Annella's Profile

I moved to this house 8 years ago after living in an old cottage for 12 years only 1 mile away. For 4 years there I had a gardener and after a long spell of redundancy he had to go. The garden went to pot,brown lawn,dead plants etc and I had 2 babies. I have always loved pretty gardens but never had a clue what to do,so I bought a book, best money I ever spent and I still refer to it.
The day we moved I cried to leave my beautiful garden behind,I had propergated everything that I could and dug up some larger shrubs that were special to me but left it nice for the new owner.
This house was 2 years old and the garden like a builders site (all hidden under the turf!) But I chose it for it's character, nobody else wanted that slope with young kids but I didn't want a small plain square.
I worked on the borders first to cover the fences and hide my neighbours (who are all lovely) and went on from there.
On the side of a hill, my soil is heavy clay, most of it blue on the slope and the back is north facing so very,very windy. NO primadonas in this garden every thing has to survive winters with no sun in cold wet clay conditions.
Every year I try new plants and the ones that do well I repeat around to garden to give a nice flow.