The Garden Designer, Alison Green gave a fascinating talk entitled ‘From Field to Floribunda’: The making of a garden from scratch.

Fifteen years ago Alison purchased a Jacobean farmhouse built in the 1650’s with two acres of land in Cruze Hill, Enfield.

Her presentation charted the amazing transformation from a barren sloping field leading to a fenced off old drainage pond, a wilderness of boggy ground and a strip of old woodland, an impenetrable thicket of dead trees seeded into the drainage ditches.

A blank canvas on which to paint a dream garden!

Work started in the winter of the millennium with the gardens close to the house. The courtyard, Pergola and Ornamental Garden were cleared and landscaped with yew hedges to the front of the house.

The garden then developed over the next decade ‘room by room’ working from the outside in.

A woodland walk was created by clearing the existing thicket with a number of species trees planted including some unusual specimens such as  the Mediterranean Cork Oak, the Foxglove tree and the Tulip tree.

Every tree was selected to provide spring, summer or autumn interest.

More garden ‘rooms’ were created, the Fountain Garden then the Vegetable Garden.

The formal areas close to the house were designed to be in balance with architecture and reflect a sense of its 17th century origins with Celtic Knots at the front of the house and parterre to the left.

In 2004, work to create the two ponds began. An old drainage pond used for hundreds of years as a rubbish dump was cleared and turned into a ‘natural’ pond and stream. The spoil was recycled creating gardens around the ponds.

The Exotic Border was cut out, double dug and planted with hornbeam columns, groups of red barked Prunus serial trees and exotics.

Finally, the Spring Walk, with fruit trees and spring bulbs, links the Exotic Border and Woodland walk and then a Pebble Mosaic Garden.

The garden has followed organic principles since its inception and now attracts wildlife galore.

The Garden is open for groups by appointment:

Contact: Alison Green mobile 07710 083 911 or e:mail; alison.g.green@talk21.com