?’ ‘No, it’s not’.
I was getting somewhere.
“My friends would occasionally visit to look at it.
‘It’s not like a normal garden is it?’
‘No, it’s not’.
I was getting somewhere.”
In the following winter we set about paving the paths. The original paths of grass from the old lawn had died quickly as they were shaded by dense and tall planting in the borders (and being peed on by the family dog). We moved the ugly shed to a less conspicuous spot where another shed had been sitting and created a new corner of the garden to develop.
My husband dug out about three tonnes of soil, we put in an aggregate base, sharp sand and then Indian sandstone paving cobbles. The new prime real estate that had been gained by moving the shed became a pergola that we installed and painted, now covering a table and benches.
I planted a wisteria sinensis alba, Clematis montana ‘Mayleen’, Clematis cirrhosa ‘Wisley Cream’, more Solanum ‘Glasnevin’ and ‘Album’, and a star jasmine to cover the pergola with green walls and roof. I lifted all my hostas from the borders and set them in pots to add lush foliage to the space and remove them from the voracious slugs. I had planted alliums, dutch irises and Ornithogalum ponticum ‘Sochi’ bulbs in winter, in both pots and borders. I added Geum ‘Totally Tangerine’ against my better judgement but on the insistence of a dear friend. I learnt how to weave with willow and made a giant obelisk for sweet pea seedlings. I added Phlomis tuberosa and Calamagrostis ‘Karl Foerster’, Eremurus himalaicus (Himalayan foxtail lily) and Cobaea scandens*, all as additions to the previous year’s garden.
* as a weed this is not able to be purchased in NZ)
“Summer arrived in earnest and the garden was transformed. I was struck by the obvious improvement in the space’s biodiversity. I watched the birds and pollinators moving in swiftly. The noise of the wildlife and the presence of the butterflies was a dramatic transformation from the lawn that lay there in quiet before.”
EXPERIENCE
Despite being in this garden for the last 16 years I’ve only really had the chance to work on it properly in the last three. I’d never had my own garden before, having lived in blocks of flats with shared gardens before moving here.
I grew up in a rural setting with parents who tried living off the land so had a childhood full of plants and harvesting – although the focus was all on productivity rather than aesthetics. My homes have always been full of houseplants and greenery but this is my first proper outside garden, and the first time in my career and family life that I have had a chance to develop it.
My goals for my garden have been driven by aesthetics but anchored in the knowledge that green space and green views are undeniably good for me and my family and bring the wildlife in. My planting style is probably best described as naturalistic, very definitely not rewilding, and I think there is much misunderstanding and perhaps misuse of the various garden terms that are currently in vogue. Rewilding is giving over space for nature to do its own thing. Naturalistic planting is imitating a natural look and is highly contrived. Mine is very much the latter.
I love the forest bathing, total immersion in green space feeling. Just 20 minutes a day in nature is enough to reduce your cortisol and even looking onto green space has mental and physical health benefits, which I have always been keen to maximise.
I’ve never had any help in either designing or maintaining the garden but my husband and family will help me with tasks that are too heavy or out of reach (I’m looking at you cordyline australis).
GARDEN VISION
The garden is a recreation of a woodland effect with interest hidden within it. I define it as a cottage jungle, a fusion of two styles -traditional cottage garden with some more tropical effect plants such as fatsia and cordyline- but there is a definite nod to Japanese garden style too with the inclusion of water.
Because it is a small urban space with minimal green borrowed landscape there is an emphasis on structural evergreens that carry the cheering effect of the garden through the winter. Despite being less than 100 m2 it has 11 trees within it, all with light, open and thinned canopies (it’s a bit of work) to give height and a woodland feel without blocking out the light. It is never without blooms as I have focused on successional planting and even within the depths of winter there is always something for the pollinators.
The highlights of the year are:
In June when the evening summer sun illuminates the alliums and geums and creates a mesmerising effect.
In late summer when the gaura and aster combine with the cosmos to create an ethereal display,
And in the depths of winter, in low light, the pink blossom on the winter-flowering cherries is iridescent and utterly uplifting, month after month.
“The garden is a recreation of a woodland effect with interest hidden within it. I define it as a cottage jungle, a fusion of two styles -traditional cottage garden with some more tropical effect plants such as fatsia and cordyline- but there is a definite nod to Japanese garden style too with the inclusion of water. ”
CONSIDERATIONS
The main consideration in my garden in terms of what is achievable is the slug population. It is huge. My best guess is the stone walls prevent any natural predators from keeping the numbers under control and I have learnt over the years that it is pointless to try and grow anything that the slugs like to eat. Delphiniums and lupins are a hard no. Hosta can survive in pots but the successful plants in my garden are innately slug resistant. I’m hoping my new population of froglets might start to predate them but the slugs and snails will likely always be with me. I’m not prepared to use chemical controls for pests.
One of my main focuses is the wildlife that I can support in a small space. I have built a retaining wall out of logs which has quickly become a hive of activity for insects. The wildlife pond with plants, frog ladder and frog house has seen the successful development of hundreds of tadpoles to frogs. I have bird feeders and birdhouses hidden around the garden, and the birds have moved in almost immediately. I spend a lot on bird feed! I have planned successional planting so there is no point where the garden is without blooms. Even in the depths of winter the cherry blossom and Helleborus argutifolius Corsican hellebores have flowers for the pollinators and the bees were flying about me in January this year.
I am acutely aware of the need to garden sustainably. So far I have plentiful access to water but I am mindful not to waste resources. The only mulching that I do is with a new layer of well-rotted manure each spring and if I need compost I choose peat-free. I don’t use pesticides, herbicides or fertiliser and I disturb the soil structure as little as possible.
ADVICE FOR NEW GARDENERS
In terms of design in gardens, I’m always trying to convince people how straightforward it actually is. Most people have a great idea of what works with interior design and I’m continually explaining to folk that it is just interior design outside.
If a house was empty with no internal walls or furniture it would feel soulless and the same goes for a garden. Imagine if you took all the walls out of your house and just had an open-plan space? It would look dreadful. It’s the same outside with a similar effect given by an expanse of lawn. It’s absolutely fine if you need this space for sport or a pet, but if you don’t, consider introducing paths and planting which break up the area.
Use furniture to create rooms. It would look strange to line up your sofa and chairs around the periphery of your sitting room walls and it is the same with the trees and plants in the garden. The boundary walls or fences delineate your space, it is not a planting guide. Pull your trees and plants in towards the middle of the garden so there is interest for the eye, arrange them in your mind like chairs with side tables and lamps. It makes the space look bigger, not smaller.
Just follow everything you know about interior design and apply it to your garden, you will be amazed at what you can achieve.
In terms of planting just start small. See what grows well in your neighbour’s gardens and grow two or three types in bulk. You soon get the hang of what works for you. Don’t go to garden centres unless you have to. Plants in flower are seductive but not the way to grow a garden. Start with seeds sown inside the house, or seedlings, bulbs and bare root plants. Plant your garden in winter and spring, not summer. And remember nothing bad happens when your planting looks rubbish, it’s just giving you experience.
Overall, my advice is this: humans thrive with being in outdoor spaces and nature and your garden is worth investing in - in time, effort and a bit of money.
If working on a house try and save some of the budget for the garden; it’s often the biggest room you own or rent and consider spending accordingly.
Always consider planting a tree as it will instantly lift any garden design.
Make an area that you can sit in so it is easy for you to want to be outside.
There are no mistakes in planting, only experiments, and even the most successful gardening professionals have plans that don’t work out the way they intended.
Try not to be put off playing the long game. When you are planting two years seems like forever, but when you are living two years is gone in a blink.
SOURCES OF INSPIRATION
Embarrassingly I have to admit that I’ve never read a book on gardening. I’ve also never really got to grips with Pinterest either. My ideas seem to come from within although no doubt have been influenced by images I’ve seen over the years.
I joined Instagram 9 months ago, mainly to share photos of my garden and find my garden tribe. There is a wealth of knowledge and support there and I’d recommend it. The app is good at suggesting accounts relevant to your interests if you search for gardening and if you start following accounts that you like the look of it will suggest others that are similar. You’ll end up seeing an unlimited number of images of plants and design and you can use this to work out where your heart lies.
It’s helpful to look at these pictures and think ‘oh I like that’ or ‘oh I really don’t like that’ but be critical. Ask yourself ‘what do I like about it?’ That way you understand what you are drawn to. Pick a picture apart. Is it the colours, or the formality, or the wildness? Is it lack of symmetry, or the water or the stripy lawn? Keep answering the question ‘why do I like this?’. You’ll soon realise your preferred aesthetic.
Provided links to plants are chosen by Julia with no bias - simply to connect with the best imagery and information to aid the reader on that plant.
No affiliate or sponsored links are included - please beware they may contain some seasonal information from other countries that differ from the one you are in!