Garden Stories 2024

Garden descriptions

1    John and Sheila Martin; our garden story

We purchased 35 Angusfield Avenue in 1985 which was built in 1929 and our first viewing of the property was of the Rear Garden from the Back Lane on a Sunday morning.
We were immediately attracted to the relatively large city rear garden facing South-West – an absolute sun trap, which was in very poor shape. The previous Owners whose relatives had rented the property out to Students clearly had no interest in the garden at all; which had some very established Rhododendrons, an ancient apple tree and about 25% of the ground grassed over.
Following house renovations and extensions to accommodate our family, as keen gardeners, we set about coming up with garden design ideas with the following objectives:1) To remove the garden squareness & create new paths and archways, 2) To create deep and shallow shrub borders,3) To capitalize on the existing established Rhododendrons, 4) To remove a collapsing garage (to create more garden space) & 5) To remove the existing grassed area and create new lawns
It took many years of planning and ‘trial by error’ successes and mistakes learning how best to create Shrub and Plant borders together with plenty of nervous moments with kids playing football and horsing around. Once the new lawn was established we set about creating curved lines to remove the ‘squareness’ and planted many different shrub species at the rear of the borders including many more Rhododendrons, Azaleas, Laburnum trees, weigela. A Sumac tree, Magnolias, Camellias, Geraniums, Monomanias, Crinodendrons Eucalyptus, Wisteria, Hydrangea’s, Choicea, Forsythia, Delphiniums, Honeysuckles, Wild Roses, Clematises’, together with many smaller seasonal plants and bulbs at the front of the borders and inspired by Crathes Gardens and Relations Gardens in the Island of Arran.
Whilst our garden has a fantastic spring show, we keep on trying to bring a lot of colour into the garden. We replaced the garage area with a fruit and vegetable plot and a greenhouse. So after 38 years, we reckon we have almost reached our goals, but as with any garden we are still learning and thoroughly enjoy our now secluded mature Angusfield Garden where we enjoy many family get-togethers.

2  Douglas And Sheila Wardlaw: The story of our garden

When we moved into this house 10 years ago, the house had been rented and the garden was a wilderness, a tangle of bushes, flowers and trees that had grown out of control, left to nature for five years. Many overgrown cypress and other trees were gradually removed and replace by more appropriate trees and hedges There was a double garage that was overgrown with ivy both inside and out damaging the roof.
A legacy allowed us to rebuild the double garage and lay out the patio and garden path. At the same time, I lifted old paths laid with “cassies” which were falling apart and liable to cause a broken ankle or two. The cassies used to form new paths and borders and are now a feature of the garden.
Some old borders have been dug out and reformed, then planted with many of the old plants, with the addition of some new plants and bushes. Quite a few of these were purchased from Ben Reid’s “bargain bench” and have developed very well!
The vegetable and soft fruit garden were laid out together with the greenhouse and garden shed and surrounded by a low fence to keep out rabbits. Adjacent to it is our fruit garden of apples pears and plums, some of which have still to produce fruit!
I enjoy being outside in my garden bringing on vegetables and plants. Cutting all the hedges has been a bit of a chore but only needed once a year after bird nesting time, and cutting the grass helps keep me quite fit. Sadly, over each winter some plants have been  lost and need replacing.
Gradually I have added new features to the garden. A garden is continually changing and this one, as you will see, is still and probably always will be “in development”.

3  Bill and Helen McGregor

A mature informal cottage -style garden situated in one third of an acre featuring azaleas,rhododendrons, Orchids,peonies and a selection of alpines.

4  John and Ros Holmes

When we moved to Mayfield House in April 1993, the garden was somewhat overgrown with little in the way of structure. There were, however, some good plants, especially rhododendrons (slightly neglected) as the garden apparently had been laid out in the 1930’s. Our first action was to clear tall leylandii from the front, so opening up views of the house. Also, to create a lighter interior of the house, large rhododendrons were moved from outside the sitting room back to the boundary wall alongside Station Road. Old wild cherry trees were also removed, and the resultant area replaced with grass and a pond (the initial excavation used the digger we had for the first house renovation).
The garden has slowly evolved since then: pond enlarged and waterfall/stream added, further tree/rhododendron/heather planting, vegetable and fruit garden created with raised beds which with the greenhouse give us a good supply of produce, herbaceous and scree/rock garden beds created, various hard landscaping features, dry stone walls etc. constructed, mostly to contain the slope.
The garden continues to mature, hopefully to be enjoyed by humans and wildlife alike.

5 Eve Glegg: The Garden at Lilybank

I loved my garden from afar for at least 10 years before I could actually call it my own and now, 28 years on, I still love it. And I love the cottage that came with it too! My last garden was nice, but it fell away downhill from the house, and I thought it would be lovely to have a garden surrounding one’s house.
We have been through a lot, and we have grown old together and I feel more of a custodian now rather than a gardener. My addition of a summer house (and good neighbours!) during Covid when we could only congregate outside has made the garden at Lilybank complete.
I really enjoy growing hardy vegetables, especially things that slugs don’t like such as leeks, onions, peas, broad beans, runner beans and courgettes. I find it so rewarding to bring the vegetables on from seed and then pot them on in the greenhouse. Fruit such as raspberries and plums do very well, especially now my dear husband isn’t here to over-zealously prune the plums trees, although I do miss his help around the garden.
The garden is entirely pesticide-free and nature friendly to encourage a wide variety of birds including woodpeckers, collared doves, and goldfinches. As Monty Don maintains, every garden should have a pond to invite nature in, so my daughter recently added a pond, which is now flourishing with water marigolds.
Passers-by often remark that they love to look over the wall at my garden each season and see which plants are blooming. It is such a pleasure to have been invited by the Deeside Rotary to share it with you for a good cause and I hope that you enjoy it as much as I do.

6  Moira Bremner.

Over the 42 ½ years we have been here, there have been many changes to the garden at Disblair.
In the early 1980s, nine very tall larch trees were removed from the left hand side - much to the relief of our neighbours at the time - and the horseshoe drive was created. The four acers were already well grown.
At the back of the house, the hedge was about 7 feet high, there was a greenhouse, but only grass, which was sloped to the far right hand corner. The pond was made in the early 1990s.
A further large fir tree was removed in 2018, and the stump was carved with the owls you will see beside the summer house. When a beech tree was taken down in 2022, a section of the trunk was carved with the squirrels.
So what you see today has gradually taken shape over many years.
By visiting garden centres and other gardens, those of us with an interest in gardening will always be encouraged to make changes and additions to our own spaces.

7  Ewan and Jackie Hatchwell: A brief garden history –

We moved to 40 Cairn Road in October 1981. The house was built in the grounds of an old house and our garden was surrounded by trees. On the north-east side we had lovely cypress trees about 50ft tall which reached down to the ground.
On the west side of the garden were Norwegian spruce which were useful for Christmas trees, but not suitable for our garden plans so they were removed. Much later, leylandii beside our drive were getting beyond our control, so they had to go – giving us more garden space.
About 15 years ago we decided to have a conservatory built. The cypress trees had become too big for the urban situation. When they came down we gained more garden.   A few years later some trees at the top of the garden were giving problems so they also had to go, changing the garden further….
There is always something in flower in the garden throughout the year. During May and June it is really full of plants and it’s hard to find a gap. But by August some gaps appear.  
Many of my plants have come from friends, plant sales, or even arrived by chance - like the rowan tree with the white berries at the front. This Spring I found to my delight a wood anemone.
We endeavour to be wild-life friendly and have had foxes, rabbits, hedgehogs, red squirrel, deer, and badger visit the garden - some are more welcome than others...

8  Andy Stringer

Visitors to The Garden House are greeted by lavender lined pathways and climbing roses.  One path leads to the courtyard garden, a tranquil sheltered sun trap in summer, featuring an espaliered peach tree.  Passing the front of the house, another path leads to the expansive rear garden with well stocked borders sheltered by the boundary wall.  Planting includes rhododendron, azalea, achillea and delphinium with mature trees such as larch, silver birch, Scots pine, apple and plum.  One border has been left to grow wild as a haven for insects.  Further planting around the edge of the terrace patio includes meconopsis and climbing roses.
The property changed hands last year so the credit for the garden design belongs to the previous owners.  

9  Sylvia and John Short

When we moved here in April 2003, pretty well all of the back garden was a grassy slope, that is but for the rockery on the right. A landscaper was hired to sketch our proposals to remodel and make it a bit more garden friendly, and as a result the steps shown above were put in, a deck at the back with steps down from garage drive. The chuckies were hauled in and paved circle installed. Firstly I have to mention that I was not that deeply into gardening, but being retired had a bit of time to try various things out. Initially spent a bit of money buying herbaceous plants such as hostas, geranium and also some speciment trees, the nice paper bark birch, the rowans and some spruce and yew. Also over the year spotted some self seeded ornamental cherry and evergreen, and relocated these to more open spots. The scotch pine now in the middle of the rockery, was a small specimen that appeared in a planter, from birds I imagine.
I am planning to take one of the evergreens down from the front path sometime soon, and open it up.   When I arrived the top of the garden had leylandi, that were about 5 metres or so, they were taken down and a lot of beach hedging installed, that is now quite established. The eucalyptus always grow well and although chopped a few times they come again. Glaucus colouring of new growth is nice for flower arranging.....not my department! Top left plot has over the years had a few red and black current bushes, but now to grass with a little line of blueberries that give a few punnits every year. A lot of azaleas and rhodi's are original, especially at the front and these have been chopped to keep in check, but are always rewarding with their June flowering. Every spring brings a bit of work, to reorganise some things, particularly on the right of the garage, with plants needing a split and divided, but this is quite satisfying, and saved a bit of money with echinea, hostas and so on. The cornus are great for filling spots with their bright branches. Also, I like my witchhazel which, have really bright yellow flowers on bare branches, early in the year, when there is not a lot of colour around.
Finally it may have past flowering on the open day, but the pink camellia, beside the back door, is always stunning and remarkable that it keeps coming year in, year out without much attention. In front of the camellia is a cherry tree, ex Lidl, that every other year or so I net to keep the birds off and get a reasonable 2kgs that we freeze for deserts, or in fact in with a bit of roast venison, works well. Finally a shout out for the heathers front and back, which all came from B&Q selections, and over the years provide nice colour and ground cover.

10  Jane  and  Terry  O'Kelly

A cottage  garden  of  just under half an acre surrounded by farmland. It features a border of Rhododendrons and azaleas, several mixed borders, two formal rose beds, a wild life pond and four raised beds growing a variety of vegetables and flowers for the house. The garden reflects a love of colour and structure and an interest in wildlife.