Garden Story 1

35 Angusfield Avenue was built in 1929 and our first viewing of the property which we purchased in 1985 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 Southwest – an absolute suntrap, 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, Camelia’s, Geraniums, Mahonia’s, 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 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.