Briarwood Garden
Barton Seagrave, Kettering,
Northamptonshire
Welcome to our garden
Briarwood Garden, Barton Seagrave, Kettering, Northamptonshire
We thought it would be a good idea for us to explain a little about the development of our garden since we moved here in August 2007.
The garden was one of the main reasons for buying the property because of its maturity, size and potential. Both moving from relatively small gardens attached to Victorian properties, where we were beginning to run out of planting space and, with quite narrow plots, were restricted to small-scale shrubs, perennials that didn’t mind shade and had little room for trees. When we arrived here the garden already had a strong structure with mature trees, including fruit trees, the fantastic Scots Pine and the ever-changing Amelanchier, which has show-stopping interest in both autumn and spring. However, we felt we wanted to open up the garden a bit more and quite soon after moving had five conifers removed, allowing more light into the garden and greater planting opportunities. Our main aims when developing the garden have been to introduce a wider range of features, variety of trees, climbers, flowering perennials and all year round interest, with particular emphasis on autumn and winter.
Elaine & William Portch
Front Garden
The front garden is north facing, so is in partial shade for most of the day. We have extended the depth of the border by the front. Other changes that we have made include planting along the front fence, introducing climbers such as clematis, roses, honeysuckle and wisteria to scramble through shrubs, against walls and along fences. The front garden has also developed into a winter garden with some striking scents such as Christmas box and witch hazel together with viburnum, winter blossoming cherry and hellebores.
Main Garden
There are many places to sit, relax and view the garden from different vantage points. We have planted palms, golden hop and grapevine, with the latter being grown up a pergola with finials designed and made by William. A wide range of bulbs and perennials have been planted in the borders on both sides of the garden. We have extended and widened borders to allow for further planting, including some of the New Zealand plants as featured in Elaine’s RHS Gold Medal winning garden, BBC Gardeners’ World Live 2011. Our pond was built in 2009, using local stone for the waterfall feature and dry stone wall. We have a lot of sculptural features in our garden, some that we have bought and most of the metal structures designed and made by us. ‘But what’, many ask, ‘is the significance of the blue tree?’ Well, we say: ‘Why not?’ The feature was inspired by the work of the artist Yayoi Kusama whose wrapped trees we saw on The South Bank in London one summer. Our garden is quite eclectic in style, with ideas being borrowed and developed from gardens and garden shows that we have visited. The ‘chairs’ on the patio came from an idea that we saw at Tatton Park Show.
The Secret Garden
You will enter the Secret Garden through a bespoke gate made by William or through the secret passage, brushing past the bamboos. This part of the garden features shady borders planted with ferns and other shade-loving plants, as well as an area for fascinating tree stumps and other twisted and gnarled wood. The raised beds of our potager, made from old repurposed chicken shed fittings and filled with topsoil from a freecycle ‘purchase’, give us good crops of salad, vegetables and soft fruit, as well as herbs, sweet peas and sunflowers. A favourite spot of ours to sit on a summer’s evening is on the verandah of our garden cabin enjoying a glass of wine and tucking into a barbeque with home-grown salad and vegetables. A new addition in 2019 was the Gabriel Ash cedar greenhouse which has already been put to productive use and is transforming the way we use the garden. In June 2020, after much planning, we dismantled the old shed/ summerhouse and in February 2021 our new Garden room; designed and made by William was complete. It was always our intention to reuse and repurpose materials such as wood from an old shed and the front panels of the old summerhouse.
