The Design Process
Initial Consultation
This is the first step which gives us the opportunity to meet in your garden and informally discuss your thoughts, budget and aspirations for the design and to ask any questions you may have about the different stages of the design process.
Following on from this, if you wish to proceed, I will prepare a quotation detailing the services that I will provide and a Client Questionnaire for you to kindly fill out which will allow me to get to know a little more about you and your garden.
An accurate, scaled survey of your garden will be required before the design process can begin. Smaller gardens with a simple topography may be able to be surveyed by myself and one other and a site survey produced to inform the design process. For larger or more complex projects it will be necessary for you to engage a land surveyor to provide a site survey. This document will need to be provided before any design work can commence.
Site Analysis
The site analysis seeks to consider how the garden relates with the house and to identify the challenges, opportunities and practicalities of the site. Information required for this analysis will be captured during a visit to your garden. Site analysis is an important early step in the process as it outlines what is achievable on a practical level on the site and starts to guide design ideas.
During this meeting we can discuss in more detail your aspirations for the design. Considering the use of space, style and materials that will go on to inform decisions during the moodboard stage.
Although not essential, it can be very beneficial to engage your chosen Contractor early on in the process so that they are better informed to advise on any practical aspects that may arise. This will help to ensure that the design concept can be successfully realised during the construction phase.
Moodboards
Moodboards or simple sketches are a key tool in communicating design ideas, allowing you to engage with the process to ensure that emerging ideas are heading in the desired direction which fulfils your brief. Often several moodboards are required to represent different areas in the garden.
Moodboards can be used to summarise the overall feel of the whole garden or specified zones or on a more practical level to present a variety of different options for details such as hard landscaping materials, planting styles, water features etc. Design decisions arising from moodboard imaginary will be discussed and agreed upon before moving onto the next phase of the process.
Concept Design
This design will be a coming together of the information provided in the Client Questionnaire, the site visit, site analysis and the ideas presented and discussed during the moodboard stage. Each design is unique to the clients requirements and by working with you every step of the way I aim to achieve a design that fulfils your requirements as closely as possible.
At this stage a rough layout design (or illustrations either hand drawn or computer generated where these will add value in communicating the concept for the design) will be presented to you and any alterations discussed and agreed upon before proceeding with the final design.
Visualisation
Illustrations can be produced of different areas of the garden which can be a powerful tool to help clients to realise proposed design concepts and can also be useful in representing how the planting will feel in the garden. It is amazing how presenting a design in this way really brings ideas to life and allows clients to visualise and feel how the different elements of the garden come together. Hand drawn or computer generated images can be presented in 2 or 3 dimensions and can be produced for certain areas within the garden or for the whole scheme.
Master Plan
A Final Master Layout Plan will be produced at this stage. A detailed scaled drawing which illustrates all of the gardens components including hard and soft landscaping, structures, trees and hedges that can be handed to your chosen Contractor/s enabling them to bring the design to fruition. At this stage detailed construction drawings can also be provided where appropriate.
Planting Plans
Areas for planting are indicated on the Master plan. Once the Master Layout Plan is signed off and the planting areas are known Planting Plans can be designed which detail specific plants to be used, plant locations and quantities. This service is covered under a separate agreement with the client. See PLANTING DESIGN for further details.
