Should the alarm bells be ringing?
I have been asked by a garden designer to take over a landscaping project,
I have visited the site and discussed the project with the client and the designer, and have discovered that they do not have any drawn up plans or sketches.
Twenty metres of natural stone walling has to snake around the garden and act as a retaining wall to the sloping beds.
Areas have to be levelled and old bricks on site have to be used to create a pathway winding past the glasshouse and connecting the lawn to the hot tub section.
Old leaning stone walls have to be dismantled and rebuilt using additional larger stones.
York stone steps have to be built.
A large stone wall of unknown height has to be built across the garden. The garden slopes dramatically, and the wall must not step up, the stones must be laid horizontally and there must be no mortar visible in any of the walls.
The garden will be replanted with native plants, and these I believe have already been bought and are being kept by nurseries.
I have to prepare the site for planting and do the planting, but I do not think there is a planting plan.
The maintenance of the garden has to undertaken by me, with the designer as a sort of overseer.
Hedges have to be trimmed and a large box hedges have to be cut in the shape of clouds.
However I have discovered that near to this hedge there are a couple of trees that
have died from Honey fungus. Half of the hedge was trimmed a year ago by the previous gardener, about a year ago. And there is about three inches of new growth, but it is a pale and insipid colour and really does not look healthy at al, compared to the uncut side.
I advised the designer that it would be unwise to cut it at the moment as it was definitely struggling and that checks would have to be made, but I was told to cut it
right away and that it was due to all the rain we have had. - None of the other gardens that I maintain have this problem?
I also mentioned that it would be important to get the large weeds out of the beds
before they drop their seeds, but again I was told that weeding other beds would be a priority even though the planting will not go ahead until the work is finished.
I pointed out that the lower section of the garden could be ready fairly quickly to enable quite a large percentage of the planting to be done this autumn, but I was told that this was none of my business.
Perhaps one of the garden designers on the site would like to comment on this matter.
Thanks
Tags:
Share
Facebook
-
▶ Reply to This