We transform a client’s simple idea for a lawn or patio into an inspirational design. We pick the best materials and a diverse selection of greenery. We then use our expertise with lighting design and colour to create small garden designs London with Victorian, continental, contemporary or traditional influences.
Our soft cottage garden designs are cosy and warm with plants packed into borders, which lets the foliage envelop you. We normally choose to lay this design out with the smaller plants at the front and the taller plants at the back so that the borders almost cradle the garden. If you look at a small garden landscape picture you’ll come across this a lot.
Many of our clients enjoy the soothing ambience of such a design and while it tends to be more popular in the Home Counties, a garden like this in London makes a welcome escape from the day to day urban grind.
When space is limited, we use a mixture of diverse plant textures and carefully chosen materials to pack as much visual appeal into the space as possible – which tempts the eye to travel.
Circles are ideal lawn shapes for small gardens. Our plant choices, including grasses, climbers, and evergreens, all have an emphasis on colour. Meanwhile, you can see that the lighting holds the space open at night. Beautiful small London gardens are all about visual appeal. We create garden designs with variety and depth to make the most of whatever you’ve got.
Sometimes the brief is simple: Lots and lots of lawn. Of course, this doesn’t leave much room for visual interest. However, through a balance of curves and focal points, we can still create an eye-catching layout .
Interesting geometry makes a small garden look bigger. As you can see here, we’ve split the lawn in two and framed it with gravel and paving. Crucially, the widest of the two lawns is at the back of the garden. So as you look at it from the patio by the house, the family garden appears to be opening out. On the patio itself, we’ve placed the seating so as not to obstruct the view.
A popular choice for small London gardens is to combine lawn space and plants. This makes sense of course, with greenery being so scarce in the capital. Lawns also make a garden feel open—an essential contrast to the claustrophobia of city life.
Here, we’ve situated the seating area right over to one side and away from the house to create an open ambience. The mirrored water feature to the rear is positioned centrally to the lawn, underscoring its importance. And the reflective surface contributes to the overall illusion of space.
When a client says they just want their small garden to look as large as possible and we can use simple optical illusions to achieve it. Eye breakers are an essential element of urban garden designs in London, and this is a great example.
If this lawn were solid, your gaze would pass over it in one go. And, as a result, the space would feel smaller than it is. That is why we break it up into sections so that it holds your gaze for longer and gives you a more favourable impression of size. Our choice of a neutral mid-grey granite colour complements this effect.
Just because a garden is small, it can still be incredibly enticing. This design is like a mini urban oasis. We found that the most effective way to create this is with a living wall — a thicket of green that towers over your home.
Although these are a wonderful and luscious idea, they do tend to require a lot of maintenance. We find that the best way to take care of this is to set up an irrigation and feed system, which you can control by computer. For small urban garden designs we also advise that you use evergreens instead of flowers as these attract insects and bees.
Another way we trick the eye is with scaling. By placing smaller stones close to the house, the stepping stones on the lawn look larger. And this in turn makes the lawn look larger too.
We didn’t plant much here at the request of the client and this is always something to think about. The garden still looks absolutely stunning. If you simply don’t have the time, or a gardener, to maintain masses of plants, we can help you find alternatives. However, while fake lawns are becoming more and more popular these days, we always advise on real grass if you have the time.
When surrounded by paving, you would be surprised how even the addition of a simple block of green can amount to an oasis in the mind. This simple curve of hardy perennials strikingly offsets the hardscaping. It is a true example of how important green can be and how the simplest curves can be so attractive.
Without it, this garden would certainly feel arid and dull — even with our choice of differently coloured slabs. A neat hedging of lavender echoes the effect, along with a block of blue flowers. We went for a multi-coloured patio to add another layer of depth to the design.
Here at Jonathan Mark Garden Design we know that small courtyard ideas are almost necessarily bespoke. And whether it’s a front garden, a shared courtyard, or part of a much larger space, we always make sure our designs maintain functionality.
Some small garden design in the UK have a wide walkway just like this one. We can normally break up the space with something, such as this central water feature. We’ve also kept the twin flowerbeds at bay with a neat and miniature block hedge. Combined with the rustic red brick motif, there’s plenty to keep the eye busy.
